Wilhelm Heusing was a charter member of St. Peters United Church of Christ in Grant Park, Kankakee Co., IL in April 1870. The story of what is today's St. Peters UCC can be traced back to a large group of German immigrants who settled in Yellowhead and Sumner Townships in the early 1860's. They were people of both the Evangelical and Lutheran branches of christianity which traced their beginnings to the Reformation in Germany.

In April 1870 they became an organized group with Herman von dem Fange as president. They officially were known as the German United Evangelical St. Peters Congregation in Grant Park. Other charter members were Henry Most, Friedrich Heusing, Friedrich Lohmann, Friedrich Heidemann, Louis Kutemeyer, Conrad Most, Christian Schroeder, Ferdinand Trebast, Herman Becker, Henry Schwerdtheger, Carl Rasche, Lawrence Matthias, Friedrich Schneider, Henry Roetter, Christian Buchmeier, Diedrich Lohmeier, and John Ammann. Their pastor was Friedrich C. Reincke. The first baptism recorded was that of Dorothea Wilhelmine Caroline Sophie Heusing, daughter of Wilhelm and Charlotte (Buchmeier) Heusing, on Dec. 10, 1865. On Sept. 26, 1870, the congregation was given two acres of land northwest of Grant Park, by the Heusing family, for a cemetery. On Oct. 20, 1870, it was dedicated as the Heusing Cemetery.

If you have come to my website via Ancestry: Several years ago the genealogy giant Ancestry absorbed the genealogy websites of Rootsweb along with personal databases posted at Rootsweb's WorldConnect Project that included a large database of my own family information. I started using Rootsweb in 2000 and they gave us the capability to add, remove, and update our information at anytime and I used these options frequently to post correct and current data. Presently (2006) I am told by Ancestry that we cannot maintain our own databases, we cannot even remove them. If you find information at Ancestry with my name attached please search my website for current information, the databases posted at Ancestry contain inaccurate information. - Karen Rowe.