It’s a small world when your neighbor five houses down turns out to be related. His last name is Foust, who in the early 1900s married a Bannister. Sam (James Samuel) Foust and Emma Lulu Bannister tied the knot and had two sons near the turn of the century in Madison County, Indiana. My birth parents were both named Bannister, also from Indiana. The two families had something in common, as we trace their genealogical heritage. Each kept changing the spelling of their last name. Fousts were also Fausts, while Banisters sometimes added an extra “n”. I’m not sure why the additional “n” made a difference, but after the World Wars, the Faust clan apparently changed vowels to disguise their German Heritage on American soil. 

This older generation of Ban(n)isters and Fausts experienced a similar challenge as we do these days. In January of 1918, a pandemic known as the “Spanish flu” (influenza) is first observed in Haskell County, Kansas. It spread across the states much as Covid has in current times, leaving death in its path. Fortunately, Sam lived to be 91 and Lulu 82 – great  longevity in that era. Sam’s father, Joshua, also sired Jesse, who in turn fathered Everett, who engendered  Gregory, my new neighbor. Lulu’s father, Lee  Bannister had a brother, David, spawned Henry, who was my birthmother’s (Edna Faye Banister) grandfather and Charles who was my birthfather’s (Cecil Ralph Banister) grandfather. I am, therefore, the bastard offspring of two Banister brothers’ children and a first cousin of James Samuel Faust (Foust) family 3x removed, if I’m understanding the lineage properly? Greg Foust would be the great-grandnephew of husband of first cousin 3x removed – I’ll just call him neighbor. 

The Foust/Faust fame is in the development of the Gutenberg Press by moneylender Johann Faust. also known as Fust (another variation of the spelling), who provided some of the financing (800 guilders) through his banking connections. “There is also apparently a Faust Castle in upper Austria, a 15th century castle on the Danube which, legend says, was built in a single night for Dr. Faust by the devil. It has been owned by several noble families and has been a hotel since 1966.” I have been warned not to go there because back taxes are still apparently due that, as a descendent, I might be obligated to help pay or risk being imprisoned. Hotel Faust like the Hotel California – I can check in but I can never leave!