*Below is an excerpt from a biography my grandfather was working on about his family.
By Wardell F. Steigerwalt
Cora Belle Steigerwalt was born December 26, 1881: the daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth Howerter, the youngest of eleven living children. At that time, the family lived in the "Eile Dahl," or "Owl Valley" in Lynn Township, Lehigh County, PA. She attended the one-room school sometimes known as Rausch's School.
She was undoubtedly a bright child and a good student and was probably also the family favorite. Her mother was 43 years old when she was born and may have already been suffering from diabetes, so Cora was for the most part raised by her older sisters, Alice and Elizabeth.
Cora was raised in a family in which only Pennsylvania Dutch was spoken. They attended the New Jerusalem Church every Sunday, where her father was the church organist for some 30 years, and in which German was the spoken language. Her father, who was literate in German, subscribed to a weekly German newspaper.
