The History of the Yakima Valley, Washington, Comprising Yakima, Kittitas and
Benton Counties, The S.J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1919, Volume II, page 1024 
A portrait of Mr. and Mrs. Valentine Rettig appears in this publication.

VALENTINE RETTIG.

Valentine Rettig, now deceased, became a farmer of Yakima county in 1899. He was
born in Germany, October 30, 1846, and acquired his education in the schools of
that country. He came to the United States in 1866, when twenty years of age,
and first settled near Erie, Kansas, where he purchased railway land and engaged
in farming. For a third of a century he resided in that locality and on the 4th
of August, 1899, arrived in Yakima county, where he purchased forty acres of
land seven miles southwest of the city of Yakima. The greater part of the tract
was still wild and undeveloped and with characteristic energy and determination
he began the improvement of the place. He built thereon a comfortable residence
and added various other improvements, carrying on the work of the fields year by
year as time passed on. Barns have been built upon the farm since he died and
the equipment is now thoroughly modern. Mr. Rettig planted two acres to orchard,
raising apples and pears, and the remainder of the farm is devoted to the
growing of alfalfa, grain and potatoes.

In 1878 Mr. Rettig was united in marriage to Miss Laura E. Miller, who was born
in Indiana in 1860, a daughter of David and Emma (Guthrie) Miller, who in the
year 1872 removed westward to Kansas, where her father continued to engage in
farming until about 1904, when he brought his family to Yakima county,
Washington. The father died at the age of eighty-three years, while the mother
passed away in 1862. To Mr. and Mrs. Rettig were born ten children: E. H., who
has followed farming on the Cowiche and is now working in the navy yard at
Olympia, is married and has eight children; G. W., residing in Idaho, is also
married; Mary Katherine is the wife of Samuel Taylor, a resident of Gooding,
Idaho, and has four children; Alice is the wife of William Beden, living on a
ranch on the Cowiche, and they have two children: Annie is the wife of M. J.
Gardner, a resident of Prosser, and they have three children; Augusta is the
wife of Ben Hartley, of Idaho, by whom she has one child; Otto is at home; Mark
is a member of the United States navy, and John and Charles are both at home.

Mr. Rettig was a member of the Lutheran church and his wife and children adhere
to the same religious faith. His political allegiance was given to the
democratic party. He was very active in church work and was widely known and
loved throughout the community in which he resided. He passed away April 7,
1915.

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Submitted to the Washington Bios Project in January 2008 by Jeffrey L. Elmer.
Submitter has no additional information about the subject of this article.