| Description | Mennonite family. The "Schönwalder" or "man from the beautiful forest." In time the name became Schanwalder, Schawalder, Schoenwalter, Schonwalder, Schowalder, and soon, until today in the United States it has become either Schowalter or, as in our case, Showalter. The birthplace of the Showalter family, according to the earliest record, was in Strengalbach, a village five miles west of Zofingen, Canton (county) of Aargau, Switzerland. Here some baptismal records list the children of Silvestor Schowalder; born about 1550, and his wife Barblin Huntzinger. Of their five children, the first baptized on April 12, 1573. The last entries were two children of Hans Joggi (Jacob) Showalder and his wife Anna Bannwart: On October 20, 1695 Anna was listed and on June 13 1697 Joggeli was listed. There were no Schowalders recorded after 1697 because of emigration. The Schowalder emigration took them out of Switzerland down the Rhine into Germany where they settled into the Palatine of the Province of Bavaria. Many by the name of Schowalder reside there still. Some of these emigrated from Bavaria to Holland and then to Pennsylvania in America in the middle 1700's (Amish families). One such was Jacob Showalter. Jacob Showalter, the ancestor of our family, was born about 1694, probably in Basel Switzerland. About 1721 he married Maria (possibly Saunders, possibly Funk). In 1744 they emigrated to Holland. In 1750 on the ship "Brotherhood" Jacob and Maria and their family of eight sons and three daughters arrived in Philadelphia on November third. Jacob Sr. and his sons Jacob, Johannes (John), Joseph, Christian and Peter were among the 119 "signers" of the list, indicating that they were 16 or older, since those under 16 did not sign. His other sons were Valentine, Daniel and Ulrich; his daughters were Barbara, Margaret, and Martha Anna. |