Eugene Bender and Douglas Wettlaufer

Eugene Bender was born in 1953, the youngest son of Clayton and Rosetta (Bender) Bender. He has two older sisters and three older brothers. He grew up on the Bender farm, Lot 32, Concession 16, East Zorra Township, just south of the East Zorra Mennonite Church, where his family attended. For grades 1-8, Eugene attended S. S. No. 7 and the Tavistock Public School. He attended high school at Waterloo Oxford Secondary School near Baden, where he met Marcia Fryfogel. They were married in 1977 and moved to Tavistock. They have three children. Eugene worked in Kitchener in the Bender family business and sometimes made business trips to Germany, where he was able to use his Deitsch and learn some standard German. He is now retired and lives in Tavistock. 

Douglas Wettlaufer was born in East Zorra Township in 1939, the son of Norman and Hilda (Yungblut) Wettlaufer. He grew up on a farm on the 16th Concession of East Zorra Township and attended the Cassel Public School. His family were members of St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church and spoke the same Deitsch language that their Amish Mennonite neighbors spoke. He purchased the family farm and he spent 60 years as a dairy and edible bean farmer. After retiring from farming he spent the last decade of his professional life with South Easthope Insurance, serving as president for a year. In 2000, Doug married Tricia Sexton. They had five children. Doug died in 2023.