Bernard “Barney” Ottens, born in Germany in 1830, was a pioneering farmer and civic leader in Nemaha County, Nebraska. Emigrating to America in 1851, Ottens initially worked as a farm laborer in Wisconsin before settling in Nebraska in 1857. He pre-empted 160 acres of land in Washington Precinct, building his farmstead from scratch and later constructing a stone house using local materials. Known for his resourcefulness and community spirit, Ottens retired to South Auburn in 1898. He and his wife, Mary McCarvel, raised twelve children and were active in founding St. Joseph’s parochial school in Auburn.
Bernard Ottens, or Barney Ottens, as he is familiarly known over a great part of southeastern Nebraska and elsewhere, is now a retired resident of South Auburn, Nemaha County. For forty years or more, he was one of the most active farmers and public-spirited citizens of the county. He came to Nebraska in pioneer days, lived in pioneer fashion for some years, and from the primitive conditions which he found, evolved a home and farmstead. He began without a cent of capital, and by industry, frugality, and honorable perseverance, has reached a place of prosperity and esteem among his neighbors and fellow citizens.
Mr. Ottens was born in Germany on October 24, 1830. After spending the first twenty years of his life there, he emigrated to America in 1851. He was two months on the way from Bremen to New York. From there, he went to Chicago, then to South Port, now Racine, Wisconsin, and from that point walked one hundred and fifty miles to Mineral Point, Wisconsin, where he had acquaintances. He was out of money and found farm work at ten dollars a month. He remained there from December 1851 to 1857. During this time, he got married and began to get ahead a little in the world. He then came to Nebraska and pre-empted a farm of one hundred and sixty acres in Washington Precinct, Nemaha County, which had plenty of timber on it but was absolutely untouched from an agricultural standpoint. He first put up a log house of plain poles with two rooms, but later erected a stone house, thirty-two by twenty-eight feet, one and a half stories, using stone from his own quarry.
He has been a diligent worker and an able businessman, and has accumulated considerable property since he first came to the state. In 1898, he bought four lots in South Auburn on Maxwell Street, where he has built his home, and he has two tenant houses close to the South Auburn mill. He has his own hay scales and barn and is also the owner of another farm in Douglas Precinct. In the summer of 1862, he teamed to Julesburg, Colorado, taking his own farm products for sale to the ranchmen. He drove oxen to his wagon and sold butter at fifty cents a pound, eggs at fifty cents a dozen, potatoes from seventy-five cents to a dollar a bushel, and bacon for forty to fifty cents a pound. He also killed buffalo and sold the meat. He has killed all kinds of big game on the plains and relates that during the sixties, the buffalo were so numerous that he has driven his wagon across sloughs over their carcasses. He also bears witness to the wanton and needless slaughter of these animals by the so-called sporting fraternity, and it is small wonder that the noble animal is now nearly extinct.
Mr. Ottens was married in 1854 at Willow Spring, Wisconsin, to Miss Mary McCarvel, who was born in Monaghan County, Ireland, in 1835, a daughter of Pat and Alice (McCabe) McCarvel. Twelve children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Ottens: Patrick, born in Wisconsin, died at the age of two years; Harmon died aged eight; Lizzie died at the age of two years; Frank died when six years old; Harmon, the second of the name, died at the age of eight; Elizabeth, the wife of John Jurgensmeier, has seven children living; Frank, the second of the name, died at the age of six; Alice died in Kansas, the wife of Henry Grewing, leaving five children; Catherine, the wife of John Bradley, of Oklahoma, has six children; Miss Jane is at home; Harmon died at the age of three; and Tillie, the wife of David Okane, a farmer at Pender, Nebraska, has two children.
Mr. and Mrs. Ottens are Catholics, and he is a Democrat in politics. From 1866 to 1870, he was justice of the peace and served as constable before that time. Mr. and Mrs. Ottens were the founders of the St. Joseph’s parochial school of Auburn, and he donated one hundred and sixty acres of land for the school.
Source: Lewis Publishing Company, A Biographical and Genealogical History of Southeastern Nebraska, 2 volumes, Lewis Publishing Company, 1904.