The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1914-11-19
Though Boys Are Heirs to An
Estate of Wealthy Ohioan,
Mother Wants Them.
COURTS WILL HEAR CASE

Cincinnati, Ohio, Nov. 17.-With
each step in the legal struggle before
Judge German for the possession Of IL
year-old Louis Weeks, known also as
Louis Kraft, is revealed another re-
markable chapter in the strange story,
the central figure of which is the late
Louis Kraft, once a powerful and
wealthy figure in republican politics of
this city and county.
According to the testimony which,
it is claimed, will be offered next
Tuesday before Judge German, Louis
Kraft had a desire for a natural and
direct heir that amounted to a as
sion, which finally led him to believe
in a theory as weird as any the mind
Of an oriental dreamer could con-
ceive. 1t is claimed that:
Evidence will show that when death
removed a young woman whom Kraft
knew he sought to communicate with
her in the spirit world.
He was led to believe he was SO
doing, and when he asked her what
he should do with all the money he
had accumulated, he was told by this
spirit he ought to have an heir; he
should have bestowed on him a spirit
child" arriving through some mystic
rious way from the unknown world.
Accepted Esprit Child"
And then, when this spirit child
llN Su, IL Is tIdlIIlcu, lIiio lllclIl "
the world, shrewd and practical in
all things pertaining to men, believed
in and accepted the spirit child" as
his own.
1t is this child who is the subject of
the litigation which has unfolded the
remarkable story. Kraft accepted this
child and another as his, and made
them heirs to part of his estate, pro-
viding for them as he would for legiti-
mate children.
Now. almost a year after Kraft's
death, comes a woman who claims
this spirit child" as hers. and says
that when it was born she did not
know such a man as Kraft existed.
III child was adopted by a woman
who has claimed him, and says Kraft,
firm in the belief of the spirit child
acknowledged the child as his in his
will.
The woman who now claims the
of what a transpired in the years
I since she parted with the baby, a few
days after its birth, up to the time OF
Kraft's death. She will bring into
court as exhibits her two sons, Samuel
and Lorenzo, to show the alleged re-
sembrance between them and the
spirit child"
Woman Is "Medium."
The spirit mother is Mrs. Stephen
Weeks, a former s~piritualistic me-
dunn, whom Kraft recognized in lis
will as the mother OF the spirit child
Mrs. Dora Funk Guien, a farmers
wife, brought the habeas orpus pro-
ceedings to obtain possession of the
spirit child"
Another of Mrs. Weeks boys, Fred
whom Kraft claimed as his, is also
named as an heir in his will.
No effort to break the will of Louis
Kraft and take from the children hf
recognized as his sons their inherit
ance will be made by Mrs. CATHERINE
Kraft, the politicians widow.
Even if the latter part of my life
has Deer saddened by this affair,
would ike to see the boys shielded,
she said.
1T was about Is years ago that my
husband, who was much interested il
s~piritualism, called to consult Nine
Weeks, who held seances in her home
then on Richmond street.
Mime Weeks seemed to have
strange occult influence over him from
the beginning"