JOHN AND FRANTISKA (OPOCENSKY) HAVLICEK
[pg 262 PHOTO Frantiska and John Havlicek]
John Havlicek became a U. S. citizen in Knox County, Nebraska on May
29, 1877. He was married to Frantiska Opocensky and they obtained
their homestead containing 160 acres on August 4, 1880, when
Rutherford B. Hayes was President of the United States. The land was
1 ½ miles north of Verdigre. They added a timber claim containing 80
acres on August 20, 1885. Grover Cleveland was the President.
John and Frantiska had nine children. Charles, Minnie, Annie, and
Frank all lived to adulthood and married. The other five died as
children. One boy died at the age of 4 from a snakebite; a
six-month-old son caught cold and died of the croup. Another boy,
Edward, 5 as well as a girl, Albia, 3, died of diphtheria, and
another daughter, 2, drowned in the creek near their home. They are
all buried, some in unmarked graves, in the Hillcrest Cemetery
northeast of Verdigre. The cemetery was sold by the Havliceks to the
ZCBJ Lodge.
John Havlicek was a tinsmith and decorative wood craftsman by trade.
One of the earliest artesian wells was drilled on the homestead and
it still flows today.
John also owned a broom shop on the farm where they manufactured
brooms. He raised all his own broom corn to make straw for the
brooms and all the work was done by the family. Most of the brooms
were sold locally, but some went as far as Omaha.
John died in 1901 of Brights Disease, thus ended the broom shop.
Frantiska died in 1915.
-Submitted by Rebecca (Havlicek) Jelinek
Page 262
