Deep Roots Family Tree Blog

Rozair Joseph Amerman. Sometimes referred to as Joseph Rozair in official documents and affectionately known as Grandpa Joe to his grandchildren. I remember hearing his name a lot growing up and always thought his name was interesting. I appreciate it even more now that I’m older. I think it’s the most unique name in my family tree currently. Rozair; and that’s what I’ll be referring to him as throughout this post.

Where did the name come from? Is there another Rozair hiding somewhere? Did he like his name (he frequently went by Joe)?

He always looked really mysterious to me. In any of the photos I’ve seen of him, he’s not really smiling and, to me, he looks like he has a sadness in his eyes. That unique name and the mysterious look probably fueled the fire that gave me the urge to write a little biography for him, so here we go.

Joseph Rozair Amerman was born on January 12, 1911 in Hoople, North Dakota, to Ernest Everett Amerman (1873-1948) and Anna Katherine Beckel (1879-1963).

We first find Rozair in the 1920 census for North Dakota living with his parents and seven siblings, Emil, Dale, Carrie, Velva, Sylvia, Neil, and Ira. He was one of the middle children. His dad was working as a clerk in a hardware store and his mom was at home. His two older brothers appear to be working to help support the family. Emil, a telephone lineman; installing, maintaining, and repairing telephone lines and Dale was a laborer on a farm. The younger kids were at home.

Alma township in North Dakota is on the completely opposite side of the state to where he would end up settling. Alma is located in the north-east corner of North Dakota, way up by the Canadian border. According to census data reports, Alma township has an approximate population of 17 in 2025.

Fast forward to 1930 where 19 year old Rozair was still living with his parents, younger siblings, and a roomer named Myrton Hull. That sent me off on a side quest which I will do another post about.

Myrton Hull. I’ve seen the name before in my research but this is the first time I’m registering that he was living with the Amerman’s.

After careful inspection, it appears that Rozair’s mother, Anna, was married previously to a Norman Hull who died in 1901. I went back to the 1900 census which has Anna living with Ernest Amerman, their first three children, and Myrton and Lillian Hull – who are listed as step-children to the head of the household (Ernest). The facts suggest that Anna and Norman, who were married in 1895, got divorced, she took the kids, married Ernest Amerman and then Norman passed away. I have not been able to find a cause of death.

After a little more sleuthing on newspapers.com, I may have figured out why Anna might have divorced Norman. It looks like Norman was a bit of a criminal and possibly an alcoholic.

Anyway, back to Rozair. He was still living with his parents and younger siblings and doesn’t appear to be working. The census report also tells us that the family had moved from Alma Township to Cando, North Dakota between 1920 and 1930.

In 1934 Rozair and Alida Bartl got married in Stirum which leads me to believe that Rozair had made his way south, a four and a half hour car ride today, and met Anna in Stirum. He would have only lived in Cando for a couple of years. People bounced around a lot in North Dakota in the early 1900s because they needed to go where the work was. Stirum is where they would end up raising their family, eventually moving into Forman. I have visited both places many, many times.

Rozair and Alida were living together by the time of the 1940 census and had their first two children, Anna and Freeman. Freeman would end up dying tragically due to either brain cancer or a brain aneurism. Anna would go on to marry Leroy Martin, they had 4 kids, including my mother.

My mom was the oldest of the grandchildren that I am aware of and she was only 6 when he tragically passed away so she doesn’t remember a lot and my grandparents have also passed. The information I have either comes from memory or from the documents that I inherited from my Uncle Joe, Rozair’s grandchild, the baby being held in the photo below. I am incredibly fortunate to have quite a few photos of him.

Somewhere between 1940 and 1947, he was registered to be drafted during World War II, although he was never called upon to serve. The draft card is still an important piece of genealogical information.

The first thing that stuck out to me when looking at his draft card was that he was signing an official government document as Joe Rozair Amerman instead of Rozair Joseph Amerman. The second thing that stuck out to me was the handwriting, assuming he was the one filling it out. I found the “S” to be pretty distinctive. He also wrote in all capitals, which I also do. I am skeptical, though. The signed name looks nothing like the printed information. A lot of the time print an cursive handwriting will have some similarities, but in this case I don’t think they do.

I haven’t found a 1950 or 1960 census for Rozair and his family, but what comes next is a little shocking.

Rozair Joseph Amerman died in a farming accident on January 6th, 1962, the day after his granddaughter Anna, my aunt, was born. The story I’ve always heard was that he was alone working on the farm after a blizzard had ripped through the county. His pregnant daughter had to be rushed to the hospital because there were complications with the delivery and the baby was jaundice and needed a blood transfusion due to Rh incompatibility in the blood. His daughter, husband, the baby, and his wife all rushed to Fargo, about an hour and a half away.

While they were gone, Rozair was working on the farm. The blizzard had covered a lot of the farm equipment. Rozair’s sleeve got caught in the power take-off of a tractor and ripped his arm off. Sources say that the death was almost instant, he wouldn’t have suffered.

And just like that, his life was over. But the baby, my aunt, did survive.

I can’t imagine the things that his wife, daughter, and family were feeling. Was there a sense of guilt? Did someone want to stay with him on the farm, but he insisted that they go? If someone was there, would he have lived? My guess is no because of the amount of blood loss. But we will never know.