The following is an excerpt from “Elmwood Townships a Pictorial History” by Larry Wakefield.
The Lautners in Elmwood Township area all descendants of Wenzel Lautner, who immigrated to America in 1865 from Engleberg, Austria, with his wife, eight sons and a daughter.
A friend living west of Traverse City, Edward Ansorge, encouraged the family to come to this country; it was a “land of great opportunity,” he wrote.
They came by sailing ship to New York and then by boat through the Erie Canal and the Great Lakes to Northport, thence to Norristown, arriving there on August 22. The landing site was the area now occupied by the Elmwood Township marina. (We are told that when they landed this area was covered with blackberry bushes, and the berries were ripe for picking.)
Some of the family stayed with the Greilicks, others with a Herkner family, until they found a place to live. The bought land in Solon Township for $1.25 per acre. This property is now known as the Burkhart farm on Co. Rd. 649 and M-72.
Five of the sons — Joseph, Anton, Edward and Ferdinand — developed farms along County Line Road (M-72). This area was known for many years as the Lautner settlement. The Old Lautner School on the northeast corner of M-72 and Co. Rd. 616, was built on land that was part of the Joseph and Matilda. Their home was built on 80 acres on the south side of M-72.
The homestead was left to Joseph’s youngest daughter, Bertha, and her husband, Edward Rokos. It is now a Centennial Farm, owned by (the late) Arlene and Jerome Lautner (Joseph’s grandson) and occupied by their daughter Kathy DiPisa and her family. That part of the farm on the north side of M-72 is owned and farmed by Terry Lautner, a descendant of Frank Lautner.
Both Jerome and Arlene attended the Lautner School through eighth grade. They built their home on property which was the site of the old Norris home on the creek in Greilickville. Their daughter Karen and her husband live nearby.
The Rokos Family
John and Antonia Rokos came to America from Bohemia in the 1870s and homesteaded about 250 acres on the west side of Bugai Road, between Hoxie and Lincoln roads. After clearing the land they built a large home, barns and other outbuildings. They had five children, and three of them — Edward, John and Marie — remained in this area after they were married. The farm remained in the family until 1937. In the 1940s the house burned to the ground and no trace of it now remains.
Edward went to work for Joseph Lautner on the County Line Road farm. There he met and married Joseph’s youngest daughter Bertha in 1907. They raised three daughter: Elsie (Walters), Matilda (Fasbaugh) and Arlene (Lautner). Arlene served as the Elmwood Township clerk for many years, Edward farmed the land until his death in 1972. Former students at the Lautner School remember the trips to the Rokos sugar bush every spring, where they were treated with samples of the maple syrup made there.
John Rokos married Matilda Kauer of Traverse City. They built the home on Lincoln Road. John and “Tillie” had four children: Milton, Edward, Lyla and Merlin. All attended the Maple Leaf School, as did their father and his brothers and sisters before them. The school house was destroyed by fire several years ago.
The Stanek Family
John and Mary Stanek and their grown son Joseph — all born in Czechoslovakia — came to the country in 1880. In 1881 they bought 80 acres of farmland in the northern part of Elmwood Township from Sophia Wright. The property had a log house on it — it stood just south of where the Centennial Farm house is today.
John and son Joseph were experienced farmers and they developed the property into a prosperous dairy farm. Son Joseph and his wife Katherine inherited the property and added to its acreage. Still more acreage was acquired by Joseph’s son, John Joseph, who planted extensive orchards of cherries, peaches, apples and plums while still maintaining the dairy farm.
Under the management of John Joseph and Gertrude and their son Gerald, the farm increased to 900 acres, 600 of which are in cherries and apples. They also established a cherry processing plant with cold storage facilities, known as Stanek & Sons, Inc.
The Stanek Centennial Farm House. Courtesy photo
