Grandpa John the Horse Thief

Polish Folk of the peasant class (non schlacta) like my family, kept few records. At least that was the case in my clan.
The earliest recorded name I ever encountered was the mysterious Wojciech. He would have been my great- grandfather. He came hereabout 1900 by my calculations, then left, apparently homesick. My grandfather Jan, (John) was born back in that place the old timers referred to as "the old country" in a city named Sczeczen, in a region near Galicia.

Getting back to Wojciech -- when he went back to "Kraju" (the other name the old folks used for Poland), he and my Grandfather got into a serious altercation over a horse grandfather Jan stole (uhh ... borrowed ) from a neighbor. Apparently, young Jan rode the beast to death. Horse thievery was regarded in Poland much the same as it was here in the States. They hung horse thieves from the nearest tree. To preserve the family's name, and the life of his son, Wojciech slipped young Jan a few hundred Zloty and ordered him to get out of Dodge. My horse thieving gramps headed for Germany, where he booked passage on a ship bound for New York.

He ended up in Chicago and found work in a marble quarry south of the city. Jan eventually met my grandmother who had recently left a convent after a couple year tryout. It was an unlikely matchup ... saintly Marianna Sarna and the hard driving, hard drinking horse thief, Jan John K.

This is where I found evidence of Wojciech. Apparently he returned briefly to America and attended his son's Chicago wedding in 1913. Three years later the lure of Henry Ford's $5 day was enough to entice the young couple to move to Detroit and set down roots.

Why oh why didn't Mr. Ford start his company in LA or Miami?

The couple saved their money, traded the home Jan built with his Ford savings for a grocery store on the west side. The couple raised 3 kids, and were  a success until the banks closed. He lost the family's life savings. Did a bit of bootlegging and proceeded to drink himself to death by the age of 44. He was brutal towards my father az a young boy and his two daughters feared him. I regret that I never met the old horse thief as I was born 5 years after his demise.