Murray Cheston Boyer

Murray was the first of five children of Titus and Maria Boyer of Camden, New Jersey. His father was a store clerk and then a shipping clerk. Murray would follow…

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John “Jack” Berger

The name on his application for a marriage license was John Berger, Jr. but he was always called Jack by his friends and family, including his three sisters. John Sr.…

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James Alexander Craig

Jim was the tenth of a dozen children parented by Alexander and Martha Craig of Ireland. The youngest was born in 1885, the same year Alexander died. The question to…

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John Brasko

Assimilation is not easy for some immigrants, but others adapt quickly to a new culture and language, especially young people like John Brasko, who arrived in Philadelphia when he was…

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Edward W. Curry

Edward W. Curry, Spanish American War Veteran

From 1895 to 1898 Cuban revolutionaries were engaged in a violent conflict to free themselves from Spanish rule.  The instability of Cuba, both politically and economically, was of major concern to…

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August Peter Teytand

The son of Danish parents, August Peter Teytand was born in St. Croix in the Virgin Islands on April 5, 1878, when it was a colony of Denmark. He came…

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Albert Beyer

Albert E. Beyer headstone at Mount Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Born in Hanover, Germany on June 13, 1859, Albert came to America when he was about six years old. He listed his hometown as Boston when he joined the Navy…

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Joseph Killackey

This service member began his military life as an Army private, but eight days after his honorable discharge, he thought he’d try the Navy and see the world. Joseph was…

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Samuel Daniel Phillippe

Samuel was born in Philadelphia on March 21, 1860 to a blacksmith and his wife, their third child, and he would be a lifelong resident of the Wharton section of…

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William Henry Scholls

Black and white photo of the USS Georgia with text that reads "The Last Soldier of the Civil War"

Chief Master-At-Arms William Henry Scholls USS Georgia (BB-15) In 1932, in the midst of the Depression, Mrs. Emma Kruger Scholls, the widow of Naval Home beneficiary William Henry Scholls, applied…

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