File:Charles Malcolm and Edna Garrott Wenner family around 1895.jpg

Summary

Charles Malcolm and Edna Garrott Wenner family around 1895 with 5 of what eventually grew to 8 children. From left to right, the children are Charles Malcolm Jr (Mack), Charles Fenton (Fent), E. Virginia (Patty), Ann and Ed. Bill, Dick and Margaret were born later in the late 1890s.

The son of mill owner CF Wenner, C.M. Wenner inherited the 550 acre family farm on Wenner's Hill and lost it due to bad investments in sub-developing the family farmland for railroaders. Wenner had formed a business partnership that sold lots on the farm, which stretched from present day Souder Rd. down to the 1st Baptist Church. They also owned and operated a brickyard that the family home on N. Maple Avenue looked out upon. That part of town became known as Wenner's Hill.

The farm was purchased in receivership by a friend named William Baker from Adamstown, who allowed Wenner to continue farming the land. Legend had it that C.M. Wenner was killed in 1920 when he fell over a fence and shot himself while looking for a fox in the hen house. People on the hill whispered that it might have been suicide, but he also was known as absent-minded having once rode into town on his horse to do business and left it there.

His son William Baker Wenner bought back 50 acres of the farm as the foundation of his grocery business in town in the 1920s. W.B. Wenner must've been inspired by his namesake.

Mrs. Edna Wenner lived to age 89 and after her husband's death, never again spoke of him to the family.

(Courtesy of Peter Wenner)