Compiled and written by David R. Schleper, 2024

Adam Geiß Geis was born Nov. 15, 1841 in Bavaria. His parents were Martin Lorenz Lawrence Geiß Geib (1816-1907) and Elisabeth Franziska Kessler Geiß Geis (1819-1886).

When he was seven years old, Adam and his parents moved to America, where the family lived in Milwaukee for five years, and then moved to Chicago and Racine, Wisconsin. They came to St. Paul in July 1853, and in the spring of 1854 the elder Geis took a claim in Sand Creek Township, eight miles south of Shakopee. There were six children in the family at that time, and they lived in a log shanty, almost in the heart of the dense woods, according to the Recollections of a Pioneer Citizen from the Midland Feature Service on Sept. 10, 1925.

At that time, there were many Dakota Indians in the area, as well as one settler-colonist, John C. Smith, before Thomas A. Holmes, along with William Quinn, headed to the area of what was later Shakopee, Marystown, and Jordan, which were not open for settlement for white people in 1851. They had to wait until February 1853 after the ratification of treaties. But Thomas Andrew Holmes wanted to establish townsites with an eye to the profit they represented. He asked for carte blanche trading rights, but was denied. He was then allowed a license for two sites, which became Shakopee and Jordan.

By getting a license to trade in 1851, Thomas Holmes was a squatter on Indian land. It gave him a toehold on townsite before claims could be legally settled. He “improved” the land with dwellings, warehouses, and stores, and thus was less liable to be taken over by settler-colonists and promoters who came along later. “In other words, fur trading was not an end in itself with these men as it had been with some of the earlier traders in the valley. Rather, it was a means of obtaining a legal or quasi-legal claim on the land they staked out before they could actually file their preemptions with the government.”

Thomas and William Holmes laid out the town of Jordan. In the area that later became Marystown, Adam Geiß Geis remembered who was in the township, including Peter Thul, Serwatzus Mergens, Michael and Peter Hartman, J.B. Grommesch, Christ Hentges, John Hentges, and W. and G. Budde.

Adam, in an article in 1929, noted that he helped clear the land, and found time to hunt and trap. “He hunted deer, wolves, wild cats, foxes and other animals, and trapped otter, mink, and muskrats. Once he shot three deer in one day, and on another occasion he speared 73 muskrats in a few hours.”

Adam worked on the claim until he was 23 years old, when he enlisted in Company I Fourth Minnesota, to serve in the Civil War. He served throughout the war and was obedient to Sherman’s Yankee boys in the memorable march from Atlanta to the sea. The campaign was marked by its objective, to cripple the Confederacy’s ability to wage war. They destroyed anything and everything important to the war effort, leaving ruins where Georgia’s great cities once stood.

In 1865 Adam bought forty acres of raw acres in Eagle Creek Township, 2 and ½ miles east of Marystown. On Jan. 23, 1866, Adam married Barbara Brück Brueck Geiß Geis, daughter of a settler-colonist. They resided at the farm home 38 years, and during that time, they increased their holdings until they possessed 326 acres of land. Fourteen children were born to the couple, and many of them married and settled in homes of their own near the old rooftree.

In 1904, Adam and Barbara moved to a small farm adjoining Marystown, and in 1924 they moved to a cozy home fronting the highway in Marystown.

At age 92, Adam was ill for several months. The heart ailment became grave and was the immediate cause of his death on Aug. 9, 1933 at his daughter, Theresa Margaret Geiß Geis Hergott’s home.

Adam, who lived 80 years in Scott County, and 67 years in Marystown, was accompanied by two former comrades, Private Charles Manaige and Joseph Pisbach to his final resting place at St. Mary of the Purification Catholic Cemetery in Marystown.

An early biographer referred to Adam Geiß Geis by writing, “When we think of a patriarch, we think of gray hairs, a rugged frame, despite the storms of life, and seamed features, lighted by an expression which denotes contentment and good will; we think of broad acres, happy children, all held together in a common bond of reverence for the sturdy oak, who in the evening of life finds comfort and peace in the contemplation of a lifetime full with the activity and incidents of a pioneer’s career, who finds ‘All’s well with the world and whose smile is a benediction.” That was truly Adam Geiß Geis.

Among the descendants were 72 grandchildren and 83 great-grandchildren.

Barbara Brück Brueck Geiß Geis died in 1934 and was buried next to her husband, Private Adam Geiß Geis, in the cemetery next to St. Mary of the Purification Church in Marystown.