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John B. was born John Berger Sheblessy on 8/7/1907 on Berger Hill in Cincinnati, OH. John B. married Sylvia Dorothy Kleve on 9/30/1933.
John had a distinguished career as a city planner. He planned the city of Lake Jackson, TX for the Dow Chemical Co.. He was a consultant for Hamilton Ontario, Canada. He was the Planning Director for the city of Midland , Michigan. For many years John B. was the Principal City Planner for the City of Cincinnati.
John was an accomplished composer, composing several Catholic Masses.
John died December 18,1990. Sylvia died October 16,1998.
Below is an e-mail sent by Jack Sheblessy
Knitting
Ruth,
When I was young, we always had bushel baskets full of skeins of wool in every color in the house because Uncle Charlie Clasgens, who married my mother's mother's sister, Aunt Nell Rattermann, owned a woolen mill in New Richmond, Ohio, just up the river. Every Christmas, he would bring the family baskets of yarn which Mother would knit into every possible item of clothing imaginable -- dunsel caps, scarves, mittens, sweaters, etc. Mother and I would sit across from each other and I had to hold my hands just so far apart with the skeins between them so Mother could wind the yarn into the balls which she could then use while knitting. That part was boring to me, but then, I was six at the time. All my kiddie photos show me wearing something knitted.
Uncle Charlie and Aunt Nell lived in a big, castle-y house right by the river in New Richmond, and every time the river came up, they would get wet and call my mother's father (a little too late) to come up to get them out of the house with a rowboat. Grandfather Kleve would say, "Charlie, why do you live so close to the river -- it comes up every year?!" And Uncle Charlie would say, "But, Carl, it's so beautiful all the rest of the time!"
Toward the end of her life, poor Aunt Nell began "seeing things and hearing voices," particularly Fred's, the dead brother of her (by then) dead husband, Charlie. She would argue with Fred, mostly trying to get him to go away, but he seemed to pretty much stay around, with the result that she always bathed with her clothes on so Fred couldn't see her undressed. She would stay with us on Werk Road in Westwood during the floods, and being, as I said, six years old, I was somewhat puzzled by it all.
Best to you, and happy knitting!
Jack
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