My mother's father's parents were Moritz Ernest Beier (1851-1926) and Marie Kluge (1859-1951). My great-grandparents were from Zschopau and Waldkirchen, in the Kingdom of Saxony in what is now Germany. Zschopau and Waldkirchen (now incorporated into the Erzgebirgskreis district of Saxony) are small towns near the city of Chemnitz, not far from the border with the Czech Republic. The industrial revolution was in full development when they lived there and Moritz worked in the textile mills as a spool maker. Saxony was in political turmoil at the time, with shifting alliances and threat of revolution in the air. In 1871, the small kingdom became a part of the newly consolidated German Empire. Moritz and Marie were married in 1880, and immigrated to the United States for a better life in 1884.
