The Trouble Tree

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

Here is a story that I have come across. It is by an unknown author.

I hired a plumber to help me restore an old farm house, and after he had just finished a rough first day on the job: a flat tire made him lose an hour of work, his electric drill quit and his ancient one ton truck refused to start.

While I drove him home, he sat in stony silence. On arriving, he invited me in to meet his family. As we walked toward the front door, he paused briefly at a small tree, touching the tips of the branches with both hands.

When opening the door he underwent an amazing transformation.. His face was wreathed in smiles and he hugged his two small children and gave his wife a kiss.

Afterward he walked me to the car. We passed the tree and my curiosity got the better of me. I asked him about what I had seen him do earlier.

'Oh, that's my trouble tree,' he replied 'I know I can't help having troubles on the job, but one thing's for sure, those troubles don't belong in the house with my wife and the children.. So I just hang them up on the tree every night when I come home and ask God to take care of them. Then in the morning I pick them up again.' 'Funny thing is,' he smiled,' when I come out in the morning to pick 'em up, there aren't nearly as many as I remember hanging up the night before.

Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here we might as well dance. We all need a Tree!

William James Roop, M.A.B.S,

Roop-Crappell Ministries

Hospice Volunteer Stories

The Trucking Tango

Apostolic Theological Seminary

Low On Salt

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

I was up at my aunt and uncle's house in Wisconsin here recently. They own the old family dairy farm. While we were there he told me a lot of interesting stories.  Here is one of those stories.

My uncle, Jerry Mankowski, told me a story about a medical emergency that happened to him a few years ago. He woke up one morning with his hands shaking! He could not stop them from shaking. Also he had little feeling in his body.

His long time wife, Nancy, said that she would take him to the clinic. Jerry told her no, he really needed an ambulance! She called an ambulance immediately! When the ambulance arrived, off they went to the local hospital!

Upon arrival at the hospital, a battery of tests were performed. As my aunt and uncle sat there, the doctor's convened and discussed. They knew what the problem was almost immediately, but they just wanted to make sure.

The doctor eventually came out and revealed what was the diagnosis. Jerry had very low sodium levels in his blood!  He was just low on salt! The doctor turned to my aunt Nancy, and said to her, " put the salt shaker back on the table!"

Now both of them put plenty of salt on their food. The salt shaker is always on the table. It's popular today to have a no salt diet. But that is not healthy for us. Our blood needs to have a good salt content for a healthy body.

William James Roop, M.A.B.S.

 Roop-Crappell Ministries 

 Hospice Volunteer Stories 

 The Trucking Tango 

 Apostolic Theological Seminary 

The Pistol

 Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

My wife and I were just up in Wisconsin visiting with my mother's family that still lives in the area.  We also escorted my elderly mother up there with us.  While we were living with my mothers older brother, my uncle Jerry Mankowski, and his wife Nancy. 

 Jerry and Nancy still live on the old dairy farm of my Grandfather Ed Mankowski, the old booze runner for the Al Capone gang! Jerry still had one of the old pistols that belonged to Al Capones men!  The other three blog posts that tell of my family's involvement with the Capones are, "The Escape From The Mob,"  "The Booze Runners,"  "FBI Crackdown."

When the famous St. Valentines Day Massacre occurred, Charlie, an Chicago policeman, was first on the scene. He took the opportunity to relieve one of the dead mobsters of one of his sidearms. He took a pistol. Charlie was married to a lady named Stella, the sister of Frank and Ed Mankowski. 

Frank and Ed worked for the Al Capone gang! Ed was a booze runner, and Frank was a gang enforcer! Ed was my grandfather. In the nineteen-thirties, crime scene investigations was not the science that it is today. Cops taking souvenirs from a crime scene was pretty common back then, especially if it was not directly involved in the crime.

Many years later, when Charlie died, his wife Stella had the pistol. Stella gave it to her brother-in-law ED, my grandfather, and father to my uncle Jerry.  When my grandfather died, Hellen, my grandmother, gave it to her son Jerry.  That's how my uncle Jerry came to own a pistol carried by a Chicago gangster that died in the St. Valentines Day massacre!

Roop-Crappell Ministries

Hospice Care and Dying

The Trucking Tango

Apostolic Theological Seminary

The Escape From The Mob!

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

I was up in Wisconsin visiting my mother's side of the family. My aunt and uncle currently live on the old family dairy farm. They are Nancy and Jerry Mankowski. Both are in their early eighties, but both doing well.  You can read related posts called, "The booze runners" and "FBI crackdown," "The Pistol."

While I was there, my uncle Jerry started telling stories about the Al Capone days in Chicago. One of the stories was about Frank Mankowski, and him changing his name. He did this to hide from the mob!  This is what happened.

Frank Mankowski was a booze runner with his brother Ed. But Frank was more than a booze runner, he also was an enforcer for the Capone crime family!  Their sister Ann was a waitress for a very expensive Supper Club.  One of Al Capones men wanted to date Ann, but Ann didn't like him, so she to refuse his advances. 

Just after the famous St. Valentine's massacre, and the mayor calling in the FBI, Ann was beaten up very badly by the Al Capone man that she rejected! She was beaten up so much that Ann was a the hospital for a month! When Ann woke up, she was terrified of the man who attacked her!

But Frank apparently knew the man, and why he had attacked her. Frank calmly informed Ann not to worry about them. Frank said that he had "taken care of him!". Now remember, Frank was an enforcer for the Al Capone crime family, so that only meant one thing!

When Frank finally got Ann out of the hospital, just as the Feds were cracking down, they fled to California!  When Ann got settled down there, Frank took a slow boat around through the Panama Canal and up to New York City. That is when Frank Mankowski changed his name to Langowski. That was his mother's maiden name.

His mother was pregnant with Frank by another man before her marriage, so Frank was never really a Mankowski anyway. So, Frank changed his name and laid low in New York City for about five years! Frank would never reveal what he did in New York City during those years, that went with him to the grave!

After the five years, Frank bought a farm in central Wisconsin near his brother Ed. There they both lived as farmers, and a much quieter life!  He kept the name Langowski for the rest of his life.

William James Roop, M.A.B.S.

 Roop-Crappell Ministries 

 Hospice Care and Life 

 The Trucking Tango 

 Apostolic Theological Seminary 

The Booze Runners

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

I was just up to Wisconsin to visit family. We stayed at the old farm house that my aunt and uncle now reside. They are Nancy and Jerry Mankowski. My grandparents were dairy farmers there. You can read related posts called, "The escape from the Mob," and "FBI crackdown," "The Pistol."

My grandfather, Ed Mankowski, was a booze runner for the Capone crime family in Chicago.  He ran with his brother, Frank Mankowski. Frank was also an enforcer for the Capone's.

Other teams would smuggle the booze out of Canada, and bring it down to the north side of Chicago. The smugglers would deposit the booze at restaurants though out north Chicago, for safe keeping.

Ed and Frank would drive a truck to one of the restaurants, park and walk in and drink coffee and pie  Sometime during the evening, the manager would nod at them. That meant that their truck was loaded and ready to roll!

Ed did the driving and Frank was there with a tommy gun!  That's how he got the nickname of "Tommy Gun Frank!". They would transport the booze to Capone warehouses on the south side of Chicago. Other teams would then deliver it to the many secret casinos and speakeasy's on Chicago's south side.

William James Roop, M.A.B.S.

 Roop-Crappell Ministries 

 Hospice Volunteer Stories 

 The Trucking Tango 

 Apostolic Theological Seminary 

FBI Crackdown

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

I flew up to Wautoma, Wisconsin, to visit my aunt and uncle. They are Jerry and Nancy Mankowski. While I was there, Jerry told me many stories, here's one. Also other related posts are, "The escape from the mob," and "The booze runner,"  "The Pistol."

My grandfather, Ed Mankowski, and his brother Frank, both work for the Al Capone crime family, in Chicago, Illinois, in the nineteen-thirties. Ed was a booze runner, and Frank was also a booze runner, but also an enforcer. They also had a sister who worked as a dance hall girl.

Running booze for the crime family was one thing, but being also an enforcer for the Capone's was another thing altogether! Frank did a lot of the dirty work for the Capone's.

Just after the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago, the Mayor called in the FBI to clean things up, due to the bad press. Everyone knew that they would soon have to lay low for awhile. 

After the massacre and before the FBI got settled in, a lot of score settling took place between the gangs of the city.  Frank got mixed up with that, and fled to California with his sister. Ed left in nineteen-forty-two to a farm in Wisconsin.

William James Roop, M.A.B.S.

 Roop-Crappell Ministries 

 Hospice Volunteer Stories 

 The Trucking Tango 

 Apostolic Theological Seminary 

Testimony Of Healing

Hello everyone.  Praise the Lord!

This is a testimony of Mrs. May Evans, of her healing, and published in the newsletter of the Azusa Street Mission, in Los Angeles, California, in 1906.

Thirteen years ago, I was brought into the light of Divine healing, through the Word of God. I had never heard any teaching from man. But I had been for a long time very greatly afflicted and body. I had taken physicians and medicine until I became discouraged and continued to grow worse, till I decided to drop every remedy and take the Lord for my healer.

To this my people would not give consent. They thought I was losing my mind. One morning, through a nurse, I was chloroformed and taken out of my home to the hospital where they performed an operation. After the physicians had cut and slashed, and found that the seat of the trouble, was deeper than they anticipated, they lost courage and said it was impossible for me to recover.

It was only a question of a few hours that I could possibly live. My husband was away in God's work at the time, and my people became alarmed, and realized what they had done, and decided to take me back to my home to die. But, praise God, He had another plan in store for me.

I did not regain consciousness for many hours, I opened my eyes in my own room, and heard them praying around my bed. Then I realized my dreadful situation and in the most excruciating agony, I lifted my eyes to heaven and saw a light streaming down upon me. And in a moment, I heard the voice of Jesus telling me to trust Him, that he was my healer.

I said, "yes, Lord, I do trust thee and will trust thee, for thou hast healed me and healed me now." Then there was a wonderful joy that came into my very being, and I felt the Spirit and the healing power of Christ permeating my whole being, praise God. In three days time I was up and around my room, and in less than a week I was able to walk a mile. Never from that time have I doubted the healing power of Jesus. Since then, for thirteen years I have been in the Lord's work.

Well I wish to relate another instance of His healing power. While in Oakland, California, during last August, through an accident, God permitted the old trouble to come back, and from Saturday evening until Tuesday noon I suffered intensely. At noon time, we always held our workers' class there, and it was during the saints' meeting, I had a wonderful spirit of prayer, and I tried to say, "Jesus is here," and found I had no utterance, but he was present in my soul. The spirit of prayer continued on me until 2:30. Where the Lord permitted me to raise my eyes, I saw a vision of beautiful, rolling clouds, and Jesus suspended in the midst, and just then I realized that He was there for my healing.

Sister Crawford and Sister Junk who were with me also saw Jesus, and God revealed to them he had come to heal me. I felt the healing work of Jesus. Many of you loved ones have seen the mason lift up his trowel the mortar, and throw it up on the wall that he was building, and just so it seemed to me that the Great Physician was rebuilding the temple of my body. 

O Hallelujah! Praise His name.  O, I know that He is the only physician that can heal all our diseases. All the afternoon and evening, no matter which way I turned, the form of my Savior was suspended in front of me, and I wish ever to behold the smile of this countenance as I saw him on that day.  My healing was instantaneous, and today I rejoice in a perfect body.

Signed, Mrs. May Evans.

William James Roop, M.A.B.S.

 Roop-Crappell Ministries 

 Hospice Volunteer Stories 

 The Trucking Tango 

 Apostolic Theological Seminary