JOSEPH BERNARD (deceased) was at the time of his death a prominent business and public man in Galena. He was a young man of more than ordinary ability and promise, and, although cut down in early manhood, had already built up a good business, and his success in life was assured, his prospects for the future having been very bright. He was born in Nackenheim, Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, Jan. 31, 1856. His father, Bartholemew Bernard, who is supposed to have been a native and life-long resident of the same place, was the proprietor of a vineyard, and was in comfortable circumstances. The mother of our subject was Catherine (Braun) Bernard, who died some years since. Our subject received a substantial education in the excellent schools of his native land, which he attended very steadily during his boyhood. At the age of seventeen, with youthful ambition, and a desire to see more of the world, he determined to try life in America. After his arrival in this country, he spent one year in New York City, and at the expiration of that time, came to Galena. He began his career here by working in the kitchen of a river-steamer, and soon became head cook. He followed that occupation for four years, and then was employed in a gas factory for eight months. After that our subject bought out a wood and coal-yard, and established himself in business, adding the sale of farm implements, and he continued in that line until the time of his death, building up an extensive and profitable trade. The business is now conducted by his brother-in-law, A. Heid.

Mr. Bernard was married Jan. 3, 1878, to Miss Mary Heid, and their union was blessed to them by the birth of four children, as follows: Theresa, born Aug. 31, 1879; Frank Joseph, born Aug. 13, 1881; Annie Catherine, born Dec. 3, 1883; Joseph Albert, born Feb. 3, 1886, and died Dec. 6, 1887. Mrs. Bernard is a lady of great intelligence, and of pleasing manners. She is a true mother, and is devoted to the care of her children. She is a native of Rock Island, Ill., and a daughter of Frank and Mary Theresa (Schroeder) Heid, natives, respectively, of Bavaria and Hanover, Germany. Her paternal grandfather, Tobias Heid, so far as known, spent his entire life in Bavaria. Her father came to America when a young man, and was married in Louisville, Ky. He had learned the trade of gasfitter in the old country, and removing to Rock Island, he followed that calling there. In 1861, he came to Galena, and after pursuing the same trade here for awhile, he became engineer of the motor works, but he has now retired from active labor. Mrs. Bernard’s mother came to America with her sister, and settled in Louisville, Ky., and there made the acquaintances of her husband. They were both charter members of St. Mary’s Catholic Church, with which they are still identified. Of their union seven children have been born, as follows: John, Mary, Frank, Joseph, August, Clara, and Frances.

Mr. Bernard was a fine representative of the self-made men of our country, as he came here a poor boy, and owed his elevation in after life to the dominance of a strong will, a clear head, and a good capacity for work. He interested himself in political affairs, and was one of the prominent Democrats of this city. His fellow-citizens early selected him as a man in every way fitted for the responsibilities of public office, and elected him to be city Alderman, which position he held for two terms of twenty-four months, and was serving out a third term, when his untimely death closed his career. Not only was Galena thus deprived of an honorable and useful citizen, his neighbors of a kind friend; but his stricken family, to whom he was devotedly attached, lost the most thoughtful and tender of husbands, and the most loving and wisest of fathers. The strong hope of immortality, that is planted in every breast, can be the only consolation for the dropping out of life’s circle of such a man. We would say to his friends in the words of the poets, “The death which you lament, is but a great event in the life of the soul. It is a change, and not a dissolution. It is the gate to a new sphere, where the hopes and the dreams of earth shall be turned to sight, and the broken circles of life be rounded to the perfect orb.”

Transcribed & Contributed by Carol Parrish - Portrait and Biographical Album of Jo Daviess and Carroll Counties, Illinois (1889), p. 628