Creating Fiction From History: 3/2/2022

Henrietta Asburges was born in Nichols, Iowa, just before the turn of the previous century, on the 15th of April 1899. This small town in South-Eastern Iowa was surrounded by farmsteads. Being of German heritage, even in those early days, the Asburges were looked at with some suspicion when they set up a small farmstead on the outskirts of the farming community.

Henrietta, or Retta as she became fondly known, was thus in her 19th year on this Good Earth when War broke out in Europe. Fortunately, neither Retta nor her family was directly affected by the conflict. However, because of their ancestry, they came under even closer scrutiny and even endured a bit of stigma. Her parents, Heinrich and Maria, had always been a boon to the small area and the greater Muscatine County, so when the tongues started wagging, they were soon told ‘what fer’ and hushed up just as quickly.

Heinrich Asburges, a banker, had moved to the area ten years prior to the birth of his only daughter. He had arranged with one of the local farmers/businessmen, Thomas T. Hall, of the Nichols Hall Association, to open a bank, which was named, appropriately, the Nichols Savings Bank. With such an austere father, one might expect Retta to have grown up to be a spoiled brat, but Henrietta Asburges was anything but.

The farmstead the Asburges had set up blossomed, with both the crops and the livestock multiplying by leaps and bounds. Henrietta and her mother did much of the day-to-day upkeep on the farm, though when Heinrich was able to break off from his banking business, he usually was working right alongside them in the fields.

In 1916, the year before the trouble brewing over across the pond came to a head, Henrietta met Frank Nichols. Nichols was an aspiring photographer from Waukon, which was a good day trip away, anywhere from six to eight hours of travel. It was a whirlwind romance, for a mere two months after they became acquainted, Frank and Henrietta were living as man and wife. Now Henrietta Nichols, Retta set up housekeeping in the slightly larger town of Waukon, in the rear of her new husband’s photography studio. Although her new circumstances were somewhat less than what she had been accustomed to, Mrs. Nichols did not leave behind all of her fineries.

If you would like to create fiction from history with one of the museum’s photos, please contact the Ledger at (406) 287-5301 or email whledger@gmail.com.