Susan Sharp's Notes:
Newspaper article (date and name of paper have been cut off) in posession of Gretchen Valentine titled Hard Work Responsible for a Young Mind and Body, Ninety Year Old Resident Declares by Juel Reed Cover, paraphrased as follows:
Tena Lorenzen came to this Country with her parents, John and Anna Kruse, from Germany in 1871 when she was 16 years old. Their sailing vessel was on the water for nine weeks and three days. Supplies ran low and the voyagers were nearly starved when they landed. Her parents settled on a farm near Mud Creek near Port Clinton to be near relatives who had preceeded them over. Almost immediately she began work at The Island House. She had full care of 29 beds doing all the laundry by hand. She headed to the washhouse at 4:00 A.M. to get the washing started and often was still ironing at midnight. Her salary was $2.00 an hour to start, later it became $2.25. Her husband, Lawrence Lorenzen, who was a fisherman, and later operated a saloon, died in 1905. Tina, (as Catherine is known) built their home at 415 Jackson Street, Port Clinton, Ohio and despite the offers of her two daughters, cares for her home, and does her own housework and marketing. Playing cards was one of her favorite pastimes, until her failing vision made it impossible to play. Shortness of breath also bothers her when she takes care of her furnace. 'The Lord always helps you out', she observes, 'if you help yourself. I'd do anything . Sometimes when there was sickness in a family, they couldn't get anybody to touch their washing. They would set it on my back porch, and I'd pour boiling water over it and let it stand overnight and then do it for them. Never got sick, either. Never had the time. She has refused the offer of her daughters to live with them. She never was "a body to just sit," she says.