Journaling reads:
I think I come by my love of learning naturally. Marquis Marcellus Deburger, my 3 times great grandfather and a most elusive RELATIVE to search for, was a schoolteacher of great repute in the late 1800s. He taught in a small town much like this. It is said he was the model for the schoolmaster in the book The Hoosier Schoolmaster, which was made into a movie in 1935.
Known as M.M. to family and friends, Mr. Deburger could tolerate quite a lot but, when he’d had enough, he would say “By the Gods!” and everyone knew to be silent or else. I wonder if he inspired the same kind of fear and instant acquiescence in the classroom?