Early Memories of Saugatuck, Michigan : 1830-1930
Author: Heath, May Francis
Publisher: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company; Grand Rapids, Mich: 1930

HENRY J. BREUCKMAN

Born in Germany in 1820, Henry Breuckman came to the United States when at the age of twenty-one and in 1848 in Kenosha, Wis., he was united in marriage to Mary Beffel, also a native of Germany, who came when an infant with her parents to Kenosha.

Mr. and Mrs. Breuckman resided there also some time, then to Chicago, and in 1851 to Holland, Mich., when on hearing of the tanneries in "The Flats" and at Wallinville he brought his wife and two children and located at the later place where he resided and acted as a foreman of the tannery for ten years; in the meantime buying the "Breuckman Corner" at the Flats, which home has been occupied by some of the family 70 years.

Five children came to this home:—Henry, Louise, Susan, Frank and Minnie, and surviving today are Susan Arnold and Minnie. Mrs. Arnold loves to dwell on her life at Wallinville, and one day when she was about five, she and Carl Augustine were playing near the old mill-pond and she fell in and would have drowned had not Captain Wm. White who was working at the tannery heard her scream, and ran to her rescue.

Mr. Breuckman gave the site on the hill to the Congregational society in 1860.

Later he went to Chicago to work for a Tanners' association, was taken ill and died; Mrs. Breuckman lived to the good old age of eighty-four.