Maria Magdalena KISTLER

Maria Magdalena Kistler was born in the area that would become West Penn Township in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania on December 17, 1787. Her parents were Jacob and Christina (Hagenbuch) Kistler. She was baptized at Jerusalem Church in Stony Brook, where her father grew up and was later buried. She appears to named after an older sister who died in infancy. She married Michael Hoppes after 1800 and they would settle down in West Penn Township near Tamaqua. She would give birth to 10 children who would survive infancy: Mary Magdalene (after herself) nicknamed "Polly", John, Saloma, Hester, Judith, Elizabeth, David, Joseph, Nathan, and Michael. Many records also list an earlier girl, Catherine, who apparently died in infancy. According to her daughter, Judith, Magdalena died before Judith's 8th birthday and was dead 65 years by April of 1886, meaning she would have had to die in November of 1822, either during or shortly after the birth of Michael. Her death would leave her husband Michael to raise 10 children on his own. There appears to be a lot of confusion regarding Magdalena's name and death date. Many records list her name as Christiane, who died in 1856. This may be due to Michaels tombstone being next to that of a Christian Happes, who is actually Michael's brother, Christian. Magdalena does not appear to have a stone. There also appears to be several different spellings for the name of Hoppes. It appears their children settled on the spelling of Hoppes; however as Michael's tombstone uses the spelling Happes, I have chosen to list Magdalena as thus.

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