The Watertown weekly leader. [volume] (Watertown, Jefferson County, Wis.) 1912-1917, 1912-03-08

IN ueF anu Lney lett the LeuQ0tS
home because they could not live upon
blood money. They came to Detroit.
That was twenty years ago, when the
boy was II years old.
They went to the home Of a Mr.. and
Mrs. Huntzinger to board and the
couple, themselves childless, took
such fancy to Fred Lueders that
they adopted him.
AS the boy grew to manhood ne
showed a promising aptitude for
music and the aunt, possessing a lit
tie money, gave him the best musical
education she could afford. But as
the boy grew there began to appear
in him the results of the death of his
brothers He wished for solitude, he
wished to be with his music and he
was growing away from his foster
parents.
Moody and Alone.
SO the aunt always striving to
please her nephew, bought the prop
erty on Cameron avenue and the two
went there to live.
And it was a strange life they lived.
Aunt Del t41d w do Oil JclCILui Il clo LCA
nephew. She was living over again
the days of splendOr on Fifth avenue,
the life which she had sacrificed for
a principle. Perhaps occasionally she
had regrets as she looked about the
little rooms, so bare in comparison
with the sumptuOusness of other days.
Lueders was as moody as ever. He
lived now for his music, composing
ever, sometimes selling his compost
tions. The proceeds from the sales
betrayed the expenses of the pair for
a tine and allowed Lueders to devote
all his day to his piano. When the
money was gone he sought employ
ment wherever his music was wanted,
usually in cheap theaters, where he
was forced to play the ragtime, which
he hated.
So they lived. The aunt made few
friends Sin the neighborhood maybe
considering herself the social supe-
rior of the humble folk who lived in
the vicinity Lueders was too much
occupied with his piano for friend
ships. The neigbbors would hear him
playing far into the night. They were
known as queer
Aunt Burned to Death
Then came a third and greater
tragedy in the life of Fred Lueders.
On the night of June IL, 1911, he
came home from the Family theater,
where he was employed as a pianist,
to find the house in ruins and the
scared body of his aunt lying in the
yard
Mrs LOthamer was in the habit
of reading in bed, and it was thought
that she fell asleep and overturned
the lamp. The house was burned al
most to the ground and the woman'5 5
body was unrecognizable. Lueders
never recovered from the shock.
Always living within himself, Lue-
ders never realized how much his
aunt had been to him until she was
gone, and he could not reconcile him
self to his solitary existence.
The day after the fire he was mood
lily gazing at the ruins when a boy
who lived in the neighborhood asked
him if he was lonesome.
''Yes," he answered. "Oh, how /
wish had boy like you to live with
me-somebody 1 could talk to, some
body l could live for
The boy was just a bit frightened
by the serious, almost passionate
words, and he stepped back to be fur
ther from those burning, eager eyes.
Gathering his scattered courage, he
told Lueders of a boy he knew, fine
boy, who was thirsting for schooling,
but whose mother was too poor to
afford it.
Enter the Final Sorrow.
"He goes to night school at Cen
trail High school, the boy said, ':and
his name is Ralph Beach" Lueders
was interested, interested perhaps for
the first time in his life in something
besides his music; interested because
: no had found that he could not live
/ without a human interest in his life
/ He had thought of his Aunt Bertha
as a crochety old woman, nuisance
| but when she was gone, he dlscoY
cred that he had loved her constant
"reminiscences, her chlldlsh WnlllS
| her petty idiosyncracies. And h'
I'll asked that the boy be brought TO MN
Il The next day Ralph A II. Beacn
! who was then IA years OLD, Vlslte'
] Lueders. Ralph liked the moody man
! but more he liked the opportunlC,
| he should have to go to school. Lue
/ ders snatched at this chance TO WI
for himself a companion, someon
/ whom he could love and protect an
work for The boy was Wiling 7
\ come with him, his mother reIuhc'
Al antly consented to give the plan
u trial and Lueders for the first tim
since he was a little boy, was happ1
But the house lay in ashes.
must be rebuilt before the boy coul
come with him. knowing that III
aunt had had some money and ha
II bought some property in Detroit, Luz
ders began elaborate preparations fo
the reconstruction of the home. ii
had electric lights installed, built
barn at the rear at Ralph's sugge
ton and put into the house bette