Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia

Vol. 10, No. 1 Spring 1987 On the cover: The family of Georg Reisbick of York, Nebraska. Christine Elizabeth Reisbick Kline is the child seated between her parents, Georg and Elizabeth Reisbick. Christine was ten or eleven years old when this picture was taken. Please note the wedding ring on her mother's finger. The father thought that wedding rings were foolishness, nonsense. Her mother did so want a ring! White Russian Laundry Soap, used by many, had a coupon stamped on the back of the wrapper. This advertised a wedding ring free for so many coupons. Christine asked the neighbors and friends to save the soap wrappers with the coupons for her so that she could obtain a wedding ring for her mother. What a day of happiness and joy it was for Christine when the ring arrived, and she presented the surprise to her mother. The radiant glow of love and appreciation on the mother's face at the time was beyond description. She wore the ring until it was worn, the edges sharp, and it cut her finger. This ring is in Christine's treasure box of earthly possessions, of priceless love, and memories of her yesteryears.

Published by American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 631 D Street • Lincoln, Nebraska 68502-1199 • Phone 402-474-3363

Edited by: Ruth M. Amen, Jo Ann Kuhr, Mary Lynn Tuck ® Copyright 1987 by the American Historical Society of Germane From Russia. All rights reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS

MAP OF KRAFT David H. Schultheiss ...... ……………………………………………..ii KRAFT: MY BIRTHPLACE AND HOMETOWN AS I REMEMBER IT David R. Schultheiss ...... ……………………………………………1 TREASURED MEMORIES Bertha Rast Jones ...... …………………………………………….5. GRANDMOTHER'S DREAM: MY REALITY Shirley Keller Halvorsen ...... …………………………………………14 THE ORGANIZATION OF THE FIRST GERMAN SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST CHURCH IN AMERICA AND ITS INFLUENCE Adaline Werner Reimche ...... ………………………………………15 OUR FOREFATHERS AND FAMILY AS TOLD TO ME BY MY MOTHER Theresa Rose Wegner Ennis ...... …………………………………...19 SUMMARY OF AND PROBLEMS RELATING TO DIALECTAL AND ETHNOGRAPHICAL STUDIES OF GERMAN SETTLEMENTS IN THE U.S.S.R. Chapter 3 Viktor Maksimovich Zhirmunskii Translated by Alexander Dupper ...... ………………………….………..27 POEMS TO PAULINE Translated by Alexander Dupper ...... …………………………………..33 ERWIN AND HIS BROTHER Hertha Karasek-Strzygowski Translated by Sally Tieszen Hieb ...... ………………………………….35 BOOKS AND ARTICLES RECENTLY ADDED TO THE AHSGR ARCHIVES Frances Amen and Mary Lynn Tuck ...... ………………………………..37 THE ROMAN-CATHOLIC GERMANS OF THE U.S.S.R.: 1917-1986 Father Christopher L. Zugger ...... …………………………………..41 CONCERNING THE NAMING OF GERMAN SETTLEMENTS IN SOUTH RUSSIA Translated by Erika Barton ...... ……………………………………..48 FELIDA MEMORIES Amelia Krieger Werre ...... ……………………………………….50

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KRAFT MY BIRTHPLACE AND HOMETOWN AS I REMEMBER IT David R. Schultheiss* The village of Kraft, located in the southern part of remember the names of the owners—Kimmel and the Volga Region, will be described as it existed during Weimer to the north aufm Steinberg (on the rock hill), the 1920s. I have no statistics or numbers except one— Michel and Starkel to the south. The Starkel windmill that of its population. The population peaked just before was the only one not on a hill. Although it stood on even WWI in 1912 when it reached 6572, according to the ground, its grinding stones turned as much as the others. Heimatbuch der Landsmannschaft derDeutschen aus There was another flour mill in Kraft. This one was Russland 1982-84, p. 150. By 1926 there were less than engine driven, and the grain was ground with steel 4000 people. War and revolution, coupled with the drums. The people called it simply die Feuermühl'. For famine and starvation of the early twenties, were the their own use people went to the windmills and had their primary reasons for the decrease in population. Some of grains stone ground. If the flour was to be sold, they the villagers immigrated to other places like Volhynia went to the Feuermühl'. There they got the best and and the Caucasus. Only a few were able to leave the finest-quality flour for the market. It was called country and settle in the United States, Canada, or South Blaustempel (blue ribbon) flour and brought the highest America. prices. The owner's name was Elsasser, and his The village of Kraft was about a mile long, and its reputation for high-quality flour was widely known. streets ran from north to south. Kraft was located on the Many times people from other villages had to wait in line Bergseite, in the southern part of the Volga German for days to have their wheat processed into Blaustempel Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, on the left side flour. of a beautiful creek called Gryaznukha, with a lot of fish Our school was a big brick building with a sheet- in it. The people of Kraft called it simply d'[er]Bach, metal roof. It was built in the early years of this century which means "the brook." The brook was also the and was called die Russe-Schul (the Russian school). It borderline between Kraft and the neighboring village to got its name because the Russian language was the west and southwest, Göbel. introduced in its classrooms. It had four big classrooms, About 65 percent of the houses in Kraft were built an auditorium with a stage, and a long corridor. with lumber and the rest of white stones or clay bricks In the center of the village, there was a beautiful (Lehmsteine). The outside was covered with a white, church with a high steeple and cross. In front of it was a chalky mass called Weisserde (white earth or dirt). bell tower with two bells. The church ground was fenced Saturday's chore was to paint the walls with a big brush in by a four-foot-high, white-painted wooden fence with on a long handle so that the house would look clean and three gates, one on each side and one in front. The attractive for the weekend. We got the Weisserde free of church itself was a wooden structure. It was not heated charge from a quarry about 2 km from the village. In the and was used only in the summertime. In winter our fall after the harvest, people would get a load of services were held in the Bethaus (prayer house), a big, Weisserde. They would store it in a dry place, and it two-story brick building erected in 1905, which was would last for an entire year. In order to use it, they across the street from the church. The main floor was filled a bucket one-third full of the Weisserde, added divided into classrooms for Sunday school. The second water, mixed it, and they had their white paint. Many of floor was equipped with pews, an altar, and a pulpit for the houses in Kraft were roofed with a double layer of church services. It was heated by wood stoves. In 1930- boards; the rest had roofs made of straw or reed grass 31 the church was closed, and the cross and the bells (Schilf). were taken down. The Bethaus became a clubhouse, and There were four windmills in Kraft, two on the north the main floor was remodeled and became a high school. end and two on the south end; there was one on each Christmas and New Year's Day were always special side of the Landstrasse (thoroughfare), usually on a occasions. People prepared for weeks for their favorite small hill to catch the wind. I still holidays. On Christmas Eve the church, or at this time the Bethaus, was packed. Everyone wanted to see the Christmas tree and the children's programs and to hear *Editor's Note: David Schultheiss will be speaking at the the church choir. There were two holidays—and the AHSGR Convention in Portland, Oregon, during the Folklore Symposium on Friday, July 24, 1987. His topic will be "Old people celebrated! There was always a church service on Country Folk Songs, Humor, and Memories." New Year's Eve. It was a special service. The would help activate the pumps. It was an unwritten law that you had to drop everything, whatever you were doing, and rush to the fire and help in accordance with your ability. If you had horse teams, you rushed water to the fire. If not, you helped by pushing the pumps or in any other way until the fire was out. Everyone was a fireman—and without pay, at fhat. At funerals the pallbearers picked up the bier. There were three sizes: small, medium, and large. They would bring the bier to the house of the deceased and place it in the courtyard. Ropes were attached at the proper moment when the minister arrived, and the casket with the body on it was put on the bier. After the casket was closed, the bearers tied the casket to the bier and then carried it in the procession to the cemetery. After the service the bier was brought back to the Wasserschuppen. The bearers also dug the grave at no charge. To be a pallbearer for your departed friend or neighbor was considered an honor. There were two general stores in Kraft and they were called lavka. The word lavka, which means "store," was one of those words adopted from the Russian language. In those stores you could purchase cloth, sugar, spices, petroleum for the lamps (since there was no electricity yet), shoes, galoshes and, of course, hardware items such as shovels, hoes, and nails. On a wooden fence across the street from the Wagners' lavka on the main street was printed in big letters "Luchshiye v mire galoshi" (the best galoshes in the world). This is the first advertising slogan I can remember. The other store belonged to the Quindt and Schulz families and was located on the Unnerstross (lower street). In about 1927 a hardware store was opened. It was run by the cooperative, which had been established three

years before. There were no bakeries or butcher shops at This photo of Anna Schultheiss Brand and Maria that time. The people baked their own bread and kuchen, Schultheiss Gaechter, cousins, was taken in Kazakhstan butchering their own animals, and preserved the meat in 1960. Anna, who died in Kazakhstan in 1972, was through salting and smoking processes and Eiskeller (ice David Schultheiss' sister. cellars). Not everyone had an Eiskeller, but those who did shared it with their relatives, neighbors, and friends. minister or the Schulmeister [schoolteacher] read the An Eiskeller was about 10' square and about 10' deep. A name of each person who had died during the past year. wooden shed covered it. Usually, on a beautiful day in He mentioned how many had gotten married, how many February, friends and neighbors got together, broke the children were born, whether they were boys or girls, and ice from the frozen brook, filled the Eiskeller with their names. This special time was a reflection of the past chunks of ice, and covered it with straw to protect it year and its events and prayers for new hope. from the hot sun in summertime. If someone had fresh Facing the church, to the left across the street, was d'r meat, the Eiskeller was the place to preserve it, Wasserschuppen (watershed), a wooden shed where the The majority of the people were farmers. Horses and community fire equipment and the Totenbahren (biers) oxen were their working animals. It was a sensation were stored. The fire equipment consisted of two pumps when the above-mentioned co-op brought the first (similar to those you see here in museums) and a wagon tractor, a Fordson imported from America, to Kraft. The with a barrel filled with water. In case of a fire, people main crops were wheat, rye, barley, oats, living close to the Wasserschuppen rushed there first, hitched their horses to the water wagon, hooked on the pumps, and rushed to the scene of the fire. There were people waiting there with water, and others

2 corn, sunflowers, and millet. We also had watermelons for syrup, which the Krafter called Honig (honey), and other vegetables like potatoes, cabbage, beets, carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, and squash. The latter was mostly used for animal feed. Cooked squash and barley was a good recipe for fattening pigs. The livestock consisted of cows, sheep, goats, pigs and, of course, chickens, geese, and ducks. Most of the animals were for their own use. Sunflowers were raised in order to extract their oil. After harvest the seeds were properly dried and brought to an Ölmühie (oil mill), where they were shelled, ground between two big grinding stones, put in a drum, roasted to a certain stage, and then put into a press, where the oil was pressed out. Because there was no oil mill in Kraft, the people had to go to one of two neighboring villages, Stefan or Mümberg, 10 to 12 miles north and northeast, respectively. Kraft was not without its craftsmen. There were three blacksmiths who took care of the farm equipment and shod the horses; tailors who made suits and Schafpeize (sheepskin coats); cabinetmakers, shoemakers, carpenters, tanners, saddlers, Filzstiefel Walker (felt-boot fullers) and Kappe Macher (headgear makers). My father was a master shoemaker, but only in the wintertime. In summer he devoted his time to farming. After the harvest and after everything else was prepared for the long winter, my father, my second brother, Reinhardt, (who also learned the craft), and an apprentice would begin to make footwear. They usually worked in people's homes where they got their meals and saved time getting the measurements of everyone's feet, from grandpa on down to one-year-old toddlers. They worked long hours, sometimes past midnight. These three men from Kraft served in the czar's army The people in Kraft were all Germans. As far as I can during WWI. They lived in Kraft until the forced remember, there were no people of other nationalities evacuation to Siberia in 1941. Left-to-right they are David living in our village. The people were Evangelical Kraft, Heinrich Schultheiss (seated), and Alexander Lutheran by faith, with the exception of a few families Schwindt. Heinrich, who died in Siberia in 1984, was the who were Seventh-Day Adventists. All went to the same oldest brother of David Schultheiss. church. Prayer meetings were held in private homes. Only a Brüderkonferem was held in the church. between two and three in the afternoon he would come to I don't remember whether Kraft had a town drunk, our house. On any day of the week, he knew which but it surely had a town character. He was d'r blinde people would give him something and which people Rehnert (the blind Reinhardt). He lost his eyesight at the would not. age of six or seven through some kind of sickness. As he Reinhardt didn't just ask for something to eat, oh no, grew up he developed a great sense of direction, he asked for money so that he could buy himself material orientation, and hearing. His voice and speech were for clothes. In the fall he begged for wool so that he normal. He came from a poor family. His parents tried could have a pair of felt boots for the winter. He insisted hard to keep him at home, but to no avail; he went that the wool be white, because white wool was stronger begging. He knew every house and every person, than black; he could not be convinced otherwise. I recognizing them by their voices, and he always knew remember, my dad asked him, "Reinhardt, if you have a where he was. He had a system; he visited every house pair of socks, one white and one black, which one goes once a week. You could bet your last penny that on kaput first?" Without hesitation he answered, "The black Thursdays one for sure." Heinrich Elsasser, the owner of the flour mill, made him an offer: "Reinhardt, I'll buy you a new suit, a pair of Filzstiefel, and a warm Pelz [fur coat], and all you have to do is to stay home and don't

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go begging any more." But the blind Reinhardt said, nomic policy) of free enterprise gave the people a "Vetter Heinrich, you are very generous and good, and spark of hope for better times, and during the years I'm very grateful. You can give me all of that, but to stay 1925-28 one could see tremendous progress. There was home, that I cannot do. I need to go out; I have to know life in the village again. Farmers increased their crops what goes on; I must talk to people; I can't sit at home and livestock, and everyone was busy, particularly in the and do nothing." And d'r blinde Rehnert continued his summertime. The long winters were spent more leisurely rounds from end to end, day after day. He knew who tending animals, celebrating weddings, and telling stories was a giver and who was not. There wasn't a wedding he on long winter evenings. The teenagers had special fun didn't come to, to get his piece of Hochzeitskuchen. Peo- when they tried to train steers for work. A pair would be ple teased him, but loved him; and after he died in 1933, hitched to a sled full of young men. On beautiful d'r blinde Rehnert, the town character, went down in afternoons they would spend several hours traveling up Kraft history. one street and down the other, singing loudly. Riding There were two blind sisters in Kraft. They were young horses and racing them was also always very called "Die blinden Mäderchen" (the blind girls). Those exciting. two girls were of a different character. They stayed home, and yet everyone knew them—not only in Kraft but also in the neighboring villages. The girls were famous for their singing. There wasn't a song in the Volga-German songbook that they didn't know by heart. They sang in church, at prayer meetings, and on many other occasions. Stundenbruder from other villages came and invited them to sing in their meetings. No Brüder-konferenz was held without the blinde Mäderchen and their singing. "Do muss m V harche, die singe wie die Engel," ("You should hear them, they sing like angels") the people said. Though they were blind, you could see them sitting on the bench in front of their The birthplace and home of David Schultheiss in Kraft, home knitting or crocheting. They also were part of the This photo was taken by a relative in 1966. community and not without respect and honor. 'S Marickche and 's Annche, in their harmony, sang The years 1926-28 were happy years not only in themselves into everyone's hearts. Kraft but in other communities too. In 1929 the An important asset to Kraft was the Wasserbett collectivization began, and the rest is history. In August (aquifer). It was located in the northern part of the 1940 I walked through the streets of Kraft for the last village, where a well was tapped and utilized. Out of a time. It had changed, but many landmarks remained. 2-inch pipe, the water filled eight big troughs like you Kraft still exists today. Even the house I was born in is see in Western movies, which were connected to each occupied, but by whom I do not know. Kraft lost its other. Here the folks got water for their animals for name, its identity, and its people just like all the other making clay bricks, for preparing the manure when German villages our forefathers called home. making Misthola for fuel in winter, and for filling their I feel obligated to name our neighboring villages- To barrels when a fire broke out. The water was tested and the north were Stefan, Mühlberg, and Müller; to the was good for human consumption but considered a little northeast were Holstein and Galka; hard. The Wasserbett, as it was called, was maintained to the east, Dreispitz and Dobrinka; to the south, Neu- by the Dorfrat (village council), and everyone had Norka and Rosenberg; to the southwest, Gobel and access to it free of charge. There were also two Ge- Semenovka; to the west, Leichtling; and to the meindebrunnen (community wells) maintained by the northwest, Köhler and Kamenka. My footprints are in all Gemeinde, from which the people got their drinking of them except the last two. How many of those villages water. Using a Tragholz on their shoulders and a bucket are still in existence is anyone's guess. At one time they hanging on each end of it, the young ladies of the house were all thriving communities with people who knew usually brought the drinking water home. hard work and thrift and had a strong faith in their God. World War I, the Revolution, the famine in the early These people cared for each other and had a great sense twenties, and starvation were the causes of a rapid of humor; they knew how to celebrate weddings and decline in the population. From over 6000 it went to holidays and how to spend their leisure time. Their life about 4000. Lenin's NOEP (new eco was simple, but their hearts were full of hope, care, and love. Today only memories remain.

4 TREASURED MEMORIES Bertha Rast Jones I was born May 24,1896, in Fere Champenoise I [Alt- I don't remember how many months a year we went Elft], Bessarabia, South Russia. Bessarabia was the to school, but we went six and a half days a week. region between the Prut and Dniester Rivers in Russia. It Saturday was the half day, and that was for Bible and had a roughly wedge-shaped base on the Black Sea that catechism study. We started to school at eight years of extended northwesterly for 300 miles. In 1812 it became age and quit at fifteen—or should I say graduated? That part of the Russian Empire until it declared its does sound better. That is the age when young people independence during the 1917 Revolution. Romania were confirmed. I can still see them marching from the annexed Bessarabia in 1918. The Russians forced school and hear them singing "Jesu, geh voran" ("Jesus, Romania to give it back in 1940. The southeastern part lead the way"). The boys were always confirmed on one and a portion of the northwest became the Moldavian Sunday and the girls another. It was a large group, as S.S.R. they came from other villages. One group was confirmed My parents, brothers, sisters, and their birth-dates, as on Palm Sunday, but I don't remember which. I would near as I can remember them, were: My father was bet it was the boys, as the men "ruled the roost" in those Daniel Rast, born August 14, 1856, in Fere Champenoise days. I, Bessarabia. He died February 9,1905, in Russia. My Everybody worked from daylight till dark. The first mother was Frederika Weiler Rast, born December 16, chore in the morning in summer was to milk the sheep. 1856, in Fere Champenoise I, Bessarabia. She died The lambs would be taken away from the ewes overnight August 21, 1931, at home in Rupert, Idaho. They were to provide milk for us. It tasted funny, but gosh, it made married November 21,1879, and the following sons and good cheese. They put rennet in the milk while it was daughters were born to them in Fere Champenoise I: still sweet, then drained off the whey, put the cheese into Daniel, August 29, 1880; Rudolf, December 3, 1883; a cloth, and pressed it. Then it was cut into pieces two George, February 22, 1884; Lydia, November 11,1886; inches wide and about four inches long and put into a Otto, July 15,1889; Hugo, April 26, 1891; Emma, June brine. Those old sheep did not care to be milked, so 1,1893; Bertha, died as a child; somebody had to hold them. Many times I went to sleep Bertha, May 24, 1896; Elisabeth, died as a child; with my arms around their necks and my head on theirs; Margaretha, December 21, 1899; Bernhardt, died as a I woke up in a hurry if they stepped on my bare feet. child; Erhart, September 23, 1902. After we got through milking the sheep, we would turn them out into the street, and the sheepherder would come along and herd them to pasture. Everybody who had sheep would do that, the same with cows, horses, and calves. Then at night when they came home, each would go through its own gate. After these herds would leave in the morning, we would follow behind and pick up the droppings in buckets. The manure was taken home, mixed with old straw, shaped into squares, set to dry, and then used for fuel in the winter. All manure was used for fuel. It was spread out to about a foot deep, then a team of horses hitched to a heavy stone roller would go round and round until it was good and solid. Then it was cut in squares Daniel and Frederika Rast in Alt-Eifty Bessarabia. with a spade, and the squares were stood up on end to dry. We also used the parts of straw that stock would not eat for fuel. The stoves, made of stone or brick, were of a The question is often asked of me, "How come you built-in type and went up to the ceiling. They were about say you are German, and you were born in Russia?" four feet wide and eight or ten feet long with the opening Well, years ago Germans were invited to come and settle in the kitchen where the fire was fed. One pile of straw in Russia. My great-grandparents were among those who would be shoveled in, and after that was gone, another; came. They were from the Schwarzwald (meaning Black then the fire would need to be poked. By the light of that Forest) in Germany. Many villages were started with fire, I would German churches and schools.

5 study my homework. After the straw was all fed into the fed to the animals. Feather ticks were also made to cover stove, some of those squares of manure were put in to us. They were real cozy. keep it warm; they were slow-burning. The stove had an We had dirt floors that were something like cement opening in a heater in the living room that had a sheet of and very hard. To clean them we mixed a yellowish clay iron above the fire. Some things could be cooked slowly and water together and brushed a light coat of this there, such as kraut and meat. mixture over the floor. Then we sprinkled it with a pretty, yellow sand. Preachers, school teachers, and other rich folks had wooden floors, and so did our school. I think the lower floor in the church had marble floors. The balcony was wood. Speaking of the church reminds me of the organ. How big that was, and how I liked to sit where I could watch it being played! It fascinated me to see the organists use their feet. One man would also pump the bellows with his feet. We had three bells in the church tower. How nice they sounded! The small one would be rung first for the first call to worship. For the second call, the large bell would ring, and then all three rang for the last call. That surely was a beautiful sound. If a child died, the small bell would be rung, and if Cutting pressed manure into squares. After the squares an adult died, the large one. Then notes were sent out were dry, they were stacked and used for fuel in stoves. that told where the funeral would be. The note would Photo courtesy of the Landsmannschaft der start in the middle of the village on both sides of the Bessarabiendeutschen. street and be passed north and south. After you read the note, you took it to your neighbors, and they would read Here is a real good way to make popcorn. Heat some it and pass it on. good, clean sand in an iron kettle. Make sure it's real hot, From the time of death until the time for the funeral, then put your corn in, and stir it with a wooden stick or the body was kept on sand on the floor-about a foot spoon as fast as you can. When it stops popping, pour it high—and kept wet. After the body was put into the through a sieve. Return the sand to the kettle and do the coffin, the sand would be sprinkled in front of the house. same thing over. Oh, it tasted so very good, and we I don't remember ever hearing of a funeral being held never found one grain of sand in it. We never used butter in a church. There were a song or two and a prayer and or salt on it, either. some Bible readings in front of the home, and The oven where we baked bread was built of brick or everybody walked to the cemetery. The body was stone and was heated in the same way. After it was hot carried on the shoulders of eight men. While they rested enough, all the embers were raked out, and it was swept and changed positions, there would be more songs. clean. Then the bread was put in, and the door was Everybody sang; there were no solos. At the cemetery closed up tightly, so as not to lose a smidgen of heat. there were more songs and prayers and Bible readings, That was really good bread. Some folks had those ovens all committing the soul to God and the body to the outdoors, and that was a good deal in the summer. grave. Nothing was ever wasted. The grapevines were The closing of the grave still makes me shudder. gathered in neat piles in straight lines so that they could Stakes would be pounded into the ground close to the be pulled out easily, broken into small pieces, and used edge of the grave, then boards were leaned up against in the cook stove. When the stock got all they wanted them, and the dirt was piled against the boards. When it from the cornstalks, the stalks were also used for fuel— was time to fill the grave, the boards would be pulled and so were the corncobs. They were the best and out, and the dirt would go down like an avalanche—the cleanest fuel! They would not leave many ashes but had most gruesome sound there was. The family stood by such pretty embers. Cornhusks and straw were used in until the grave was filled in and then knelt in prayer ticks to sleep on. When the straw got kind of crushed, around the grave and cried their hearts out. we would empty it and burn it in the heater, so we We always ate whatever was in season; bread was always had a clean mattress. We would also use the main part of the meal. No bread was ever served cornhusks (shredded by hand) for ticks, but most of them with potatoes or food such as noodles, were 6 strudels, or Knöpfle, which were small dumplings made from flour and water. They were really yummy cooked in vegetable soup or sauerkraut. We always had enough kraut to last all winter. We pickled watermelon, green tomatoes, and some carrots all together in a large keg. Squash, pumpkin, and sunflower seeds were used for snacks—just like peanuts are used in this country. If there were lots of them, oil was made out of them. This oil was delicious, and we would use it on our bread like butter. We also used goose grease mixed with a little honey. I don't remember any jelly. We had some jam out of grapes, pears, gooseberries, and rose leaves. There were no canned fruits. Some fruits were dried for winter, such as grapes and pears. We had two large mulberry trees, and every Sunday morning my father would let people come and pick all the berries they wanted. There would be ten to fifteen boys in one tree at a time, Cornhusking parties followed by a watermelon feast were fun. The weddings were something. After the ceremony came the food. Chicken noodle soup and rice boiled in milk were cooked in large iron kettles outdoors. I can Combing flax. Courtesy of the Landsmannschaft der still see those dear old ladies stirring that rice with long, Bessarabiendeutschen. wooden spoons. Sugar was cooked with the rice, raisins were added just before serving, and the rice was At sheep-shearing time, the sheep were taken into a sprinkled with more sugar and cinnamon. They also stream of water and washed, then put on the grass to dry. served hot potato salad that was very tasty. Lots of sour It took a kid or two to keep them standing up until the wine and coffee cakes were served. There would be sing- wool was dry. After the sheep were sheared, wool was ing and dancing—if there was room in the house. In picked over by hand, stretched real fine, then carded to summer dancing took place outdoors. get ready to spin—which meant more weaving to be How well I remember my mother's first sewing done and also knitting. Skirts were made of wool; machine. It had to be turned by hand, so at times that was underwear, towels, tablecloths, and sheets were of linen. a good chore for the small ones. Until she got the Linen thread was also used for crocheting and wool machine, all her sewing was done by hand—even the thread for embroidery. men's clothing. People raised flax in order to make their Memories of my father are few. He liked to tease. He own linen. When the plants were ripe enough, the seeds would tie a little wagon with a string onto a big wagon; were knocked off and used for oil and replanting. The then he would ask if we wanted to go with him. We whole plant was pulled by hand, tied in small bundles, would, of course, and got into the little wagon. When he then soaked in a stream of water (I don't recall the length started out, the string would break. Another trick was, of time). Then it was taken out and dried. When dry when we asked if we could go, he would say, "Sure, enough, the fibers were crushed. After being crushed, three steps behind the wagon." He would take three they were pulled through a comb-like thing that looked steps, set us down, and away he'd go. That happened like wool cards. What a beautiful sight it was to see those while I was very small. He liked to fish. I remember one clean, white threads! The next step was to spin it. I never morning when he came home pulling the little wagon did learn that. When it came to weaving time, I wound full of fish and whistling. Mother asked him how he the bobbins and kept the shuttles filled. After the could whistle when she had cried all night. His answer weaving came the bleaching, which was done by was, "But look at all the fish I caught." He was very stretching the cloth out on the grass with little space strict, but also very kind. Mother told us how he used to between the cloth and grass, and then it had to be kept check the necks and sleeves of the kids' shirts and wet all the time. Whenever a dry spot showed up, it had nightclothes to see that they were not too tight. He didn't to be wet again. This was done with a sprinkling can. believe anything should be too tight around the necks or That was an all-day j ob for a kid big enough to lug a wrists. We did not have to be told all the time that we sprinkling can of water out of a stream. I bleached my were loved; we knew it. share of cloth. We had to mind even when we were sick. He had love and compassion like no one else I knew. (My son reminds me of him in a lot of ways.) I still can see to sleep many nights and was so very tired; the nights him reach up into a cherry tree and cut a switch when he were too short to get all the sleep I would have liked to saw me running home with something in my apron. He have had. asked me what I had, and I told him doll rags that my These folks wanted to make a trip home before cousin had given me. He did not believe me and winter set in. I was so very happy and planned to ask my switched my hinder all the way back to return them, mother not to let me go back with them. I cried for joy where I got on my knees and asked her forgiveness. when I saw our home and ran as fast as my legs could How he knew they had not been given to me, I will go. But, as I came around the gate, my brother Rudolf never know. stopped me, dried my tears, and told me to tell Mother Another memory of him was after he came home that I didn't want to stay home and would like to go from his cousin's funeral. He was so very sad, and I back with them. He told me that Mother had only one heard him talking to Mother, saying God was unjust to sack of flour and a small pig for meat. My sister take a father of eight children away from them when he Margaretha and brother Erhart were too little to go away was needed so much. Mother told him he had better ask from home, and Margaretha was a sickly child. So, after God's forgiveness, as God is just. Well, soon after that, two days' visit, back with them I went. But after a few he got very sick. It was called lung fever. I remember months, Mother was very homesick, too, and sent a how he would cough up bloody stuff, so they bled him. letter to them by people that came that way (there was That was done by puncturing the flesh in several places. no postal service at this place) and told them to bring or Then a small wick or whatever was lit, put into a glass, send me home. and the glass was placed over the openings in the flesh. So, in the dead of winter, Samuel took me home. We That acted like a suction cup and drew out the blood. started out before daylight. There wasn't any snow, yet, What a gruesome sight that was; I always managed to but it was bitter cold. We traveled by find a way to see what I was not supposed to. Anyway, he did not live long after that. So God took him from his ten children who also needed him. It was during that illness that I saw my first orange. My oldest sister, Lydia, brought some to him. Father passed away Febru- ary 9,1905, at 4:15 p.m., and the funeral was the afternoon of February 12. From then on, life was rough. My sister Emma was taken by a family not far from our place. She must have been about twelve. I remember how terribly sick she was. She had run a pitchfork into her foot. The foot was black and horribly swollen. She suffered a lot of pain and twisted with agony. You never heard of pain killers then. A family took me to a new settlement about a hundred miles from home. I was to take care of two small children and help with the chores. Work began at daybreak and ended at dark. The chores were to help carry water, gather fuel—anything that would burn— milk the sheep, rake hay, hoe weeds, and wash the diapers by hand (I was nine years old then). One day the young man working for them and I were sent to haul some straw. As we were coming down a hill on the wagon loaded with straw, he slipped off the straw onto the wagon tongue. The horses started to run, and I, too, hit the ground and must have been knocked out. Just before dark they found me walking in a daze and unable to talk. I was sick for days. To this day I don't know if or where I was hurt. I don't remember playing at anything or with anyone all summer. There were no other girls my own age. That is when I got a real taste of homesickness. I cried myself

The Bessarabian steppe in the winter. Courtesy of the Landsmannschaft der Bessarabiendeutschen. wagon. It had a thick layer of straw for me to sit in or lie butchered. The fat was trimmed off and rendered for lard. on. We had two small pigs in a sack. I put my feet under The breasts, legs, and thighs were cured like ham and them to keep warm, but the backs of my legs got frozen eaten without cooking. Yum, yum, they were good! The anyway. Samuel did not know the road—or should I say rest of the goose carcass was frozen (even the feet) and "trail." It was hard to see in the dark, and we were soon used later for soups and stews. The wings were used for lost. The horses stopped and would not go any farther. dusters; they were made into shapes like brushes. They So Samuel got down to see what was wrong. We were on were also used to brush egg yolk onto the top of the the edge of a cliff. He backed the horses up and started bread to give it a pretty glaze. again. Going was very slow until dawn, when we found a I used to help my brother-in-law, John Hehr, in his fairly well-traveled road. This took us to a frozen stream carpenter shop. I mixed paint and putty in a hand-turned we had to cross. Samuel cut a hole in the ice, and we mill that resembled a food chopper. I helped him tread a scattered the fine ice on the main stream and poured machine that he used to shape wood for furniture legs. water on it to make the surface rough so that the horses The furniture that man could make was beautiful. He was could walk and not fall. We made it safely over that one. an artist when it came to painting. I can still see him put We soon came to another stream that was wider and stain on and brush it in ever so lightly. He made it look deeper. We could see water under the ice. Once again we as if it had grown that way. He made beds, tables, chairs, made the top rough, but got only a little way across when wardrobes, and coffins. the horses stopped and then started to back up. When we Another chore for me was in the spring when plowing got back away, the ice broke. If the horses hadn't started. I had to lead the horses so that they would make stopped, "we would have gone down. I often wonder if a straight row. I could just reach the horses, because they that is why I love horses so very much. were large work horses. I had to lead them when Anyway, we traveled on, and just before dark we cultivating the cornfields and vineyards too. It seems to came to a Bulgarian village with no motels or inns. A me that spring came early. The storks would arrive about family took us in and gave us tea to drink with our bread. the ninth of March to claim their nests on the houses. By That was all we had with us. They put straw on the Easter the grass was tall; Johnny-jump-ups and butter- heater, which was a built-in deal about nine feet wide cups would be in bloom. We would take grass and make and the full length of the room. The whole family slept nests for the Easter Bunny to put eggs into—and maybe a there side by side. In the morning the bedding was folded cookie or two. Easter dresses were not heard of; you up, and the straw was used to heat the place where we wore whatever you had to church. On Easter morning at had slept. It was so good to get into a warm house. Just sunrise, the band would march to the cemetery, gather before it was quite daylight, I heard a noise outdoors. I around the large cross, and play hymns. A sermon was woke Samuel, and he and our host went out to see. Sure given by the pastor. My brother George played the enough, it was horse thieves, but they did not get the trumpet in the band. horses. We started once more and at last got home safely, Our summers were very nice, not too hot. The winters but very cold and hungry. were very bitter cold. Mother made shoes out of old wool In the spring after the geese hatched and were big suits. Several layers of cloth made the soles. The tops enough to put out on the grass, we would take them to a came just to our ankles. Our stockings were knee-length small forest. I had to spend the whole day with them so and handmade out of homespun wool. Only the kids who that the old ones would not take them to the stream, went to school had leather shoes made to measure by the which was icy cold and would chill them to death. There shoemaker. were other kids there with their geese. The old gander Christmas brought kind of a holy season and would sure would try to get the mothers and little ones to the last about three weeks. We always had a small, nicely water. I dug a small hole in the dirt, gathered dry twigs, shaped thorn tree. We cut old writing tablets in strips and built a fire. Then I climbed trees and robbed crows' about two inches wide, cut one side like a fringe, and nests. I wrapped the eggs in wet rags and put them into wrapped that around the branches of the tree. It made the the coals for a little while. They were just like a hard- tree look snow covered. We also trimmed it with a few boiled egg and tasted just as good. I would also watch walnuts, cookies, and carob pods (also called St. John's the geese for other folks who had no kids. I was paid for bread and very tasty). Kristkindle (a lady dressed in this with sunflower seeds, or they would give Mother white) would come Christmas Eve after church. After we something, such as flour. The geese were plucked alive sang "Silent Night" and other songs, she would give us when they were about to molt, because it was painless each a few walnuts and a candy that was flat, about then (or so we thought). Those feathers made the best pillows and quilts. When winter set in the young geese were two inches wide and three inches long. It was wrapped in Pigpens were built above the ground with board white paper with a pretty picture on the front and a fringe floors, and a part of the floor had cracks about two on both ends. It tasted very good, I haven't had any in this inches wide where the waste went. One end had straw country that tastes like it, but I do think nougat comes as for the pigs to lie on. They would never mess on it but close as any. Oh, yes, we played a game with nuts. It was would go to the end where the floor was bare. Pigs, played by placing nuts in pairs on the floor a certain sheep, geese, cows, and horses were our main livestock. distance apart. You had to stand a certain distance away When my brother Daniel returned from the Russo- and roll one walnut, and all those you hit were yours. Oh, Japanese War of 1904-05, he decided to go to America. my, what a gamble that was—and a sure way to lose He had been in the thick of the battle with the Japanese nuts. We received gifts that were badly needed: mittens and had had his horse shot out from under him. I am not for the boys and a homemade ball (to play something like sure if he carried a gun or just a saber. He and his wife baseball in this country). The girls got dolls that were Wilhelmina settled in Kulm, North Dakota, made out of rags. I remember the first one that I received. My brothers Otto, Rudolph, and Hugo also settled in It had a china head. That was the last Christmas my Kulm, North Dakota. Otto had some training to be a father was alive. blacksmith, and Rudolph had some training in carpentry. He could do almost anything, such as drawing and painting. He was a born artist. Hugo was real handy at making things with his hands. In the year 1909 my mother said, "I, too, will go to America, where my children and their children won't have to go to war." (Well, it never turned out that way since my husband was in World War I and my son in World War II.) So, my brother George, his wife Christina and little son Daniel, my mother, sisters Emma and Margaretha, brother Erhart, and I made the trip. I don't remember how far we went or where we got on the train. It could have been at St. Petersburg. I wish I could remember more about the train ride. The train crews in Germany were mean. One of them kicked my fanny and told me to hurry out of there—that did not increase my love for the Germans. They called us names that I won't mention. We spent a few days in Bremen before boarding the S.S. Main for America. We were vaccinated for smallpox. Ten days or two weeks later I sure got sick from that vaccination. My arm was swollen three times its normal size. That is when I got seasick. The ocean was rough for a few days. The ship would rock like a cradle and dip water. We were on the ocean Playing games with nuts at Christmas time was a favorite three weeks. We came closer to the Statue of Liberty to pastime of children in Bessarabia. Sometimes the game see what she looked like, and the band aboard played was played in pairs, sometimes in singles. Courtesy of "America" as we were going by. We were finally at the Landsmannschaft der Bessarabiendeutschen. Baltimore, where we landed, and were soon on our way to North Dakota. We made one stop in St. Paul, where The washing was done in the summer in the stream. we had our first taste of rolled oats. We arrived safely in Clothes were laid on a flat rock and beat lightly with a Kulm, North Dakota, in November 1909 and were taken flat board. In the winter they were rubbed on the to my brother Daniel's place, where neighbors had unpainted kitchen table. John Hem-made a washboard for gathered with all kinds of food, the likes of which I had Mother, which was a big help. When knitting needles got never seen or tasted. rusty, they were laid on the sandy ground and rolled Mother, Margaretha, and Erhart stayed with Daniel under foot. This would make them shine like new again. and Wilhelmina. I went with Rudolf and Lydia for about Sand was used for cleaning forks, knives, skillets, and a year. I spent part of the next year anything that needed scouring. Vinegar and salt were used for brass and copper.

10 with another family that had several boys and one little That summer I stayed with a family that had three girl. I was supposed to help with the housework but had little boys, and the woman was kind of sickly. Then I to help the boys with the milking of fourteen cows (by spent one year in a bakery. I got up at 3 a.m. to help mix hand) and working in the hayfield. We also harvested dough and fry doughnuts before we started to serve wheat. I was working on the header box one day, when breakfast in the cafe. I waited tables and washed my brother Hugo came to get me and said, "We are dishes—chores a fourteen-year-old could do. I had to tell going to Idaho." In 1912 Mother took up a homestead at folks I was eighteen so that I did not have to go to school Pleasant Valley, American Falls, Idaho. We had to cross but could work and earn money for Mother. I earned the reservoir by ferryboat at that time. I spent the first four dollars a week and my board. winter with Mother; Hugo, Erhart, Emma, and I then went home for a while. Erhart and Margaretha Margaretha went to my cousins, Manuel and Mary were still there too. Mother went to help some people get Adolf. One day when we had an awful blizzard, Manuel ready for a wedding or an auction, I don't remember drove up with a hayrack full of sagebrush. That was our which. I was supposed to clean the attic while she was fuel. He also had flour, milk, and meat. In spring we gone. Before I got through, I fell down the ladder and cleared some ground and stacked the brush for fuel. It broke my ankle. I was taken to the hospital that had just surely put out the heat but kept a fellow feeding the been started in American Falls. We were unable to pay stove. The men would go to the lava rocks and cut the bill, so as soon as I was able, I started working there. cedars for fence posts. What could not be used for posts I liked it so much that I stayed and began training to be a was used for fuel. nurse. That was rough, too, as I could not read, write, or speak English and was not very smart to start with, because I lacked the schooling others had had. But I had lots of elbow grease and backbone, and in those days that was very much in need. I wanted to be a missionary nurse and go to New Guinea and help in hospitals. My mother was so desperately opposed to this idea, even though she was a very religious woman, that I gave it up, but I did continue my nursing. I was graduated and ordained a deaconess in the Pleasant Valley Lutheran Church (which is still standing but not in use). We had to help finish the new hospital by putting on lath and varnishing floors and woodwork. As rooms were finished on the first floor of the new hospital, the staff moved in, but it was a long time before the nurses didn't have to haul trays up three flights of stairs. There was no elevator, although there was a shaft for one. The surgery patients were on the third floor, so lots of legwork was needed. In two years a dumb waiter was installed to take the trays up and down. This had to be pulled by hand; still it was a blessing to have. Medical care had one advantage over current care, and that was the cost of service. A ward bed was only five dollars per week; a semiprivate room was ten dollars, and a private room was fifteen dollars. A corner room, larger and more elaborate than the others was twenty dollars a week. In those days fellow sisters and I operated the hospital. The first six months we were paid nothing. For the next year we were paid four dollars a month; then we got a boost to six dollars a month. The second year it went up to eight dollars and the third year to ten dollars.

Bertha Rast, in her confirmation dress, is pictured with her brother Erhart and Bertha Hossey (no relation).

11 American Falls hospital the following winter. In the spring of 1918, I went to visit Father and Mother Jones and Brother-in-law Glenn in Kansas, Illinois. They were good, wholesome folks. Mother Jones had real bad legs and could not get around very well, but I learned many things from her. She could make the best bread out of war flour, which was not all wheat. I met lots of Harry's aunts, uncles, and cousins. They were all good Christian people. After the war ended in November 1918, I came back to Idaho to await the return of my "doughboy," as the army boys were called. He came home in May 1919. He worked in Soda Springs for a while, then went to Sage, Wyoming, and back to Soda Springs. That is where the hunting and fishing were the best—especially the ducks. That man always shot his limit, and that was twenty a day for a long time. I thought they all had to be picked, cooked, and eaten. I made pillows and feather quilts out of all the feathers. That was a wife's duty. I also cleaned all the fish and skinned and cut up the large game too. In 1921 we became proud parents of our firstborn, a son, Warren Franklin, born on December 13. Two years later we were proud to announce the birth of a daughter, Leah Pearl, on January 10, 1923. We had a wonderful duck dog that was trained to pull the children on a sleigh. He would often pull Warren to school. It broke our hearts to leave him when we moved to Inkom; we gave him to some very dear friends who gave him a good home,

Nurse Bertha Rast All surgery patients got special nurses in those days— without cost. We also took care of all the chores: washing, ironing, and cleaning. We also went to peoples' homes to care for the sick. Many people were too poor to pay, but we always gave them needed care. The sisters were always short of funds, too, so we would go baby- sitting at night to help out. It seemed like we worked twenty-six hours a day, fifteen days a week, forty days a month. In 1916 another sister and I were sent to Soda Springs, Idaho, to take charge of the hospital there. That Harry, Bertha, Warren, Leak, and the dog Bob at Soda is when I met a certain telegraph operator and fell in Springs, Idaho, in 1929. love—even though I had been ordained a deaconess. Deaconesses were not supposed to get married. On October 1, 1917, I married Harry Jones. He answered Uncle Sam's call to war and was sent overseas to France. I worked in the

12 In November 1929 we moved to Inkom, Idaho. We left a nice, modern home at Soda Springs and moved into the Union Pacific Railroad Depot, which had no electricity and no bath—just a path to the privy across two switch tracks. The water was supplied by a hand pump just outside the backdoor. After a year we got electric lights. That was a big help and made things brighter and the work lighter. It also did away with the old stove irons; so life went on. There in 1932 we became the parents of another daughter, Evelyn May. She was born on July 24, while her father was busy catching a fish that weighed more than she did. We made lots of new and very dear friends. In 1957 Harry retired from the railroad, and with the financial help of Warren and Alice, we bought a little home with a yard to take care of, dig in, plant flowers in, and watch them grow. I surely was blessed with three wonderful children, and each of them has a mate that I love as my very own. After fifty years of marriage, they gave us a reception for our Golden Wedding Anniversary. We had an open house at the Presbyterian Church in Pocatello, Idaho. That was the first time in ten years the family had all been together; only one grandson was missing, and he was in the army at the time. We saw some dear friends whom we hadn't seen for forty years, which was a joy. Due to the failing health of Harry (my honey-bear) and the prodding of friends and relatives, we sold our home in Inkom, bought a two-bedroom mobile home, and moved it to the pleasant little community of Firth, Bertha Hast Jones with two bantam chickens she raised Idaho. Our son-in-law "put us out to pasture." We left after their mother died shortly after they hatched. many old friends and many pleasant memories behind, but we are making many new ones here. We have two At the writing of this story, March 1970, there are three of beautiful pine trees by our bedroom windows, and the us left: my brother Erhart of Guinda, California; Margaretha of moon comes shining through them so nicely. I listen to Valley City, North Dakota, and myself. the banty chickens talking as they roost in the tree by my Editor's note: Bertha Hast Jones passed away on bedroom window. So with all the tender, loving care of September 15, 1986. the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, we are very comfortable and feel very much at home. I think I have just about "thunk" myself out. So with kindest regards to family, relatives, and friends, be happy and safe now and always. Have faith in God. Those of you who don't believe in Him better do so, as you have nothing to lose and everything to gain in this world as well as the next. So, love one another, and share your burdens as well as your joys. I'll close with a big "thank you" and a heart full of love to all my family and friends.

13

14 THE ORGANIZATION OF THE FIRST GERMAN SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST CHURCH IN AMERICA AND ITS INFLUENCE Adaline Werner Reimche This article, under the title "How the German Work Began," was first printed in Adventist Review, April 29, 1982, pp. 8-10. It is reprinted here by permission from Adventist Review with adaptations from additional material provided 'to us by Mrs. Reimche. These additions appear in brackets in the text. Mrs. Reimche refers to a number of her relatives and to those of her husband Elmer in this account. They were instrumental in establishing the Seventh-Day Adventist Church in the United States and have continued to wield influence in the mission of the church. The Reimches live in Lodi, California. On April 9,1882, the first German Seventh-Day Adventist church in America was organized. But the story of how the German work began reaches back to Russia as well as Germany. In the eighteenth century, responding to Catherine the Great's invitation, many Germans migrated to Russia. From the [Hessian area], home of Martin Luther, some of Conrad Reiswig and his wife Elizabeth (Tebelius) the Reiswig, Reimche, Bechthold, and Baumbach Reiswig. They came to the United States in 1874. families settled in the Ukraine near Chernigov. From the Rhineland, Johannes Seib with his wife and 20, 1875. They had sold their home in Herenhoff [sic} 2-year-old daughter, Anna Marie [Elmer's maternal [Herrendank in the Crimea], Russia, and taken the train to grandmother], also joined a group [bound] for Russia. Hamburg, Germany, port of departure for America. Anna Johannes was handicapped, having been born with only Marie Bechthold was the former 2-year-old Anna Marie one arm. They had neither wagon nor cart, so he prepared Seib and now the mother of Jacob and Mary Anna a wheelbarrow that he could handle with one hand plus a Reiswig [Elmer's mother]. In 1878 Mary Anna married strap over his shoulder. On this wheelbarrow they loaded Conrad Reimche [Elmer's father], an emigrant from their belongings. Many of the emigrants carried all they Rundewiese, Russia. had in sacks on their backs. In Russia the German families lived in colonies. They did not integrate with the Russian people. If the village or Dorf did not have a school, the parents taught the children the three "Rs," with religious instruction the most important subject in each home and the Bible as the reading book. These German colonies provided the nucleus for the future Adventist work among Germans in the United States. In 1874 Conrad Reiswig and his wife, and Henry Bechthold and his wife, sailed for America. Going by train to the Dakota Territory, they worked in the Yankton area, sawing cordwood for 50 cents a ten-hour day. In the spring they took up a homestead in the Wittenberg area, south of Milltown, South Dakota. Michael Bechthold, Henry's father, and Anna Marie, his stepmother, with eight members in the family, sailed into New York Harbor October

Anna Marie Seib Reiswig Bechthold, born in Germany, immigrated to the United States from Russia in 1875.

15 Phillip Reiswig [Adaline's paternal greatgrandfather] The following Sunday at the study group, Jacob and wife, Catherine, who came to the Milltown area in related his experience with the young man and told the 1876, were accompanied by their daughter, Marie leader about the tract. He stated that he felt the tract gave Elizabeth [Adaline's grandmother, who married definite proof for the keeping of the seventh-day Sabbath Frederick Werner, Adaline's paternal grandfather in and that he could not find any text in the Bible that 1877. They filed for a homestead in section 30, the pointed to Sunday sacredness. The group asked Jacob to southeast 160 acres. Marie's father, Phillip Reiswig, filed bring the tract to the next meeting. He did so, whereupon for the northwest 160 acres, section 30. Adaline's the leader asked for it and said he would be able to maternal great-grandfather, Henry Baumbach, and his answer it the next Sunday with plenty of proof for sons, Conrad, George, Johann, and Christian, with their Sundaykeeping. After several families had taken the families and Henry II, Adaline's grandfather, came from tract home to find proof for Sundaykeeping, the group Herrendank, Russia, via Hamburg, Germany.] They, too, had a lively discussion and decided to worship on the homesteaded in the Wittenberg area. These families were seventh day. Lutheran and met in a sod building each Sunday to Richard Conradi reported that E. H. Pullen went to worship. One Sunday in 1878, on the way home in their the Russian settlement near Milltown in 1878 and one-horse carriage, Jacob Reiswig [Elmer's maternal distributed some reading matter. He could speak very grandfather] and family picked up a young man. Since a little German, but he tried to present to the people, as baby was on the mother's lap and a little girl (the late best he could, the arguments for the present truth by Mary Reiswig Tebelius) was seated on the floor at their giving them, from his English Bible, the references to feet, the young man had to ride standing on the axle at proof texts, which they looked up in their German the back of the carriage. Bibles. In a little while about thirty-five accepted the The young man inquired about the meeting, and upon Sabbath. finding it was of a religious nature, started talking about Since there were no German ministers at that time, the Scriptures. They reached a fork in the road. The the work did not progress very fast. However, a German young man had planned to take the other road, but Jacob paper, the Stimme der Wahrheit (Voice of Truth), began invited him home so that they could continue the Bible in July 1879—first as a quarterly, later as a monthly. discussion. Although Jacob spoke but little English and This paper gave the new believers added knowledge the young man could not speak German, the two about present truth. S. B. Wnitney visited the group, but managed to communicate. They studied together until they could not agree on some minor points. two o'clock in the morning. The next day, as the young Nevertheless, the group continued requests for a German man was leaving, he gave Jacob a German tract, "Warum worker, and on February 13, 1882, L. R. Conradi was nicht früher entdeckt?" (Why Not Discovered Before?). sent to Milltown. By this time the group had split into It gave many texts dealing with the seventh-day Sabbath, factions. and Jacob spent much time the rest of the week studying Elder Conradi reported in March: "Arriving again at it. Milltown, I commenced a regular course of lectures, and the plain truths of the message have melted away the peculiarities which existed here. Sabbath we had our first German Sabbath school. Over forty were in attendance. We did the best we could without lesson sheets. Sunday night we again met for the purpose of talking over the subject of their uniting with us. On a Friday afternoon in April, Elder Whitney was called to attend a funeral in Bridgewater. Then he went to Milltown, where he found "the company fully in the faith of the message as the result of the faithful labors of Brother Conradi." Reporting on his findings, Elder Whitney wrote: "Only those who understand the situation can appreciate what these labors have been or the importance of the results reached. It is one of the Anna Marie Seib Reiswig Bechthold's son, Jacob great triumphs of truth, and its influence will reach much Reiswig, was a local elder of the first German Adventist further than this immediate time and locality. Yesterday, Church in America. Later he was ordained and took April 9, the church was fully organized with a responsibility for the German membership of fourteen. In the afternoon two were work. baptized and

16 in the evening these, with one another, united with the The influence of the group in Milltown also bore fruit church." Later events proved this to be a prophetic in [the! Crimea, Russia, as members sent papers and statement indeed. tracts to friends and relatives. Phillip Reiswig, 67 years Jacob Reiswig [Elmer's uncle] was chosen as elder, of age, had lost his wife and had a speech impediment. Conrad Reiswig the deacon, and Henry Bechthold the But he had a son, relatives, and friends in the Crimea, Sabbath school leader and treasurer. The group built a sod and he determined that they should know about the church on Phillip Reiswig's lots near the James River. Adventist message. He sold his property and, in Later a frame building replaced the sod one. An 1885 November 1883, with a trunkful of Seventh-Day report listed more than forty members, with every charter Adventist tracts and papers, returned to Russia at his own member still faithful. Each Sabbath they left the church expense. singing the old Lutheran hymn, "Take Thou My Hand, 0 His age and speech impediment proved to be an Father," the German pioneers' prayer. advantage under the prevailing circumstances, for he was Many from the Milltown church became ministers and not permitted to preach openly. He would go to a worked for the Germans in the Dakotas, other states, and marketplace and ask someone to read to him from the Canada. Jacob Reiswig was sent to Battle Creek for pamphlet. Then he would make some remarks about the training and was ordained in July 1885. He then was passage read. If the reader showed any interest, he would placed on the conference committee and took the burden let him keep the leaflet. He visited in the homes and also of the German work in other parts of the field. His son, called on the Lutheran pastors. After two years Phillip Jacob Judson Reiswig, went to school at Union College, came back to South Dakota, but later returned [to Russia] Nebraska, and in 1907 began work in the North Dakota in 1887 with more literature, even selling his American Conference as an evangelist. In Canada he served as boots for enough money to pay his fare to [the] Crimea. Young People's secretary and then as president of the He died in Russia. Alberta Conference. Subsequently he was president of the When L. R. Conradi went to the Crimea in July 1886, Oklahoma, Montana, and New York conferences. [He he found a dozen Sabbathkeepers in [Vypasnoye] and retired as the associate pastor of the Fairmont Seventh- learned of as many more scattered within a radius of 50 Day Adventist Church in Lodi, California, and frequently miles. During that summer he organized the first visited the surrounding churches. It was not unusual for Adventist church in the Crimea with nineteen members, him to have three preaching appointments on the former Baptists and Mennonite Brethren. He found many weekend.] people who spoke of "the good old man" (Phillip Reiswig) who came from America and scattered the seeds of truth. In Conradi's report in the General Con- ference Bulletin, 1901, he wrote, "Only the day of judgment will show how many souls have been brought to the knowledge of the truth through the publications circulated by that faithful old brother." One of the nineteen members was G. Tetz. He later became a pioneer worker in southern Russia and elsewhere. [His influence extended into Canada when Andrew Tetz married Elizabeth Humann. Many Adventists in Canada remember Henry Humann, Elizabeth's brother, one of the presidents of the Alberta Conference.] John Werner's home was one of the homes in [Vypasnoye] where Phillip spent some time in 1883. In October 1884, the Werners [Adaline's paternal great- Jacob Judson Reiswig (Jacob's son) with his wife grandparents] arrived in New York on the Suevia. John, Caroline and children Lloyd and Delia. Jacob Judson was with his sons and sons-in-law, Adam Eberhardt, and an evangelist for the church in the North Dakota Adolph Knittel, took up homesteads in Wells County, Conference. North Dakota. They were members of the Bowdon Seventh-Day Adventist Church, where they worshipped Other ministers included Conrad Reiswig (the young in a sod building erected in 1897. [Later some of the man who came in 1874), his son Christian, Valentine Leer Wemer families moved to Canada, California, and other (a former Baptist minister from Russia), and his son Carl. states. Many of the descendants of this family are

17 Adventists and laborers for the church.] the Sabbath. Conrad and his son, Carl, joined the As the families in the Wittenberg, South Dakota, area Milltown church, but the others continued to worship in moved to other states and Canada, they also helped to their building. Christian, with his family and mother spread the three angels' messages. Many of their Wilhelmina, moved to Kansas. When Grandpa Henry descendants became educators, doctors, nurses, and took his family to Kansas to visit, he preached the other workers for the church. Art Reiswig, wishing like Sabbath message. When he moved to Lodi, the his greatgrandfather, Phillip Reiswig, to see lives Baumbach church was the place of worship for some of changed through the reading of Bible-oriented literature, his converts—the Reuscher family, the Young family, engaged in the literature program of the church for the Erhardt family, and others. This church is now the thirty-one years. His last position was literature Seventh-Day Church of God.] evangelism director for the West Coast—California, Surely the organization of the Milltown German Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and Hawaii. church, April 9, 1882, did reach out to influence [Adaline's maternal great-grandfather, Henry thousands beyond its immediate time and place. Baumbach, his sons, and their families, accepted

AHSGR*S EIGHTEENTH INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION PORTLAND, OREGON. JULY 20-26 Look for the texts of the major convention addresses to be published in future issues of the Journal or Clues—or better yet, plan to attend the convention and hear the speeches firsthand! They will include: **”101 Ways to Preserve Your Heritage"—Carol Harless, Los Altos, CA **”A Dialect Story From Frank, Russia"—Conrad Krening, Portland, OR **"Unser Babba und unsere Mamma— Their Early Life and Marriage"—Mary Koch, McMinnville, OR **”01d Country Polk Songs, Humor, and Memories"—David R. Schultheiss, Portland, OR **"Poetic Lines and Musical Rhymes of the Germans From Russia"—Lewis R. Marquardt and Dona Reeves-Marquardt, Buda, TX **"Russia Today: A Cross-cultural Experience"—Shirley Halvorsen, Bloomington, MN **"My Experiences in a Siberian Prison Camp During and After World War II"— Bruno Reule, Portland, OR

18 OUR FOREFATHERS AND FAMILY AS TOLD TO ME BY MY MOTHER Theresa Rose Wegner Ennis Life in Russia (married Dorthea Schmidt), and Amelia (married David Alberti). Our parents were descendants of the German people Mother's parents were Solomon Lehman and Dorthea who immigrated to Russia during the reign of Catherine Lehman nee Schmitt. Their children were as follows: II. The German people settled into many small villages, Wilhelmina (married Edward Wegner), Alexander which were usually named after the first settlers. The (married Katherina Runk), Elizabeth (married Fredrick chief language spoken in the villages was German, Kober), Sophia (married Gottlieb Kober), Molly although each village had a different dialect. (married Liwen Kober), Wilhelm (married Sophia Each village consisted of a church, a school, a store, Kober, then Elizabeth Kober, Sophia's sister, after and several small businesses. The church in our family's Sophia died), Pauline (married Anthony Zippo), Dorthy village was Lutheran, Most churches were Protestant if (married David Runk, then Cornelius Michel, after Runk not Lutheran. Some of the businesses in the villages were died). tanneries, flour mills, and sunflower presses. The Our father was born February 3, 1876, and our sunflower press processed the large quantity of seed mother was born September 28, 1883. They were raised in the village. The seeds were pressed for the oil to married on November 13, 1903, at Susannental, Russia. be used as cooking oil, and the remains were fed to the livestock—much like the cottonseed cake is fed here. Tobacco was another crop raised. The leaves were dried, baled, and sold. The stalks and stems were chopped, sprinkled with salt, and fed to the stock. Nothing was wasted; everything was put to use. Each family had a large plot of ground in the village for a very large vegetable garden, a small orchard, and a barnyard. The main farming was done a number of miles outside the village. When a son married, it was customary that he brought his wife to live with his family. In some instances this carried over into the third and fourth generations. In the schools the children learned the basic reading, writing, and ciphering. The boys went to school longer than the girls, as it was believed it was more important for the girls to learn to cook, sew, etc. It was compulsory for the boys to learn to read and write the Russian language because of the military service, although German was spoken in school, and classes were conducted in German. Our family had settled along the Volga River. There the land was fertile river bottom with sufficient annual rainfall to grow good crops without irrigation. The village in which our mother and father were born was called Susannental [also known as Winkelmann], Dad's parents were Gottlieb Wegner and Dorthea (Roth) Wegner. Their children were as follows: Henry (married Katherina Roth), Edward (married Wilhelnina Lehman), David (married Amelia Kober), Edward Wegner is pictured on the left wearing his Theresa (married David Kober), Wilhelm Russian army uniform. The name of his comrade is not known. This photograph was taken in Chernigov, Russia.

19 In the late 1800s the Russian government had broken scarce. One would have to obtain a permit to gather the promise made by Catherine the Great and had started kindling wood in the hills and river bottom. So the main drafting the young men into the military service. fuel was this straw and manure mixture called Mistholz On February 8, 1904, war was declared on Japan. which means "manure wood." Dad was called into the service. After basic training he was sent to Manchuria on August 8, 1904. There his work was about the equivalent of the military police in our American army; he transported troops to and from the induction center to the war front. The Russo" Japanese War of 1904-1905 was a hard-fought, heartbreaking war. In the end, a treaty was signed that gave Japan the southern half of Sakhalin Island; the Russian-built railroad; cities in southern Manchuria, including Port Arthur, Russia's only open port to the Pacific Ocean, and Dalny [now Dairen] and Russia's fishing rights to the eastern waters. It also led to Japanese domination of Korea, Japan wanted—but did not get—war indemnities. Although victorious, Japan could ill afford the costly war of 1904-1905 much longer, especially since she was rapidly losing American sympathy. On September 5, 1905, peace was concluded at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, U.S.A., through the mediation of President Theodore Roosevelt. Dad was discharged from the service and came home December 20,1905, to see his firstborn child, a daughter, Dorthy, born December 1,1904. Mom told me that for the entire time Dad was in the service, she received in - Russian money the equivalent of $1.35 in American money as an allotment for servicemen's wives. Ironic as it may seem, Russia regained all of these losses of 1905 Camels were used by many farmers in the Volga at the close of World War II in 1945. Region. These belonged to the Lebsack family in Frank. Meanwhile, back in the village of Susannental, things Photo courtesy of the Nebraska State Historical Society. were going along about the same as usual, The farming was done mostly by hand; the land was plowed with My grandfather used camels for farming because horses or camels and seeded to grain. After planting the they could outwork two Or three sets of horses. The men fields on land some distance away from the village, most following the plows would rotate, but the camels would of the workers would return to the village for the work twelve to sixteen hours a day. With their long legs summer, leaving one of the married sons and his wife taking long strides, they could cover a lot of miles in the out on the land to watch the crop. This area was referred course of a day. The camels could graze on weeds and to as the khutor. There they lived in a soddy. Mom said thistle and fare just fine, whereas a horse would starve that the time she and Dad spent out there was some of under the same conditions. the best years of her life in Russia. They now had their The Wegner family had five camels, which they own little family, and it was good not to have to live bought from a Turkish horse-trader selling camels as a with the big family in the village, sideline. Four of the camels were dromedarius The rest of the family back home would perform all [dromedaries], the single-humped Arabian species. One sorts of tasks such as tending to the garden and the was of the two-humped Asian species, bactri-anus, orchard as well as raising the row crops of tobacco and differing from Arabian camels in having a shorter, sunflowers. They also formed straw, water, and stockier body with long, more abundant hair and being barnyard manure into blocks. These they laid out to dry better fitted for a rigorous climate. The camels were kept and cure in the sun- Later they were used for fuel, much in the bam during the winter due to the cold. In spring like the early pioneers used buffalo chips. In Russia they were sheared, and the wool was carded and spun wood for fuel was very into yarn to make shawls, socks, quilt batts, etc. Contrary to the old belief that a camel stores water in its hump, the hump actually stores fat on which the camel lives

20 in times of feed shortage. One of the camels sickened and Our parents lived and worked with the family, but died. In order to find the cause of death, he was cut open, Dad was dissatisfied and wanted out of Russia. Dad and and an obstruction was found. He wasn't a total loss, our brother Carl had already gotten their allotted however, as the hide was salvaged and the hump government acreage, but Dad had seen the handwriting rendered and made into soap. on the wall while he was in the service. While things When our brother Carl was about six years old, he were fine at home in the village, the unrest he had seen in crawled onto the double-humped camel, which was lying the larger cities didn't appeal to him. He wasn't in down, and sat between the humps. Well, Mr. Camel agreement with the government policies or the ideas of didn't approve of this, so he got up and gave Carl quite a the revolutionaries, so he decided to make plans to go to ride. Carl hung on to the long, shaggy hair for dear life. America. The camel led the folks a merry chase before they got By now his family had grown. In addition to Dorthy, Carl off. born December 1, 1904, he had Carl, born August 30, In fall when the grain was ready to be harvested, the 1906. Another son Solomon, born August 28,1908, died family workers would return to the humor, cut the grain at about three months of age from complications of with scythes, tie it into bundles, and haul it to the village measles. Amelia was born July 29, 1910. When the next to be threshed. They would select a number of bundles baby was coming, Grandmother Wegner insisted that if it that were long and smooth, cut off the heads, and set was a boy he was to be named Solomon as was aside the straw. These heads were threshed with the rest customary. She said that because the dead Solomon was of the grain by driving cattle or horses around and around mentioned so often, there should be another Solomon in over it. Then the grain was sieved to remove the chaff. the house. So when the next child was born October 4, The reserved straw stalks were later soaked in water 1911, and it was a boy, he was named Solomon. overnight to make them more pliable, braided into skeins, Mother's parents and family had already left Russia to which were sewn into hats or woven into baskets, and go to America. In 1912 Dad finally had enough money sold. Some of the braided skeins were sold as they were. saved or borrowed to make the trip. To top it off his This work was done during the long winter evenings by youngest brother Wilhelm, whom we called Uncle Bill, both men and women. The remainder of the straw was and his wife Dorthea and then-son Rudy decided to go used for stuffing mattress pads (a feather bed was used on too. Although she was almost due with her second child, top), bedding for the animals, and fuel. Another evening they nevertheless made their plans. Grandfather made the pastime was weaving willow baskets for home use and families promise that they would stay together regardless for sale. This helped bring in a few extra rubles. of what happened. How They Came to America and the Hardships They Endured In August 1912 they traveled by horse and wagon to Katharinenstadt (now Marks], where they changed to a boat on the Volga River. They traveled on to Saratov, where they boarded a train. This was the first train ride for Mom and the children. The next stop was Berlin, Germany, where Aunt Dorthea gave birth to a son, whom they named Johnny. Here Mom and the children ate their first oranges. When Aunt Dorthea and baby were able to travel, they took a train to the city of Bremen. At Bremerhaven, the harbor near Bremen, they booked passage on the S.S. Bremen. After a stop at Antwerp, Belgium, they were off The family of Wilhelmina Lehmann Wegner is pictured in to Ellis Island, New York. There all of the adults and front of the Lehmann family home in Susannental, Volga children except Aunt Dorthea passed their physical Region, Russia. Wilhelmina and Edward Wegner are examinations. She had an eye infection and wasn't shown in the second row from the back, the third and allowed to enter the United State of America. By now fourth individuals from the left. The second girl from the then-money was running low, and they weren't sure what right in the first row is their daughter Pauline. Their son to do, so they talked it over. Uncle Bill said, Carl would not sit still for the photograph. He is easily identified in the front row, because John Lehmann is holding him by the head.

21 "Well, we can always go back to Russia." Our father and the next they would slam down between the waves. said, "If you want to, go ahead. I'm not going." So Dad Mom said she thought she'd never see the light of day went to the German embassy officials and presented his again. After the storm abated and morning came, they problem to them. He was told that they could go to ventured up onto the deck. The fresh air was most South America, as there would be no restrictions on welcome, entry there. Because they had promised their father that Now they were on their way across the Atlantic they would stay together, they decided to pool their Ocean again, on their way to Buenos Aires, Argentina. money and go to South America. All they could afford The cattle on the ship were the meat supply for the was steerage on a freighter. Conditions were terrible. passengers and crew. When they needed meat they They were routed back across the Atlantic Ocean to the would fasten a sling around the belly of a critter and Canary Islands, where they stopped at Las Palmas and hoist him up onto the deck, where a crew was standing Tenerife. Here Mom was shocked to see large black men by. No sooner did the animal's feet touch the deck than with gold loops in their ears. These were the first black one man would hit it on the forehead with a sledge people she had ever seen. They seemed to be eating hammer or the blunt end of an ax, another would slit its something, for they chewed and chewed but never throat, and another would catch the blood in a basin. The swallowed whatever it was. She later learned they were slaughtering crew drank the blood while it was still chewing gum; warm. Then they swarmed over the carcass like a bunch this was her first encounter with that too. Here they of ants, skinning and drawing the carcass and now and boarded a freighter again. It was night when they had to then cutting off a chunk of raw meat, eating it on the go out to the ship by barge and climb a rope ladder up spot with blood dripping off their chins. The sight of all the side of the ship. Once on deck they found that their this made Mom deathly ill. When the slaughter was lodging was down in the hold with the freight and some finished, the entrails were thrown overboard, and the cattle. Our brother Carl was old enough to remember the decks were flushed with hoses. All the waste and blood voyage and said that the cattle were quartered so near to would draw the fish to the surface, where the water them, they could hear them and smell the stench of the churned, as they sought their fair share of the food. Also, manure. That first night was a terrible night with winds on this part of the trip, the crew caught a huge fish, causing twenty- to thirty-foot waves. One moment they which was cleaned on the deck and used for food by the would be riding the top of the crest, crew and passengers. Mom didn't have any idea ^ nAPOXIAJIbHOE GBlW^TEnbCTBO ora nacTopa..,a-^*;^'- s^".-,. ..E^laH]--ff•i&^^r-^•^Sw^feriw3•T^•^--.^l)lTXOBa Rai odmer.Tiia f. 'r^^(^-£^c'€^yf.T^?C:e^l' ..aa % a?^-- . ^a^!'^s^^f%fl^ ^'^ ' / '' /" ' / ^ / ' /- //'•'/^ ir-i w yf-r \f' ' y •e- i.: /,,-r-l-!','..y. 1 -"' '• -'-^V --'- ^ ^ ,Wa%? ^•^2'w^c. • ,•'••/" ^ / .-' /^ .//^^-^ / i^^i^FAl" /'iw^fr^i^a/ f ^ IfJVf C ' ^^-^e^/^^ •/ „./- ,//y^-^ 1 <• '•t^-WA-f^/' " ^'-.•-i-/<^y ^-,- ^^-^ i^ '': "'i-f-^-i^y/y^/. i--&<^v^z-e"/' —,^-;r-.f \ i l-.Hi i i i This is a facsimile of the Parochial Certificate issued to the Edward Wegner family by the parish pastor prior to their departure from Susannental. This document was needed by the family in order to join a church in their new homeland. Vindicates when each member of the family was born, baptized, confirmed, married (where applicable), knowledge of reading and religion, and the last time the adults partook of Holy Communion. It indicates the family left the parish on 29 August 1912 to go to America.

22 what kind of fish it may have been, but the scales were up and gave up the retrieval operation. Carl said, "Boy! I as big as saucers and iridescent, like mother-of-pearl. thought it was goodbye, Carl." Another source of water Mother was always sorry that she didn't save several of was a stagnant pond filled with all sorts of bugs and them. leeches. One day our sister Dorthy decided she'd go During this portion of their travels, a small child wading in the pond. Almost instantly her feet and legs aboard ship took sick and died. As there was no way to were covered with leeches. She screamed bloody murder keep the body until they reached Buenos Aires, it had to until she was pulled from the water and the little beasts be buried at sea. They failed to weight the body were removed. Needless to say, she never went wading adequately, and it wouldn't sink. Mom said you could see again. the pathetic little bundle bobbing up and down on the Huge tarantula spiders were also in good supply. One waves for miles. The poor, distraught mother was nearly day a very large one was headed straight for Amelia going out of her mind, for all she could see and when Carl grabbed a rock and smashed it. Some of the remember was those fish churning up the water for those tarantulas would measure about three inches in diameter. animal entrails. She was sure those big fish would get Mom said their legspread would be as big as a saucer. her baby too. She was terrified the entire time she was in South Solomon, who was the baby .in our family, became America. quite ill and very jaundiced. Mom feared her baby would Her greatest fear was the night-riding gauchos who be the next one buried at sea, but by the grace of God, he were known to rape and steal white women and girls. overcame the illness and survived. Dad and Uncle Bill would be gone for weeks at a time The ship finally arrived at Buenos Aires, Argentina. out in the fields during harvest, leaving the women and I've been told that Buenos Aires was named from a children alone. Being alone in a strange land was bad, saying made by the sailors on the cattle ships that but for Mom these nights were the worst. shipped cattle to Buenos Aires. Upon their arrival, they When the harvest was done, Dad decided he would would get off the ship, breathe deeply, and say, "Buenos send Uncle Bill and his family on ahead to America. Dad Aires! Buenos Aires!" I'm told that this means "fresh gave him his in-laws', the Lehmans', address and the air." That's about the way the folks felt when they finally address of a cousin, Andrew Wegner, who were already got to Buenos Aires and could get out of the hold and off in America. Uncle Bill was to have Mom's folks or this the ship. They were ready for fresh air too. cousin send Dad some money to supplement what money Here they found work on a wheat and cattle ranch. he had. He decided to take advantage of the available Living conditions were very primitive and strange to the work while waiting for the money to arrive. folks. Their living quarters were a frame of two-by-fours Unbeknown to Dad and Mom, Uncle Bill and Aunt covered with corrugated metal for the walls and roof and Dorthea did not arrive in the United States as planned. with dirt floors. It was almost unbearable in the heat, and They had run out of money and were stranded in Havana, when it hailed or rained, the noise was deafening. The Cuba. Uncle Bill hoped to obtain enough money from the legs of the beds were placed in cans of coal oil to keep relatives in America to get his family into the United the spiders and insects from crawling up the legs into the States. It was then that he discovered that the Lehmans' beds. Mom had been warned about a certain hard-shelled address was missing. Aunt Dorthea didn't care too much bug, which could inflict a very painful bite, so she would about Mom's family, so either she purposely lost the ad- get up in the night to check the children and shake the dress or destroyed it. They did send a cablegram to the bedding to make sure these pests weren't settling in. One cousin. Although he received it, he never acknowledged would never put on clothes or shoes without checking it. them out for bugs or scorpions. When one month had gone by and no word or money Their main water supply was a well from which water had come. Dad said to Mom, "I think we should get had to be drawn with buckets. Apparently, they had only underway. If we manage carefully, I think we can make two buckets. One day they dropped one into the well. In it on what money we have." By now Mom was expecting order to retrieve it, they lowered Carl in the remaining another baby. bucket. He was told to grab the other bucket and be On April 7,1913, Dad and his family left Buenos hauled back up. He said that he didn't know how deep it Aires, Argentina. Their first stop was at Salvador was, but all he could see was that deep, black hole with a [Bahia], Brazil. While they were there, they were little spot of light above him. He was panic-stricken, allowed to leave the ship and stroll about on the dock. screaming for dear life, so they hauled him When it was time to return to the ship, everyone did so except brother Carl. Somehow he was overlooked, as he was busily exploring the

23 dock. When he happened to look up, he saw the port, Dad took Carl aside and put a few drops into his gangplank being taken up, so he took a running leap eyes. He passed with flying colors. They had finally across the space between the dock and gangplank and, made it to America. Mom said she had shed so many luckily, made it. tears from the time they had left Russia until they finally The next stop was Havana, Cuba. The folks were up arrived in America that if her tears had been able to on the deck as they were coming into the harbor, when wash her into the United States, she would have been Dad spotted a man standing on the dock waving his here way ahead of the rest of them. handkerchief. While they were still about half an hour's Mom had been nursing the baby, but without a ride out, Dad said to Mom, "There is my brother Bill." proper diet and adequate rest, her milk didn't amount to Mom said, "Nonsense, by now he is in America." But much. The baby was about half-starved and cried night when they got off the ship, sure enough, it was Uncle and day as they traveled through Texas. There was no Bill. He had met every boat that docked, hoping Dad diner or milk available on the train, so they walked the would be on one of them. He had run out of money and aisles with a screaming baby. Two young Swiss men was in arrears with his hotel and board bill. Dad paid it took pity on them; off and sent Uncle Bill and our sister Dorthy on to they took the baby and yodeled as they walked the America. They went back to Ellis Island with Dorthy aisles, trying to put him to sleep—but to no avail. posing as his daughter. This time they were allowed to Finally a porter came through the car selling bananas enter. They came directly to Billings, where they stayed and apples. Dad bought some, and they fed the baby with Mom's folks until he could find a place for himself some mashed banana and scraped apple pulp. When his and his family. It was also understood that he would stomach was full, he finally went to sleep. Along the provide a place for Dad and our family when they way they were able to buy some milk, and that made it a arrived. Meanwhile Grandpa Lehman sent Mom and little easier. Dad some money, so Dad was able to send Aunt Coming north through Sheridan, Wyoming, they Dorthea and the two boys on to Ellis Island. She was arrived in Billings on December 13, 1913. granted entry this time and joined Uncle Bill in Billings, Montana. Our sister Dorthy stayed with our Life in America grandparents. Dad did some more inquiring and was told if he At first they stayed with Mom's family. Later they would go to Mexico, it would cost less to enter America. moved into a renovated saloon in old Central Park on By now it was getting nearer to the time for the baby to Central Avenue, where Grandpa Lehman was caretaker. arrive, so they decided to go that route, hoping they It was here that Theresa Rose Wegner was born on April could make it to America before the baby was born. 30,1916. She was their seventh child and the first to be They took a boat from Havana, Cuba, to Vera Cruz, born in America. Mexico, and a train on to Laredo, Mexico. While Our father went to work for the Great Western Sugar traveling by train between these two cities, Carl insisted Company on the company's ranch, raising sugar beet on sticking his head out of the train window. Cinders seed. The seed had formerly been imported from from the smokestack flew into his eyes, he rubbed them, Germany; however, World War I had already started in and they became infected. In fact, they became so badly Europe, and the United States no longer traded with infected that they feared for his eyesight. So now there Germany, so they were forced to raise their own seed. was another delay and more doctoring, for which they The United States entered World War I in 1917. At could hardly spare the money but somehow managed. this time Mom and Dad moved to a farm approximately November 5, 1913, Earl Gottlieb Wegner was born at eight miles west of Billings. The war didn't end until Laredo, Mexico. Here they were, with only the Rio November 11,1918. On March 27, 1919, a baby girl Grande River between them and Laredo, Texas, U.S.A. named Wilhelmina was born on this farm. From here Carl was still being treated for his eyes, which were they moved to a farm about seven miles east of Billings improving. The doctor had given the folks some eye on what was known as Lockwood Flats. This farm drops for his eyes. Dad saved the bottle and carried it in belonged to Peter Yegen Sr. and was farmed on shares. his pocket. The last time Dad took Carl to the doctor, he Here another daughter, Mary Elizabeth, was born on filled his little bottle from the doctor's supply while the March 24, 1922. On her baptism certificate her name doctor was out of the room. appears as Maria Elisa, but she was registered in school When Earl was about two weeks old. they decided to as Mary Elizabeth, went through school by that name, try to make it into America. Just before they went for and has been known by that name ever since. their checkup at the immigration In March 1923 we moved to Belfry, Montana, and then to Bridger, Montana, where a son Edward

24 mother Dorthea Lehman, born in 1862, passed away in October 1944 in Billings at the age of 82. Dad, Mom, Grandfather, and Grandmother all lie at rest in Mountview Cemetery in Billings, Montana. And what happened to our father's family? God only knows, as Dad and Uncle Bill were the only ones to come to America. At first they would hear from the family in Russia once in a while. It took two to three months for a letter to come, and then it would be censored by blotting out or cutting out portions. They did hear that Grandfather Wegner fell through the ice while crossing the Volga River in a horse-drawn sled. He escaped with his life but was never well again. Mom thought that he must have died of pneumonia from what was said when they received word of his death in 1916. His last

This portrait of the Edward Wegner family was taken in Billings in February 1917. Left-to-right in the back row are Carl, 10, Dorthy, 12, Earl, 5. In the front row are Edward, 41, Solomon, 5, Amelia, 6, Rose, 10 months (the author of this story), and Wilhelmina, 34. was born November 6, 1927. In March 1930 we moved again—this time to a hay, grain, and cattle ranch in Absarokee, Montana. During the height of the depression, we were plagued by grasshoppers and Mormon crickets as well as a drought. Those were some rough years, but somehow the Lord always saw fit to provide us with some sort of income and enough to eat and wear. Dad had been ailing for a number of years. At the age of 58, he passed away in Billings Deaconess Hospital of cancer on April 29,1934. We remained on the ranch until September 27, 1935, when we soldout and moved back to Billings. Mom had a heart condition and other ailments. She passed away at the age of 72 in Amelia's home in Billings, Montana, on August 2,1956. Both Dad and Mom had become naturalized citizens of the United States of America, This brings to an end a very hard yet interesting and sometimes a very discouraging and frightening life of two people who struggled so hard to This picture, taken at Saratov, Russia, is of Edward achieve their dreams. Wegner's mother, his youngest sister, Amelia Albert!, I've told my children, "Never let anyone tell you that and her husband David. Amelia had left her home in there weren't strong pioneers in your family." Susannental to seek employment in Saratov as a nanny. What became of our parents' families? Mother's were There she met and married David Alberti, who owned safe and sound in America. They lived in and around and operated a small bake shop. They had three Billings the rest of their lives, except for the short time children, and life seemed very good for this couple until they lived in Misco in Stillwater County just east of the Bolsheviks gained control of the government. His life Columbus Hill. Misco consisted of several houses, a was threatened, so he fled to Susannental. There he was school, and a whistle stop for the train, none of which found and beaten to death. The Edward Wegner family remains today. Grandfather Solomon Lehman, born does not know what happened to Amelia and the 1861, passed away July 6, 1938, in Billings at the age of children. 77. Grand

25 words were of his children in America- Grandmother the table to do homework or play games. One evening Wegner died of starvation about 1920 or 1921. This is Dad decided it was time to go to bed and said so, but we sort of sketchy, as we no longer heard from any of Dad's just dawdled. He went over to the water pail on the family very often. His brothers and sisters who remained washstand and took a drink from the dipper. Some in Russia were dragged from their homes at night. Their droplets of water must have clung to his heavy homes were set on fire, and they were driven down the mustache. As he walked past the table, he blew out the road like cattle and sent to Siberia. At one time Dad had light thinking that would send us off to bed, but it sent his oldest brother's wife $100. She did acknowledge backfired on him. The lamp chimney was very hot, and receiving it, but by the time the government took its as he blew a droplet of water must have hit the lamp deduction, she only received $10.00. She told him that globe, and it shattered into a million pieces. He very she appreciated the money but that they got so little of it sheepishly left the room and—without a word—went to that it would be best not to send any more. She said, "We bed. are starving, and the money only helps prolong our Another incident I recall was a time we butchered a misery. I don't know what became of my husband and hog. Dad always saved the bladder, which he inflated your brother Henry, but we saw him fall along the way and dried. Later he would cut off the tube end, turn it on our forced march when the Bolsheviks drove us from inside out, peel off the inner lining, soak it in salt brine, our homes. We were forced to go on without him, so he wash it thoroughly, and fill it with headcheese or must have died there, as that was the last we saw of sausage; Wilhelmina (Minnie, as we called her) and I him." The last letter we received came in February 1934. were helping Dad with this little chore. Dad inserted the Some of them may have survived, and maybe some of tube to blow through, looped the string around it, but their children still live somewhere in Russia. God only didn't pull it tight. He told Minnie, "Now I'll blow it up, knows. and when I motion with my hand, you pull the string Sometime during the 1950s Gottlieb Kober's sister tight and tie it." That's what they did, but the string Amelia went on a guided tour of Russia. She said that broke. Dad was very disgusted, so he said, "Well, do it the guides took them only where they wanted and again, and this time don't tear the string." It still didn't showed them only what they wanted them to see. She work, so they had to try a third time. By now Minnie said, "We spent one night across the Volga River from was a little irked herself, and she muttered under her the village I grew up in. There were a few buildings left breath out of the corner of her mouth. "I hope the damn that I recognized, but they wouldn't let us cross the thing busts." Sure enough, when it was blown up the Volga and go into the village. I spent a sleepless night third time, she tried to pull the string tight, and—pow!— sitting by the window looking over the area. I could see the bladder burst into shreds. The concussion fairly the hill we used to sled on as children, and I could made his mustache flutter in the breeze. Minnie and I visualize the whole village. How I wanted to set foot on wanted to laugh in the worst way, but we didn't dare. that land! But it wasn't allowed." Instead, we beat a hasty retreat to a safer place, and that Not all our memories are sad, though. At times we was the end of our bladder-inflating career. laugh when we remember some of the incidents of our We Wegner kids all grew up, got married, and had childhood. One such incident occurred with our father. families of our own. Our sister, Dorthy Wegner Dad was very strict, so when he said "do" or "don't" Ottolino, passed way on January 22, 1975, and that's just what he meant. Before we had electric lights, Wilhelmina Wegner Chapman on June 5,1984. So far, we used kerosene lamps, and as a rule, they would sit on the rest of us seem to be going along pretty good—just a shelf or in the middle of the table. In the evening we getting a little older. would sit around Kraht der Gickel auf 'm Mist, dnnert sich If the rooster crows on the manure pile, the 's Wetter, ewer bleibt wie 's is. weather will change—or stay the same.

26 SUMMARY OF AND PROBLEMS RELATING TO DIALECTAL AND ETHNOGRAPHICAL STUDIES OF GERMAN SETTLEMENTS IN THE U.S.S.R. Viktor Maksimovich Zhirmunskii Translated by Alexander Dupper Chapter 3* of the World War, the German, Prof. Unwerth, published the first scientific description of a small group of colonist The language spoken by the German colonists is a dialects, mainly of the Volga, based on phonetic notes local rural dialect, which they use in daily intercourse made in Germany from interviews with colonist within the family and the village. Each colony has its prisoners of war. Unwerth's grammatical descriptions are own particular dialect, brought by the settlers from accompanied by localization of the corresponding Germany or formed in the new homeland from a mixture dialect's place of origin.2 After Unwerth, Prof. Dinges, on of several different dialects. Depending on conditions the basis of questionnaires and personal notes collected during settlement, the dialectal map shows great variety. earlier, published a dialectal map of the old Volga In one village, for instance, the Swabian dialect may be colonies, which shows the location of basic types of represented, in a neighboring one, the Low German or Volga-German dialects.3 According to Unwerth and Hessian. Besides their dialect, most colonists usually Dinges, the following German dialects are represented on speak two languages: the High-German (literary) the Volga: 1) Upper Hessian (district of Schotten and language (tinged with dialect, of course), fostered since Büdingen); 2) South Hessian (Frankfurt-am-Main— olden times by church, school, and press, and the Russian Mainz—Darmstadt); 3) Hessian-Palatinian (Worms— language, which in the early days was also introduced Odenwald); 4) West Palatinian (district of Zweibriicken); through the school and direct contact with their 5) East Middle German (dialects of eastern Thuringia neighbors. From the beginning in the southern colonies, and Saxony); the local Ukrainian dialects competed with the Russian 6) Low German (West-Prussian dialects of the Lower language and, after the Revolution, with the Ukrainian Vistula near Danzig spoken by the Men-nonites). With literary language. To a varying degree other local the exception of the Mennonites, only Middle-German languages were also influential, for example, the Tatar in dialects are represented on the Volga. The predominance the Crimea and the Georgian, etc., in the Transcaucasus. of the Hessian dialects is connected with the fact that in The degree of knowledge among the colonists of all Frankfurt and in Büdingen, the Russian government's those languages varies very much and depends on the emissaries were actively recruiting settlers; from the characteristics of the particular area, on the social level, eastern part of Germany (Saxony) came peasants ruined and on the difference between generations (passing by the Seven Years^ War. through different educational systems). Thus, the use of The field work of 1926-1930, done in expeditions High German is much more widespread in the Ukrainian under my guidance, made it possible to collect dialectal colonies, especially among the prosperous farmers, than material from all the old colonies of the Black Sea area on the Volga. In several small settlements of the by means of direct polls, interrogation, and Leningrad area, the Russian language has almost ousted questionnaires and to compile a grammatical description the German dialects, especially among the younger of the most important dialectal types represented in that generation. In two Catholic colonies of the Belovizh region. On the basis of that material, I have compiled a group (Gross-Werder and Klein-Werder), the local dialectal map of the old German colonies of the southern Ukrainian dialect is spoken exclusively at the present Ukraine, the Crimea, and Transcaucasia, which is time. At the same time on the Volga, we encounter deposited in the Institute of Linguistics (Leningrad). women who have no knowledge of the Russian language Additional material from resettlement colonies was at all. gathered by means of a dialectal questionnaire, put The earliest information concerning dialects of the 1 together by me and circulated in 1927 among all the colonists is found in the reader of Firmenich, which German schools in the Ukraine by the inspection board contains several examples of German dialects from the of ethnic schools in the Ukrainian S.S.R. The southern Ukraine (1854), At the time questionnaire includes forty sentences for translation into the local dialect, which were admit-ted into the German * Chapter 1 appeared in the Summer 1986 issue of the dialectal atlas of Marburg (so-called "Wenker-Sdtze"}, Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans and two hundred words in an additional list selected by From Russia. Chapter 2 appeared in the Winter 1986 me in consideration of the peculiarities of the local issue. dialects. Of the 600

27 questionnaires sent out, about 450 were answered and Azerbaidzhan are represented exclusively by (75%). This additional material was processed by Swabian dialects (7). In Volhynia, as the questionnaires researchers of the Institute of Linguistics, who entered have shown, the Low-German dialects prevail; in a the most important dialectal characteristics of every whole string of colonies, they are at present superseded questionnaire on index cards, allowing one to determine by High German, tinged with some elements of the which dialectal types represented in the old colonies are extinct dialect. The older colonies of the Leningrad also found in one or the other resettlement. Region closely approach the North-Baden (6) and East- As a result of the research done in the southern areas Palatinate (district of Worms—Heidelberg) type, but at of the Ukraine (to which for convenience sake I added the same time include a series of elements indicating the the Belovizh group), the following dialects were found: presence of a complicated dialectal mixture. The colony Low German: 1) West-Prussian dialects from the of Riebensdorf adjoins the North-Baden type, which Lower Vistula around Danzig—in the colonies of Alt- prevails on the Molochna River (6). Danzig (near the city of Zinov'esk [Elisavet-grad, now At present we may then consider the initial Kirovograd]) and Josefstal (near the city of preliminary survey of dialects spoken in the older Dnepropetrovsk), spoken by the Prussians of the colonies as completed in a general way for the whole Mariupol Region and by the Mennonites in the district Soviet Union, and our next task would be the com- of Khortifcsa (Zaporozhye Region), and at the pilation of a map with the corresponding grammatical Molochna River (Melitopol Region). description of basic dialectal types, which shows their Middle German: 2) Upper Hessian—in the colonies place of origin. It would locate every dialect type on a of the Belovizh group (Konotop Region) and the linguistic map of Germany.4 corresponding resettlements of the "Belovi-zhians" Work on grammatical description and determination ("Belemeser") in the Mariupol Region, also in the of the colonial dialects' places of origin revealed a whole colony of Neu-Jamburg (Mariupol Region); series of primary linguistic problems, the solution of 3) West Rhine-Palatinian (from the Bavarian Palatinate, which goes beyond the limits of special study.5 As is the city of Zweibrucken)—in the so-called "Hungarian" generally known, the central problem—caused by the colonies of Peterstal and Freudental (Odessa Region) present German and French dialectography—is the and their resettlements ("Hungarians"—German farmers language-mixing problem. The studies of researchers who immigrated to the Ukraine from southern Hungary, working on linguistic atlases of Germany and France where they had lived as colonists from the 1780s on); 4) (Gileron, Vrede, Frings, and others) have shown that the South Rhine-Palatinian (from the southern part of the majority of modern dialects sprang up not by way of Bavarian Palatinate, the region of Landau)—the Beresan spontaneous development and differentiation from any Catholic colonies (Nikolayev Region). one "parent language," as thought by the representatives South German: 5) North Alsatian (a south" of formal comparative grammar of the old style, but are Franconian dialect of the border strip north of Alsace the complex product of intermingling economic and between the cities of Seltz, Wissembourg, and cultural relationships between neighboring territories.6 Lauterbourg)—in the Catholic villages of the Odessa Solving the problems arising from the mingling of old Region (Kuchurgan and Klein-Liebental groups); 6) dialects in the ancestral land, which took place in distant North Badenic (a south-Franconian dialect of the Baden- historical epochs, presents great difficulties, since Durlach Region—the prevailing dialect of the Molochna precise historical data and linguistic materials accessible colonies (Melitopol Region); 7) Swabian (from the for direct observation are absent. Contrarily, the colonist valley of the Neckar River and its tributaries, between dialects of relatively recent origin represent—in the Marbach and Reutlingen)—in the colonies of the artificial conditions imposed by an isolating environment Württemberg separatists around the city of Berdyansk upon a different-speaking population—a kind of and the Odessa Region (Hoffnungstal), also in the Würt- experimental laboratory for linguistic observation. temberg colonies of Lustdorf and Grossliebental (near Having precise data on the original composition of the Odessa); 8) North Bavarian (from the region north of the inhabitants of one or the other colony and about their city of Regensburg)—in the colony of Jamburg (near the socioeconomic development enables us to observe the city of Dnepropetrovsk); 9) Mixed dialects of various results of mixing the German dialects known to us in the types (mainly Swabo-Franconian). colonists' new home and, in some cases, to utilize those The German dialects of the Crimea (the older observations in explaining analogous facts relating to colonies) belong to the Swabo-Franconian mixed type dialect mixing during earlier epochs in the history of the (9). The Transcaucasian colonies in Georgia language. Not infrequently the mixing process in such colonies has not yet reached completion, and we have the opportunity to observe

28 directly the struggle of competing elements and the "Schnabel," gawl "Gabel" and the Swabian sna:bl, ga:bl conditions attending the ousting of an archaic, dying become sna:wl, ga:wl (Swabian a; and Franconian w) in form by a new, robust one, to which the future belongs. Johannestal and Güldendorf. Possible also are We may assume all colonial dialects to be more or intermediate forms: the Swabian vu:rst "Wurst," 'ku.-rts less mixed, since in each colony there were set-tiers "kurz" and the Franconian varst, ^karts become vorst, from different places. But in some colonies an almost ^korts in Gluckstal, with the intermediate sound o complete absorption of one dialect by another occurred, (between u and a). The observation of different perhaps with the exception of some minor relicts. In generations in one village allows the ascertainment of others, however, the end result of blending does not well-defined tendencies within the ongoing struggle match any of the dialects known in the old homeland, between disparate elements in the mixture of dialects. but consists of separate elements, each of which must be These tendencies do not always move in the direction of sought in a different part of the dialectal map of the literary language. On the contrary, wherever a Germany. Such, for example, are the widespread Franco- definite dialectal feature is carried by the majority of the Swabian mixed dialects of various types in the southern Franconian dialects prevailing in the Ukraine, it appears Ukraine (the colonies of Johannestal and Waterloo in the to be an indication of dialectal coined (general common Nikolayev Region, of Alexanderhilf, Neu-burg, and language) and frequently forces out the competing form, Güldendorf in the Odessa Region, and of Glückstal and even when that form coincides with the literary language: Bergdorf in the Moldavian Republic.7 thus the Franconian gla:W9 "glauben.' Ao.'/a "kaufen" The basic principle of dialect blending, discovered by have forced out the Swabian glaoba, kaofff, in all areas me while examining those dialects, consists of the loss of of mixed dialects, because the transition au>a: and the "primary" features, those dialectal forms which deviate intervocalic -b-^-w- are a general distinguishing mark of most radically from the standard literary language (for most dialects of the Franconian type. instance, the Swabian graos instead of gross, snae In the final victory of one form over the other, the instead of Schnee, fuir instead of Feuer). Being the most decisive factor is, of course, not only the numerical significant barrier to communication between different- superiority of one dialectal group over the other but its speaking people in the same village, those forms social predominance as well. Within that context it is eventually disappear, even when they are used by the interesting to note the fate of mixed dialects in the majority of the inhabitants. The less radical differences in colonies of Alexanderhilf and Neuburg, the population of competing dialects ("secondary" features) now struggle which consisted of Swabians and "Hungarians" (who for dominance. There one then observes a breakdown in spoke a West-Palatinian dialect). Despite the Swabian the unity of sound progression: for example, in the numerical superiority (though slight) among the original colony of Alexanderhilf, the pf\^posd "Pfosten," 'pont settlers, the dialect, according to its basic features, "Pfund," also 'pfaif "Pfeife." 'pflu.-K "Pflug"; became West Palatinian, with rather a small number of Sdopa "stopfen," also apfl "Apfel"—or a fluctuation Swabian relicts. Even some features peculiar to the West- between competing forms: rkop and ^kopf, rops and ropfa Palatinian dialect were preserved, which are found "rupfen," in the same subject, and also in comparing neither in any other Franconian dialects nor in the literary different subjects between themselves. If, as a result of language: this struggle, a certain degree of uniformity is attained, a for instance, the abridged participle: kstarap few relicts of the displaced type may survive: for "gestorben/'^fo/ "gelaufen"; the eliminated intervocalic - instance, in the Waterloo colonist dialect, despite the g- with the accompanying contraction of the following dominance of the beginning?^ ^pedrig ("godfather") is vowels: tra: "tragen," ig sla: used instead of 'pfedrip, in a lexically isolated word "schlage," vd: "Wagen," and others. The same applies which does not have a phonetic equivalent in the literary also to the field of lexicography: out of the fifty-three language (High German: Pate). As a concomitant words entered by me in the lexicological questionnaire, [accompanying] phenomenon of dualism in lexically thirty-two are neutral, eighteen belong to the Palatinian isolated words, one encounters dual forms: for instance, dialect, and only three to the Swabian. The explanation in Neuburg is and is "1st" are [both] used, but in of this phenomenon may be found in the economic Alexanderhilf the form is has become archaic and is history of the colonies. As reported by the author of the spoken only by the Wohl family, which is known by the official chronicle of Neuburg Colony (1848), it was nickname "is Wohl." Not infrequently, a colony* s precisely these "Hungarians," not the "Swabians," who double speech results in the hybridization of different established agriculture in this colony ("die Schopfer des forms: thus the Franconian snawl Ackerbaus dieser Colonie"}. The emigrants from Württemberg were "almost exclusively craftsmen" ("fast lauter Handworker"); they learned

29 agriculture and livestock raising from the "Hungarians,"8 teristics shown on the same maps. One can also who arrived slightly later with their horses and wagons. observe the process of forming a dialectal "general Regretfully, such information about the social language" in the Crimean colonies (the so-called composition of the original settlers is still very scarce. "Crimea-Swabian" dialects) and in the settlements of the In regions of concentrated German colonization (for Leningrad Region. instance, in the Berezan' colonies of the Nikolayev The influence of the literary language is most Region, Kuchurgan in the Odessa Region, and Molochna noticeable in dialects which sharply deviate from the in the Melitopol Region) there gradually develops a national standard, for instance, Swabian or Upper dialectally peculiar koine (general common language), Hessian. Under the influence of that standard, the above- superseding the particular local dialects of the separate mentioned dialects are gradually losing their "primary" colonies. As already mentioned, it appears to be based features (that is, their most noticeable features), on general grammatical features of the West-German preserving only their "secondary" ones. The same (Franconian) dialects dominant in the Ukraine. An influence, as we have seen, affects the amalgamation of essential factor of blending in such cases is the marrying other dialects, also, and consequently explains the of women from neighboring villages. Therefore such presence of the Franconian dialectal environment. The koines among the Germans have a confessional "Neo-Swabian" dialects (for instance, in the colonies of character, since before the Revolution Catholics, Grossliebental, Lustdorf, and Hoffnungstal in the Odessa Lutherans, and Mennonites did not marry each other. For Region) and the "Neo-Hessian" ones (in the reset- instance, the Berezan' koine unites only Catholic tlements of the Belovizhians in the Mariupol Region), colonies of the Nikolayev Region; the small number of originating under such conditions, have a great similarity Protestant colonies scattered among them (Rohrbach, to the bourgeois dialects spoken in the corresponding Worms, Waterloo, Johannestal) have each preserved parts of Germany (for instance, the Swabian in their particular dialects. The socioeconomic factors in- Stuttgart), which were formed in the same way. When fluencing language unification were researched by A. N. comparing them in their dialectal relationship to their Strom in the case of the koine formed on the Molochna counterparts in Germany, it is necessary to begin with River.9 The formation of a dialectal "general language" the restoration of lost features. Archaisms are found in the second half of the nineteenth century is associated mainly among the older people. Taking into here, as shown by Strom, with the capitalistic consideration the social stratification of the village, one development of the German village and with the finds that the speech of the poorer people is richer in influence of the North-Baden dialect in the commercial such relicts than the speech of the rich and the "edu- centers of the Prishib-Hoffental District. In contrast to cated," since in the old times education was accessible the general language, there is a small number of rem- only to prosperous farmers. For instance, the colony of nants of the disappearing dialects of individual villages: Helenendorf (Azerbaidzhan), which reached a high level Hessian in the colony of Alt-Nassau; Swabian in the of economic prosperity thanks to the development of colony of Weinau; East Palatinian in the Catholic wine-making ("Concordia"), can serve as an example of colonies of Hochheim, Blumental, and Heidelberg, such half-citified, "bourgeois" modernization of the located at the northern edge of the Molochna group Swabian dialect, in contrast to the German colonies in (economic, territorial, and confessional isolation); and Georgia. The speech of the resettlements is also others. Thus the development of a "general language," [paradoxically] quite often more archaic than the speech under the conditions accompanying intercolonial of the old colonies, because mostly the poorer elements blending, represents an interesting analogy to the origin went to the resettlements, which were often founded in of national languages in the age of the infancy of more remote areas, where free land was still available. In capitalism in the West. that sense, there exist, as in Germany itself, relict On the Volga, as can be seen from Prof. Dinges's territories such as the Swabian separatists in the dialectal maps, there exists a tendency to generalize the Berdyansk District, among whom all the primary dialectal features within the boundaries of certain features of the old Swabian dialect were preserved commercial districts whose borders overlap the original untouched in contrast to the Swabian colonies of distribution limits of the dialects spoken in Grossliebental and Lustdorf (near Odessa). This corresponding villages when they were founded.10 On condition was contributed to by geographic isolation, the other hand, these commercial borders determine that is, the absence of neighboring Franconian-speaking analogical tendencies to generalize the ethnographic and colonies, such as those that encircle the Swabian folkloristic charac colonies in the Odessa Region where a modernized dialect is spoken. Another contributing factor was cultural

30 isolation, resulting from religious separation, which cut Borrowed foreign words are primarily terms denoting off the usual path of generalized German cultural new objects and concepts of the geographical, economic, influence by way of the Lutheran parochial school of the and sociopolitical environment in which the colonists old time. found themselves upon settling in their new homeland. Geographical lexicography, that is, dealing with Thus, in the list of borrowed words accompanying J. problems relating to the territorial differentiation of Quiring* s paper on the Mennonite dialect spoken in synonyms, is of great importance in researching the Khortitsa colony (Zaporozhye Region)13 we find: knut blending process. The so-called "ethnographical "knut" [knout], tamntas "tarantas" [a half-covered vehi- dictionary" includes words possessing the greatest cle on springs], pi:c "Russian peck'" (Ukrainian pick') number of variant forms in the geographical sense. They [Russian oven], duchovka "dukhovka" [oven], arbu:s often do not have any corresponding counterpart in the "arbuz" [watermelon], barstaund "bashtan" [melonfield], literary language—mostly agricultural terminology bors "borshch" [borsch], wreniki ' * vareniki'' relating to the farming community with its associated [cheesebuttons], baslik * 'bashlyk'' [hood], lapka "lapti" domestic sphere. The vocabulary questionnaire circulated [footwear], laufka "lavka" [shop], prakaugik * by me with the help of the inspection board of German 'prikazchik'' [store clerk], bolnitsa, "boPnitsa" [hospital], schools in the spring of 1930 to all colonies in the sxod "skhod" [meeting], dasatnik "desiatnik" [bailiff], Ukraine, consists of fifty words relevant to the sotska "sotskii" [village policeman or guard], xolodna geographically differentiated terminology of agriculture: "kholodnaia" ("arestanskaia") [jail], and so on. The names of domestic and field animals, dwellings and their loanword displaces the original dialectal word in those parts, utensils, and farm equipment and its application. cases when the common objects of one's material Two analogical questionnaires were circulated some time environment undergo significant change. Thus, in the earlier among the Volga colonies by the Ethnographical Leningrad colonies the storage place for grain is called Museum of the city of Engels. ampa'.r, not "Speicher," because in the primitive West- Observation of the collected material revealed that German farmhouse, grain was stored directly under the when grammatical features of the superseded dialect are roof, not in a separate building. Also, plita [kitchen ousted, they quite often remain as isolated verbal relicts. stove] is denoted by the word plit, because during the Thus, the colony of Rybals'kiy (Dnepropetrovsk Region), eighteenth century German peasants in their original which now speaks a mixed dialect of the High-German homeland knew mainly the open-fire hearth with a type, retained the Low-German word 'kojsl, meaning smoke duct. An important role in the displacement of a "boar-sire" ("mannliches Zuchtschwein"), adopted from dialectal word by a borrowed one may be played by the dislodged Low-German speech of the original Danzig commercial relations between neighbors: the Leningrad settlers. Analogical German relicts have been recorded by colonies, occupied with vegetable-gardening, use the L. R. Sinder in the colonies of the Berislavskiy District borrowed word agurts [cucumber] exclusively, instead of (Schwedengebiet), for instance, erpi "drake," gendr the corresponding German dialectal designations "gander," and others. [gugumr and others). An interesting case occurs in the The extent of these verbal relicts is limited, except for colony of Jamburg, where the garden pear (a trade item) a few cases of foreign influence, to the speech of the is designated by the Ukrainian word du:h "dulia," but the German colonists." The influence of the Russian (or word for wild pear has been preserved in the German Ukrainian) language upon the vocabulary of the German dialectal form pi:ar ("Birne"). In the field of agricultural dialects varies greatly in degree. It is more apparent in terminology, V. P. Po-gorel'skaia described a whole the Volga colonies than in the Ukraine, where in times series of German dialectal terms displaced by past the difference in the economic and cultural level corresponding Ukrainian ones in the course of working between the Germans and their neighbors was contacts between German farmers and their hired particularly pronounced. It becomes yet more apparent in Ukrainian laborers while working the farmstead.14 the settlements of the immediate Leningrad area, which At that, the old, foreign-language borrowings are were pulled into the process of Russification as a direct made to conform with the grammatical principles of the result of the economic connection to the big city. dialect. Thus, in the Leningrad colonies, the borrowed According to materials collected in 1917, the Volga- word kapu'l "kobyla" [mare] becomes the diminutive German dialects at that time contained up to eight kapu^a (a filly), with the German ending and vowel hundred Russian loanwords;12 at the present time their mutation (u-u > i); in the Ukrainian colonies the adopted number should have greatly increased because of the new word ^kats "utka" (Ukrainian "kachka") [duck] becomes sociopolitical and industrial-technical terminology. ^ket^'ric, "katsariq, 'ketSart, ^atSkar, 'ketSkar, and others in

31 signifying a "drake" (in the manner of gensarif, gensart, problems, based on the study of German dialects in the ganskar, etc.,—"gusak" [gander]).16 Ukraine, are given in the papers of A. Strom.18 The Of particular interest are the verbal borrowings of the guidelines for teaching German, arrived at in these revolutionary epoch, especially in the field of papers, are taken into account in the latest curricula of sociopolitical terminology.16 The Revolution introduced the German language, accepted by German schools in into the communal life of the German village a number the Ukrainian S.S.R. and the Volga German A.S.S.R. of new realities and concepts, for which the German farmer did not have any verbal equivalents in the limited range of his dialect. In the stories describing the Chapter 3 Notes Ukrainian-German village's way of life during the reconstruction period-written in dialect by the colonist 1. Firmenich, Germaniens Völkerstimmen, vol. Ill (1854). 17 writer H. Bachmann —we find, for instance, in the 2. W. v. Unwerth, Proben deutsck-russischer Mun-darten speech of a farmer, such words as Pradsedatel aus den Wolgakohnien und dem Gouv. Cher-son (Berlin, [chairman], Rik [raiispolkom = district executive 1918). committee], Selbud [village house], Rewolmie 3. G. Dinges, "Unsere Mundarten," collection Beitrage zur [revolution], Resoluzje [resolution], Informazje Heimatkunde des deutschen Wolga-gebiets (Pokrowsk, 1928). [information], Demons trazje [demonstration], Partje Compare also his "Zur Erforschung der Wolgadeutschen [party], Aktiwisckt [activist], Paj [share], Sojus [union], Mundarten," Teuthonista, vol. I, 1925. In Russian: G. Dinges, Prodnalog [food tax], Raskulatschaje [liquidation of big "Kizucheniiu govorov povolzhskikh nemtsev," Zap. farms], and others. Of great interest are the observations Saratovskogo univ. [Western Saratov University], IV, vyp. of the speech of German collective-farmers, which were [no.] 3 (1925). made primarily on the Volga during political meetings, 4. Besides the above-mentioned papers, until the present the court proceedings, and so forth (notes of the student D. following descriptions of German dialects in the Soviet Union Justus). They demonstrate that, at present, such words have been published: A. Strom and V. Schirmunski as, for instance, "udarnik" [shock worker], [Zhirmunskii], "Deutsche Mundarten an der Newa," "uravnilovka" [equalization], "obezlichka" Teuthonista, vol. Ill (1926-1927); V. Schirmunski, "Die [depersonalization], and so forth, are customarily schwabischen Mundarten in Transkaukasien und Sudukraine," replaced by their German equivalents in the speech of Teuthonista, vol. V (1928-1929); V. Schirmunski, "Die the more progressive collective-farmer activists, under nordbairische Mundart von Jamburg a. Dnjepr," Paul- the influence of the Soviet-German press. This has Braune's Beitrage, vol. 56 (1931); T. Sokolskaja and L. considerably enriched the vocabulary of the literary Sinder, "Eine oberhessische Sprachinsel in der Nordukraine," German language under the influence of the socialist P. Br. Beitr., vol. 54 (1930); J. Quiring, Die Mundart von buildup. Contrarily, the stratum of politically backward Chortitza in Südrussland (Mimchen, 1928). farmers uses mainly Russian loanwords. Here the 5. See V. Zhirmunskii, "Problemy kolonial'noi dialek- questions arising from the study of past and present tologii," lazyk i Uteratura, collection of the IRK, vol. Ill German dialects link up directly with the actual (1929); V. Schirmunski. "Sprachgeschichte und problems relating to language development, for whose Siedelungsmundarten," Germanisch-roma-nische correct solution dialectal inquiry must furnish the Monatschrift (1930), nos. 3/4 u. 5/6. essential material. 6. See V. Zhirmunskii, "Problemy nemetskoi dialek-tografii Of no less vital importance to the correct way of v sviazi s istoricheskim kraevedeniem," Et-nografiia, book III teaching German in the ethnic school is the study of (1927), no. 1-2. rural dialects. The method of teaching German in a 7. See V. Zhirmunskii, "Protses iazykovogo sme-sheniia v dialectal environment must start with recognizing the franko-shvabskikh govorakh iuzhnoi Ukrainy," lazyk i fact that the colloquial speech of a village school's pupils literatura, collection of the IRK, vyp. [no.] VII (1930), is the local dialect, which coincides with the literary 8. Georg Leibbrandt, "Die deutschen Kolonien in Cherson language only in part, deviating from it to a certain und Bessarabien," Berichte der Gemein-dedmter (Stuttgart, degree in pronunciation and likewise in grammar and 1926), p. 50. vocabulary. These deviations appear to be the major 9. Paper of A. N. Strom concerning dialects of the Molochna cause of a pupil's errors, brought about by his local colonies, to be published by U.A.N. [Ukrainian Academy of dialect, which errors can be eliminated only by Sciences]. 10. Of these maps only one has been published so conscientiously mastering the basic differences between far: Synonyms of the Word "Arbusenacker" ("bashtan"); see the local dialect and Standard German. This requires of Zap. Sarat. univ. Pedagogicheskii fakul'tet [Western Saratov the teacher some training in dialectology and its ap- Pedagogical Faculty] vol. Ill, vyp. [no.] Ill, (1929). plication to teaching. Methodical solutions to these

32 11. Concerning the phonetic influence of the Ukrainian zaimstvovannykh povolzhskimi nemtsami do 1876 g," language on the dialect of the Belovizh Germans, see L. Uchen zap. Sarat. univ., vol. VII, vyp. [no.] 3 (1929). R. Sinder, "Eine oberhessische Sprachinsel in der 16. See observations of F. Schiller: "Vliianie revoliutsii na Nordukraine," P. Br. Beitr. (1930), p. 35. iazyk volzhskikh nemtsev," Zap. Mosk. Ist.-tingvist. inst., 12. See G. Dinges, "Kizucheniiu govorov povolzhskikh vol. II (1928). nemtsev," Zap. Sarat. univ., vol. IV, vyp. [no.] 3 (1925), 17. H. Bachmann, Kolonischte-Gschichtle (Zentral- p. 3. Volkerverlag, 1931). 13. Quiring, Die Mundart uon Chortitza, p. 108. 18. A. Strom, Deutschunterricht in mundartlich-er Umgebung 14. V. P. Pogorel'skaia, "0 slovarnykh zaimstvo-vaniiakh iz (Charkow: Zentral-Volkerverlag, 1928); ukrainskogo iazyka v dialektiki belo-vezhskikh nemtsev," A. Strom, Die Muttersprache im unteren Komen-trum der lazyk i literatura, collection of the IRK, vyp. [no.] VII deutschen Arbeitschulen. Methodiscker Brief (Charkow: (1930). Zentralverlag, 1929). See also V. Schirmunski, Die 15. Concerning old loanwords in the Volga-German dialects, deutschen Kolonien in der Ukraine, p. 46, etc. see: Prof. Dinges, "O russkikh slovakh

POEMS TO PAULINE Translated by Alexander Dupper

The Winter 1985 issue of the Journal (Vol. 8, No. 3) contained a number of "Letters to Pauline." These letters had been written to Pauline Schlegel Lehl, the only member of the family to immigrate to the United States, by members of the family remaining in Russia. Among the letters were also a number of poems written in Russian. It is suspected that these poems were written either by Pauline's mother or sisters. We are grateful to the Lehl family for allowing us to share them with our readers and to Alexander Dupper for his sensitive translations. See pages 47 and 49 for additional poems. Poor Fellow Free Speech

One stifling, sultry day Free speech awakens the people A ragged urchin walks on the road; And points the way—not backwards but forwards. Rocks have cut his feet, It creates a desire for learning and knowledge; And sweat is pouring from his face. It teaches fighting and standing up for the truth. When a In his walk, his movements, his gaze, true word enters the heart, Just give it time— There is no trace of childhood joy, it will bear fruit; But only the aspect of heavy sorrow, It will destroy falsehood and oppression, As is poverty in his threadbare rags. And the tired people will glimpse a ray of He has gone to the city to find work As a laborer for some rich merchant. happiness. But they hesitate to hire one such as he; The Lark A weakly laborer produces little. He is alone—yesterday they carried As soon as the breath of spring passes over the land His older mother to the graveyard. The forest bedecks itself with softest down; 'Tis likely he now must needs gather Someone's clear song is heard invisibly Out of the His daily bread from door to door. azure of transparent skies. Brooks are bubbling, flowers are dazzling.

33

Erwin Raiter 34 ERWIN AND HIS BROTHER Hertha Karasek-Strzygowski Translated by Sally Tieszen Hieb

This is another chapter of Wolhynisches Tagetmch (published in West Germany in 1979), which was reviewed in the Journal, Vol. 2, No. 3 (Winter 1979). The writer, a Silesian artist, visited the village ofBlumental (near Zhitomir in Ukrainian Volhynia) in the summer of1942, when it was under German occupation. She interviewed and sketched many of its inhabitants and eventually put her descriptions of their sad lives together in this book. Translations of other chapters have appeared in previous issues of the Journal. Mrs. Wolf, who is mentioned in the story below, was featured in the story, "A Mother," in the Spring 1984 issue ofthe Journal (Vol. 7,No.l),pp. 7-9; Mother Fenske's story is in "The Widows, "published in the Winter 1981 issue of the Journal (Vol. 4, No. 3), pp. 5-8. Erwin Raiter was the half-grown lad who had set to had only been one thing—peril and fear for his life and work so courageously to roof the house of Mrs. Wolf. It the constant, terrifying worry of what the next day might was at the time that she was forced to move out of her bring. He had but few recollections of the beautiful, home, and there was no one else who could have done it large farm farther to the east. Because he owned a large to meet the pressing deadline. This same Erwin had farm, his father was considered a kulak, an enemy of the grown up to be a fine young man. He and his friend people. He was one of the first to have his farm taken Emil worked in the collective caring for horses. He also away from him. Shortly thereafter, because of his fear of had his "family" there, two mares and their colts, which deportation, a process which was already going on in the he cared for lovingly. neighboring villages, he moved out of his colony with He lived with his mother and his younger brother his family, restlessly going from one village to another, Gottfried in a kolkhoz house. "It's the small one next to always to the locality where the men had just been the home of Mrs. Wolf," Mother Fenske explained to me hauled away. "I cannot remember anymore in how many on our way home. It was even plainer than the rest of the different places we lived," said Erwin with a deep sigh. houses. There was very little space in the one room. It It was a long, difficult journey before they eventually contained a wobbly iron stove on high legs, a table, a came to Blumental. The village was virtually without bench, a small chest, and two beds, one for Erwin and men, so they could hope to be safe from deportation and the second one for his mother and twelve-year-old Gott- finally to find some peace. His father did soon find his fried. The whitewashed walls were crowded with sheets peace, but it was the "Everlasting Peace." Weak and ill of sketches nailed to them, but it was not the same as in as a result of this fear-filled, wandering life, he was soon Mother Fenske's room, which was filled with mottos and a "dead man." colorful flowers. Here there were plain, distinct pencil During these years of insecurity and pursuit, his sketches of machinery parts, screws, windlasses, and parents had often spoken of their former farm, of the wheels. They gave the room a very striking character. work and trouble of the first colonists, of the true labor Today Erwin had entrusted "his family" to his friend of farming, and of the happiness of a village community. Emil, to allow him to take a somewhat extended noon For years now, of course, they had experienced this only break so that I could unhurriedly sketch him. He sat up temporarily when they found work and a roof over their straight on the edge of the bed, full of anticipation. His heads for a few weeks or months with fellow Germans amber-colored eyes looked at me expectantly and and coreligionists. It was specifically this ingrained trait without shyness. I studied his face, so tense and serious of the colonists of standing together and helping each beyond his years. This made it possible for me to sketch other when in distress that had left a deep impression on him eye-to-eye in this quiet dialogue. young Erwin. It had been stamped permanently into his It took some time before we began a conversation, soul. From that time on a desire burned in his heart to be since we were wrapped up in working and observing able to live in this manner also, to work, and to help. each other. Of course, I knew many things about his life, So, no doubt, he had seized the opportunity of a life which had truly not been an easy one. But it helping Mrs. Wolf that time without thinking the matter moved me deeply as he now candidly and tersely told over too much, but doing the work quickly and adeptly, me of his youth, with the deliberation of a peasant, without reward, and doing it with warm joy in his heart. without bitterness or accusation. For as long as he could At that time, this remember, there

35 characteristic of his forefathers manifested itself machines, perhaps even be an engineer. What is to unhesitatingly and unselfishly. In those difficult days of become of him? Whoever heard of such a thing, a lad work, youngster that he was, he became a true colonist who doesn't want to become a farmer like his father and who from time immemorial had believed, "All for one his grandfather?" She grumbled and scolded in spite of and one for all!" the fact that Gottfried had been standing by her side for For Erwin it was as sure as the "amen" at the close of some time. His face was just as bright as his brother's, a prayer that he would become a farmer. His mother was but more intelligent-looking, almost more austere. aware of this and was happy and pleased. "Father Timidly he handed me a sketch on which he was still Wenzler was right," she said as she reentered the room working, and he eyed me closely. I immediately and overheard our conversation. "You can count on this comprehended the urgent entreaty in his eyes. "Even if young lad; he does everything in the best way." He was no one in this village understands, surely this German on the right path; she didn't have to worry about him. artist will understand how very much this interests me! But Gottfried! This younger son was her problem She'll know that this hobby of sketching, of nuts and child. And now she poured out her overfilled heart. He bolts, is more interesting to me than all the farming in was twelve years old and was still in school. He enjoyed the world." school, and his teacher was pleased with his work. In his Yes, I understood this youth. I examined the spare time he tended the cattle. Earlier, while doing this drawings closely, one after the other, as well as all of work, he always sang or whittled or read m one of his those hanging on the wall. It was then that I first noticed schoolbooks. But several months ago he had found the what an intense technical, graphic gift for drawing was remains of a crashed airplane far out in the woods near hidden in these sketches, what an uninhibited impulse the brook Richka. At first, he guarded this discovery as for development commanded this youth. "Gottfried, if it were a precious secret. Again and again he when the war is over, you must go to school where you disappeared, going to the stream, where he gathered the can study mechanical drawing and learn to build scattered parts that were lying around. While the cows airplanes. This is what you need to do with your life. contentedly grazed, he carefully dismantled everything, You can really amount to something!" sketched it painstakingly, and then reassembled it again. The boy, beaming and full of confidence, looked at Later he dragged parts home with him. His mother me. His thin, boyish face reddened, and he breathed noticed that he was constantly occupied with this hobby deeply as if he'd been rescued. But his mother in her in some quiet corner, completely engrossed in his corner near the stove grumbled, "Alas, I don't think his sketching. He was "as though bewitched" and had no life will amount to much, and he'll never be a farmer." interest in anything else. It didn't help to admonish him. At that time I was firmly resolved to help this young His mother complained further, "What good are all these lad with an education. His obvious talent deserved the drawings that fill the walls of the room that no one dares opportunity for development. I knew very well from my to touch or put away? No one can understand what they own experience what a great joy that would be for him. are supposed to be, and no one will ever give him a But. O God, at that time I had no idea of all that was single kopek for them. Only the old smithy believes that yet to come! he could become a good locksmith or work with ^

36 ^ ^

BOOKS AND ARTICLES RECENTLY ADDED TO THE AHSGR ARCHIVES Frances Amen and Mary Lynn Tuck

PLEASE NOTE: When a number has an R before it, that indicates that the item does not circulate. This means that patrons may use the item in the AHSGR library itself, but they may not check it out for use elsewhere. The items mentioned below and other library materials may be borrowed from AHSGR Archives through the interlibrary loan services of your local public or college library via an interlibrary loan request form or the OCLC computer system. Most of the items below are not for sale by AHSGR. Please consult your current Order Form to see what is available for purchase. GR 1832 (perm.), v. 2 tion" of individuals and whole classes of the population. It Amen, Delbert D., compiler. relates the terroristic work of the Gay-Pay-Oo (United State Weddings and Anniversaries, Volume II. Typewritten Political Administration), which bears the responsibility of (1985), 47 pp. Donated by compiler. cutting short so many human lives. These wedding announcements, weddings, and wedding anniversaries have been extracted from the Washita County R Enterprise, Corn, Oklahoma, for 1938 through 1941. Volume Z253 .U69 1982 I, also available from the Archives, covers 1928 through 1935. The Chicago Manual of Style. 13th ed., revised and expanded (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 737 pp. CS71 .B531 1900x This is a "how to" book for authors, editors, and Bieber, Martin. copywriters. It was updated from the 1969 edition to show the Branches and Twigs of the Jacob Bieber Family Tree (n.p., changes of new technology in the entire editing and publishing 1900), 650 pp. One copy donated by author, the other by process. Ardella Bennett. Family group charts and a brief, historical account of the CS71 .B478 1986x Bieber ancestry, some of whom settled in Glückstal, South Delker, Harry A. Russia, after emigrating from Germany. The Bertsch Book—222 Years (Aberdeen, SD: H. A. Delker, 1986), 253 pp. Photos, maps, documents. Donated by Eiton R Bertsch. GR 1802 (perm.) This is the history of the ancestors and descendants of By-laws and Minutes of 'the Evangelical St. Paul's Gottlieb and Salomea Bertsch, 1764-1985, whose parents Congregation in Walla Walla, Washington. Photocopy (1977), immigrated to South Russia from Württemberg, Germany, in 48 pp. Donated by Elaine Frank Davison. the early 1800s. There are family sketches, family group Church proceeding's beginning in 1907, which are charts, and stories of life on the homesteads in South Dakota. handwritten in old German script. PF3111 .N453 1975x F1074.5 .B34B44 Deutsch, Lehrbuch fur die pddagogischen Fachschulen Beiseker's Golden Heritage (Beiseker, AB: Beiseker (Fachrichtung Deutsch). (Nemetskil fazyk: uchebnoe Historical Society, 1977), 525 pp. Photos, maps. Donated by posobie difa pedagogicheskikh uchilishch fotdelenie Walter and Elsie Kiesz. nemefskogo !azykaj). Courses 1 and 2 (Moscow, A compilation of historical events in the lives of the U.S.S.R.: Prosveshchenie, 1975), 302 pp. From Emma pioneers of this Canadian settlement. It depicts the customs S. Haynes library. and social life of the era. Besides an appendix and general This sixteen-lesson textbook is designed for those studying index, there is a family index. to be German teachers on the elementary-school level. Phonology, morphology, reading selections, intonation, DK267 .C49 grammar, and spelling are carefully covered. Chamberlin, William H. Russia's Iron Age (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, and Co., DK651 .M57E76 1984x 1934), 400 pp. Illustrations. Ernst, Friedrich. An informative account of Russia's drive for Friedenstal in Bessarabien (Stuttgart, West Germany: F. industrialization and the ruthless methods by which it was Ernst, 1984), 404 pp. Photos, maps. One copy donated by carried out. These include forcible collectivization of peasant Frieda Brulotte, the other by author. agriculture and "liquida-

37 A history published for the 150th anniversary of CS71 .K37 1978x, v. 1 Friedenstal. Lists names of families who left Germany in Griffin, Margaret Karlin, compiler. 1847 and settled in Friedenstal and names of pastors and The Karlin Family Tree, 1820-1978, Vol. 1 (n.p., 1978), teachers who served the church and school. Chapters 520 pp. Photos, map. Donated by compiler. also relate wedding, funeral, Christmas, and New Year The family stems from Bessarabia. The brief in- customs and the extent of agriculture, industry, and troduction explains the Karlin-Esslmger family history. trade. Excellent genealogical information on the families In 1873 the family sailed to America on the ship residing in Friedenstal. Harmonia and eventually settled in Columbus, Nebraska. The book is chiefly family charts. CS71 .B374 1982x, v. 2 Ferguson, Johanna Sawatzke. CS71 .K572 1986x The Family Barkman, Vol. 2 (n.p., 1985), 210 pp. History and Descendants of Jakob Kirschenmann (1846 Donated by author. to 1922) 1846 to 1986 (n.p., 1986), 139 pp. Photos, A continuation of the history and genealogy of the music score. Donated by Mrs. Edwin Preszler. Jakob Barkman family through the lineage of Martin J. Neudorf, South Russia, was the birthplace of Jakob Barkman and Peter M. Barkman, 1765-1985. Kirschenmann. The family immigrated to America about 1874 and homesteaded in Yankton County, South DK508.7 .S78x Dakota. Family charts and brief histories make up this "German Occupation Reports From the Ukraine and book. Poland" (n.p., 194?). Photocopy from microfilm, 18 pp. Includes Karl Stumpp's "Bericht liber das Gebiet DK651 .M57J82 1984x Korosten [in the Ukrainian S.S,R.] Gen.-Bez. Shitomir" Jubildumsfeier, 150 Jahre Friedenstal; 27./28. Oktober and Friedrich Rink's "Die deutschen Siedlungen in den 1984 in der Stadthalle Marbach/Neckar (Ludwigsburg, Generalbezirken Lusk [Lutsk in the Ukrainian S.S.R.] West Germany: G. Burner, 1984), 32 pp. Photos. und Shitomir [Zhitomir]." Stumpp reports on thirty-two Donated by Frieda Brulotte. settlements in Ukrainian Volhynia: history, the Outline of the program prepared for the 150th collectivization, murders, famine, banishment (1921- anniversary of Friedenstal. Includes the presentation 1941), and forced resettlement. Rink provides a general (Festansprache) given by Gotthilf Entzminger and the history of Volhynian Germans from prior to 1800 "Heimatlied der Bessarabiendeutschen." through 1941. There are a number of tables illustrating the data presented by both authors. CT235 .L4A3x Leiker, Henry S. F784 .M4G58x Our Henry 1917-1977 (n.p., published between 1977- Gloss Mountain Country; a History of Major County, 1980), 116 pp. Photos. Donated by Esther Korbe Oklahoma (Major County Historical Society, 1977), 503 Rohleder. pp. Maps, photos. Donated by Ruth Morrison Schuber An entertaining autobiography about life in Munjor and June Schuber Montgomery. and Hays, Kansas. Includes many humorous anecdotes. A compilation of numerous family histories and feature stories. A pictorial section of family memorials DK267 .M344 and tributes completes the volume. Mandel, William M. A Guide to the Soviet Union (New York, NY: Dial CS71 .G743 1980x Press, 1946), 511 pp. Griess, Regina Dolores Leader. This is a documented study. The topics discussed in From Thee... To Thee... The Leader-Griess detail are: The Sixteen Republics, History Since 1917, Genealogical Story and History (Baltimore, MD: Contemporary Foreign Policy, Not by Bread Alone, The Gateway Press, Inc., 1980), 363 pp. Photos, maps, Soviet Economy, and The Soviet Government. The family charts. Donated by Richard H. Alien. Germans who settled along the Volga River and other Many family histories are presented. The origins of areas are barely mentioned. these families include Rohrbach, South Russia, Austria- Hungary, and Germany. As they immigrated to North DK274 .M437 1969b America, they settled in South Dakota, Nebraska, and Message From Moscow by an Observer (New York, Canada. NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969), 288 pp. The author has chosen to remain anonymous to protect from reprisals the Soviet workers and more- educated citizens who took him into their homes

38 and into their trust. He points out the contrasts between the BX8117 .044P46x cities and the little, bleak villages; between the cultured and Penner, Lloyd Chester. educated, the scientific and technological achievements, and The Mennonites on the Washita River: The Culmination the primitive and uneducated. This report portrays the wave of of Four Centuries of Migrations. Oklahoma State repressive neo-Stalinism. University-Stillwater, 1976. Dissertation, 310 pp. Photos. Donated by Bruce Harms. CS71 .K58 1986x This dissertation focuses on whether the Mennonites are Mierau, Thomas B., ed. still supporting the traditional doctrines and convictions of The Johann Klippenstein and Helena Kroeker Family their forefathers and whether the present generation is History and Genealogy (Wichita, KS: Fair-view Books, courageous enough to sacrifice material prosperity for the sake 1986), 392 pp. Maps, photos. Donated by editor. of their spiritual values as did their forebears. The Klippensteins were Mennonites from the Molochna colonies. They and the Kroeker family came to York County, CS71 .R33 1900x Nebraska, in 1877. Foremost in the history of this family is its Rau, Edwin C., compiler. Anabaptist-Mennonite heritage. Rau Family Genealogy (n.p., 1986?), 102 pp. Donated by compiler. HV640.4 .G3M84 An assembly of family group charts and an index to cover Multhaupt, Hermann and Paul Kewitsch. all names included in the charts. Die aus dem Dunkein kommen. Begegnungen mit Spataussiedlern (Paderborn, West Germany: HV1265.5 .S6713 Melde- und Leitstelle fur spatausgesiedelte kath. Jugendliche, Springenschmid, Karl. 1974?), 118 pp. Our Lost Children: Janissaries? (Milwaukee, WI: The book's aim is to arouse an understanding of those who Danube Swabian Association of the U.S.A., Inc., 1980), 67 pp. immigrated to a strange land in later years, often on religious Donated by Eve E. Koehler. grounds, and endured hardships for their faith. It includes Originally published under the title Janit-scharen? Die interviews, one of which is with a couple who were residing in Kinder Tragodie im Banat, it is translated into English with West Germany, but who had formerly lived in Halbstadt additional notes by John Adam Kohler and Eve Eckert (Ukraine). Koehler. This is the story of the taking of thousands of children-many of German heritage—from their parents in GR 381 (perm.) Yugoslavia, during and after World War II. They were placed The Palatine Immigrant, Quarterly Journal of Palatines to in homes across the country to be instilled with new loyalties America. Vol. V, No. 3 (Winter 1980). Donated by Arta P. to an alien philosophy. Johnson, editor. Published by Palatines to America, Lafayette, Indiana, an CS71 .D653 1986x organization dedicated to finding the origins of German- Sullivan, Joanne Domnick, compiler. speaking immigrant ancestors in Europe. This issue has an Domnick-Steiner and Allied Families from Germany and article entitled "Germans Into and Out of Russia," pp. 99-144, Switzerland to West Virginia, Ohio, Kansas, and Illinois by Alice Sitler Dyck, a native of Kansas. (n.p., 1986), 111 pp. Photos, maps, documents. Donated by compiler. BX8076 .A37 1986x Includes family charts and brief histories of the individual Pathway of Faith. St. John's Lutheran Church, Ar- families. Ancestors came from Strasbourg, Alsace, and drossan, Alberta, 1936-1986 (Sherwood Park, AB: Konigsberg, East Prussia. St. John's History Committee, 1986), 230 pp. Photos. Donated by Edmonton Chapter, AHSGR. CS71 .G443 1982x Commemorates the church's fiftieth anniversary. Sweigard, Verdella Ahl Geiger. Numerous family histories depict the background and origin of Geiger Heritage (n.p., 1982), 99 pp. Donated by author. its members, many of whom came from the Prussian zone of Consists mainly of genealogy charts, photos, and copies of Poland and thence to Volhynia. Includes the record of bap- documents. The Ahl family was part of some Evangelical tisms, confirmations, weddings, and funerals of the settlements northwest of Odessa, while the Geiger family was congregation. part of the Catholic settlements in the Beresan Valley north- east of Odessa. Later they immigrated to America and settled in North Dakota.

39 TX715 .T47x The four issues each year contain compilations of The Thresher Table (North Newton, KS: Bethel College material found in the Woods County Courthouse, such Women's Association, 1986), 117 pp. Donated by Dr. as marriage records, declarations of intention, petitions and Mrs. W. E. Hieb. for naturalization, and land records. They also contain Consists of photographs, anecdotes, and recipes cemetery lists, genealogies, maps, mortuary records, collected and contributed by the alumni, faculty, and school information, and queries. staff of Bethel College in celebration of the first one hundred years of the college. Included is a chronological P49 .Z47213 table of events from May 1877 to October 1987. Zhirmunsky, V. M. Selected Writings, Linguistics, Poetics (Moscow, F702 ,W7W65x U.S.S.R,: Progress Publishers. 1985), 41'2 pp. Trans. by Woods County (Alva, Oklahoma) Genealogists. Vol. 8, Sergei Ess. No. 1 (Spring 1982)"Vol. 10, No. 4 (Winter 1984). This volume contains Zhirmunsky's shorter works on Donated by Central Oklahoma Chapter. general and Germanic linguistics, poetics, and versification.

Cemetery Kecords in the AHSGR Archives The Brüderheim Moravian Church Cemetery, Friedens Cemetery, Russell County, Kansas (Fair- Brüderheim, Alberta, Canada field Township) German Baptist Cemetery, Camrose, Alberta, Hope Valley Church Cemetery, St. Francis, Kansas [All] Canada Lincoln-Lancaster County, Nebraska, Cemeteries Hand Hills Baptist Cemetery, Alberta, Canada (Volumes 1-8, including indexes) Congregational Church Cemetery, Alexander, Yellowstone County, Montana, Cemeteries Kansas Lutheran Cemetery of Pine Island, New York Peace Lutheran Church Cemetery, Alexander, Johannes Reformed Church Cemetery, Zeeland, Kansas North Dakota Barton County, Kansas, Cemeteries Buffalo. Old Sayre, Poarch, Old Sayre-Doxey (Old Cemeteries of Blaine County, Oklahoma (Gone but Not Hillside) Cemeteries, Oklahoma Kiowa Cemetery, Forgotten) Roger Mills County, Oklahoma Oregon Trail Cemetery, Bridgeport, Nebraska Congregational Cemetery, Shattuck, Oklahoma (Veterans of WWI & WWII) Washita County, Oklahoma, Cemeteries Rose Hill Cemetery, Broadwater, Nebraska Mt. View Cemetery, Riverton, Wyoming (Veterans of WWI & WWII) Turkey Creek Cemetery Records, Saline County, Visalia, California, Cemetery Records Nebraska (also known as "The German Cemetery") Prairie View Cemetery, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho Reformed Cemetery, Sutley, South Dakota (Seventh-Day Adventist) Grant County Cemetery, #2, Wilson Creek, Washington Christian Cemetery, Weld County, Colorado (also Manfred, North Dakota, Seventh-Day Adventist called Horst's Cemetery) Church Cemetery Frieden Gemeinde Cemetery (also called German Lincoln Valley Country Seventh-Day-Adventist Lutheran Cemetery, Damm's Cemetery, Russian Church Cemetery, north of McClusky, North Cemetery, and Lutheran Funds), Culbert- Dakota son, Montana Goodrich, North Dakota, City Cemetery Denhoff, North Dakota, Catholic Church Cemetery Horst's Cemetery, Weld County, Colorado (also Denhoff, North Dakota, Nazarene Cemetery called Christian Cemetery) Hoffnungsfeld Congregational Cemetery, German St. Mark's Lutheran Church, Delia, Alberta, Township, Dickey County, North Dakota Canada (Cemetery) Enid, Oklahoma, Cemetery St. John's Lutheran Church Cemetery, White, Nebraska Salem-Zion Cemetery, Section No. 3, Freeman, South Dakota St. Joseph Cemetery, Liebenthal, Kansas St. Francis Cemetery, Munjor, Kansas [Grains of Wheat) PLEASE NOTE: If the area in which you live or an area in which you are interested is not represented in this list of Cemetery Records, we hope you will obtain a listing and send it to the AHSGR Archives for use by all our members.

40 THE ROMAN-CATHOLIC GERMANS OF THE U.S.S.R.: 1917-1986 Father Christopher L. Zugger With modern hindsight we find it odd to learn that living from the Caucasus (alongside 40,000 Armenian- Roman Catholicism welcomed the Revolution of 1917 Rite Catholics) to ethnically-mixed Moldavia (lost to and had hopes for a bright future in November after the Romania in 1920). Their ordinary had been Bishop Zerr, Bolshevik Revolution. The disestablishment of the but he was very old and in poor health, and in 1908 Orthodox Church and the general enthusiasm of those Johannes Kessler became the new bishop. The diocese first days of peace and—literally—revolutionary change was headquartered in Saratov, in the middle section of resulted in an extraordinary sight on May 10,1918, when the Volga, and was tightly knit and well-organized (it a vast crowd of thousands of Catholics, led by was called Tiraspol, because that had been the capital of Archbishop Edward von der Ropp carrying the the ancient diocese of Kherson, seat of Christianity in the Consecrated Host, his Polish suffragan Bishop Jan early Ukraine).6 Cieplak, and the Byzantine Catholic Exarch, Leonid Saratov was entered by the Red Army on August Feodorov, wound its way through the streets of 14,1918, and the shock of Communist rule was abrupt. Petrograd in Russia's first—and only—public Corpus Bishop Kessler was forced out of his house, and the Christi procession. When the banners and crosses of troops occupied the seminary, cathedral, diocesan Catholicism crossed the Liteiny Bridge on the River offices, and the cathedral grounds. Three priests were Neva, the Orthodox cathedral and churches rang their executed, and the bishop was forced to flee for his life. bells in welcome.1 To Catholics of both the Latin and As the southern Ukraine collapsed, he walked for ten Byzantine Rites, victims of czarist oppression, the days, arriving in Odessa sick and weary. Behind him he Revolution of 1917 heralded a new spring, and for a time left clergy and faithful in shock and vicars-general to even the antireligious Bolsheviks treated them with govern the diocese.7 respect as martyrs of czarist rule.2 These days of relief By 1922 the Civil War had ended in European soon faded, and by 1922 the Church was fighting for its Russia, treaties had been signed with the new states, and life. the White Army campaigns had ended. The Volga and Black Sea Germans were under Bolshevik rule and in the The Prelude heart of the great famine of 1922-23. Famine relief was a serious need, and the battered churches did their best. In 1914 Roman Catholicism counted some 13 million The Holy See was able to send a pontifical relief mission faithful in the Russian Empire. Of these, over half lived into the Crimea and Moscow, and America and other in the Kingdom of Poland, and only 5 million were in countries sent in huge amounts of food and medicine. Russia proper. With the establishment of the independent The government, however, decided to use the famine as Baltic States and Republic of Poland in 1918, the chaos an opportunity to humiliate the Russian Churches. Quite of the Civil War, Russo-Polish War, and the emigration needlessly, they were ordered to surrender all items of of many Poles and Baits to escape the horrors of Bol- value, even those used for Holy Communion so that the shevism, this number had been greatly reduced to about 3 precious stones and metals could be used to buy food. 1.5 million by 1922. The bulk of Catholics lived in the Orthodox and Catholic alike refused; in desperation, the western borderlands, in the rural South, and in some Vatican offered to redeem the sacred vessels, but urban centers such as Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Kiev. Moscow was adamant and attacked with a vengeance.8 The East—now home to 25 percent of the Soviet Union's The Catholic devastation was frightful: in the Ukraine Catholics—then had only 74,000—all in Siberia. The only sixteen of the sixty-eight churches were spared. In bulk of those were Polish and Eastern-Rite Ruthenian Minsk the cathedral was looted for days by soldiers who exiles and their descendants. With probably 3000 stripped the Icon of the Virgin and the Tomb of St. Felix. Germans they maintained seven parishes of seven 4 All of the Siberian churches were plundered, as were all churches and twenty-one chapels. churches in Petrograd. The carefully organized campaign Most Russian-German Catholics lived in the South, from May through August left people stunned; the in the vast Diocese of Tiraspol, one of the largest devastation in the Tiraspol diocese was described as "the dioceses in the Catholic world of the time, stretching worst." The destruction and stealing extended even to the from the Caspian Sea to old Romania. The Tiraspol cemeteries, where the monuments and crosses were diocese had 155,000 German Catholics in 38 Volga taken away or plowed colonies, and 195.000 in 1077 Black Sea colonies.5 These had about 150 priests to serve 100 far-flung parishes with the German faithful

41 under, plantings burned, fences torn down, and the lands ingrad and Kamenets.13 given over to secular uses.9 All these measures were The collectivization drive forced the German col- designed to shock and demoralize. onies to change their lifestyles even more and were In March 1923 the government arrested the new bitterly resented. In the 1930s the Germans lost even the archbishop, Jan Cieplak (von der Ropp had been exiled solace of the Mass. The government decided that the to Warsaw), and all of the clergy in Petrograd, along village priests were "extremely dangerous'' because they with the exarch Feodorov. These priests and one layman worked to bring into the collectives the spirit of justice, were taken to Moscow on March 4. They represented mercy, and Christian love.14 In a drive to reorganize the leadership of the Catholic Church, and all eyes society, where there had to be traitors and punishment of turned to the capital. A tragic show trial was held, those who resisted, the party could not afford such ending ironically on Palm Sunday (March 25). The qualities. Throughout the colonies, as well as throughout archbishop and his advisor were sentenced to death, the the borderlands, the priests disappeared. What became exarch and all the priests to long imprisonments. The standards later were developed then: fake sick calls, on advisor, Msgr. Constantine Budkiewicz, was shot before which a priest disappeared; perhaps a local show trial; Easter Sunday dawned. The archbishop was spared and often simply an empty room where a priest had sheltered deported.10 The Church was leaderless, without property the night before. or legal title to its churches. The clergy was deprived of In the Great Terror in 1937, Bishop Frison, the last civil rights, vulnerable to arrest at any time. Bolshevik Catholic bishop in all Russia, was arrested and shot. His attempts to promote a schism failed miserably: the death was followed by a roundup of every Catholic Catholics held firm to their religion and loyalty to priest left at liberty. They were charged with espionage Rome. for Poland and Japan, economic sabotage in the Atheistic propaganda intensified in 1922-24, eased collectives, and inciting the Catholic minorities to resist off, then became especially violent in the 1930s. There collectivization. All were deported to Siberian labor was never a letup to one basic line: camps.15 Catholicism is the enemy of the Russian State and The elimination of the clergy meant an end to people and of Marxism. The party line fed on anti-Polish sacramental life in Russia. Only one church survived: St. feelings and, as Hitler rose to power, added anti-German Louis-des-Francais to serve foreigners in Moscow (St. feelings." In 1926 the Vatican attempted to restore the Catherine's of Leningrad lasted until 1941, when it lost hierarchy by sending Bishop Michael d'Herbigny, S.J., its French priest). Catholics suffered as did all believers: into the U.S.S.R. He consecrated four priests as bishops atheism was taught in school, children were and named seven others as apostolic administrators. indoctrinated with party maxims. Village life allowed Among them were Bishop Alexander Prison for Odessa some basic teachings and practices to be passed on, but and South Russia, Msgr. Augustin Baumtrog for Saratov one had to be very careful in a country plagued with and Central Russia, and Msgr. Johann Roth for fear, as Stalin's Great Terror devoured millions of Pyatigorsk and the North Caucasus. The setting was innocent souls. In 1941 even this was lost, as the Volga complicated, the actions done without the knowledge of Germans were rounded up and hauled away. a xenophobic government that expected to be informed The status of the Volga Germans in exile is now and to control all facets of life. known to readers of this journal, especially as a result of When word leaked out that there was a Catholic Robert Conquest's The Nation Killers: life in camps, bishop in Moscow, literally thousands of Volga Ger- scattered families, few material comforts after being mans trekked north to present their children for rounded up with only as little as two hours' notice. The confirmation—a journey of over a thousand miles, and August deportations of the people from the dissolved one of great risk. They were joined by Poles, White Volga Republic had been followed in October by those Russians, French from the Donetz Basin, and Russian of the seventeen national districts in the Crimea and the converts and were encouraged when d'Herbigny Caucasus, and in March 1944 by the Russian Germans celebrated a pontifical High Mass at SS. Peter and Paul who had survived the 900-day siege of Leningrad. Some Church in Moscow. The government was not amused, 250,000 were either overtaken by the Red Army's and the emissary was deported.12 advance into Central Europe or were sent back by the Gradually, the new hierarchy was eliminated. Pope Allies after they had escaped to the West. All those Pius XI's international day of prayer for Russia in 1929 seized in 1941-44 were sent into Central Asia, mostly to spelled doom for the Armenian-Rite bishops of the old Kazakhstan. The last group ended up in Siberia, where Diocese of Tiraspol, both Mon-signors Roth and they suffered greatly in the 1947 famine.16 Treated Baumtrog, and prelates in Len "better" than the other five

42 nationalities rounded up in 1943-44, survivors remember finding as many as thirty dead in the camps in the mornings.17 They faced new hardships and a new chapter in life, Catholic and Protestant alike.

Exile The Russian Germans were forbidden to return home after their political rehabilitation, because their agricultural expertise was needed in the Soviet East. Catholics had survived an era deprived of Sacraments and even such basics as German-language Bibles and prayer books or holy pictures to hang in the Lieberherrgottsecke (Dear Lord God's corner) in their huts, or even rosaries and medals. Some priests survived the frozen wastes of the camps. An exiled Ruthenian priest is recorded as mentioning to a Volga German in the 1970s, "I benefit from the work done by your clergy." Other details are very few. The nearly two million Germans eventually concentrated into two large groups, as families reunited and freedoms were slowly restored in the 1950s. Today 46 percent (over 860,000) live in Kazakhstan, and another 41 percent (over 760,000) live in the nearby Asiatic republics. Some 7 percent live in Kirghizia (90,000) and Tadzhikstan (32,000), while another 6 percent are scattered across Siberia's cities and towns, live in the Moldavian colonies, which were Romanian until 1945, or returned Bishop Alexander Chira as a prisoner in 1955. Photo 18 to the Baltic republics. courtesy of the Byzantine Catholic World. In Kazakhstan nearly 25 percent of the Germans are Catholic, and Catholics are found in every other (served by a Lithuanian priest), and one was in the population (except the Baltic group, which has been suburb for Poles. At the same time, one Eastern-Rite Lutheran for four hundred years.)19 There are church was opened for the faithful in the Ukrainian approximately three million Catholics in the Soviet East, suburb. Three houses were bought by the people, altars of whom 1.4 million are Polish and the rest a mixture of raised, Masses begun, and decorations gradually added. Germans, Baits, Eastern-Rite deportees, and converts.20 These did not survive long: Other German church groups in the Soviet East include the Eastern-Rite church was closed in the spring of 1957, 100,000 Mennonites21 and 500,000 Lutherans.22 followed by the German church in May and the Polish The death of Stalin in 1953 was followed by the one on July 4th. Its former pastor wrote, "God alone famous thaw, amnesties, and the release of millions of knows how much we mourned for it."24 The same pattern prisoners. Polish, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, and Ruthenian was followed in Tselinograd (Akmolinsk), opened from Eastern-Rite priests (and one American bi-ritual, Fr. 1955-59, and Taincha (1956-60). The Germans, Poles, Walter Ciszek, S.J.), were with these people and began and Lithuanians opened a series of chapels along main to do pastoral work among the exiles as early as 1954. In highways and in the town of Kant, but all were later 1955 the Poles, who had been dragged from their homes closed.25 in 1939, were allowed to go home at last. (Poles whose In Siberia, too, churches were opened. Fr. Ciszek homes were in post-1945 Soviet territory were not all so came from prison directly into active parish work in the lucky.) They took with them priests, but some stayed. distant city of Norilsk. There, too, the faithful of both The other priests could never go home, and they settled Rites raised chapels in the sprawling suburbs of boloks, in.23 wooden shantytowns of tiny huts and muddy streets. In 1956 two Latin-Rite churches were opened in There, by 1957, he was serving both Rites of all Karaganda, the sprawling "city of exiles." One was in nationalities, celebrating Masses where the crowds were the center of the city and for Germans so thick that he could be vested at Easter only by raising his arms over his head and letting men pull the vestments down onto him.26 But in April 1958 the churches were closed, and he was sent to Krasnoyarsk.

43 Fr. Ciszek's experiences in Krasnoyarsk are a typical tral Asia has thirty-seven registered Roman Catholic example of what these exiled believers endure. The city churches and chapels—some priestless, but all open.32 In group of Lithuanians, a German suburb, and a German Siberia there is only one: the Germans of Novosibirsk state farm erected a central church, sought to have the gathered in the spring of 1983 to open a parish. The original church restored to them, then requested a radio original Polish church, described as "magnificent," had station. Petitions went to the city council, ministries, been pulled down in the 1920s. They did open a chapel Moscow, and even Khrushchev that they be registered as and establish a parish, with a station at Tomsk, but their a parish. They had a church (complete with an altar, Polish priest was imprisoned in May 1985.38 There are Stations, confessionals, baptismal font) and now a no Eastern-Rite churches legally left open anywhere. priest—why could they not be registered? In June Fr. Ciszek was deported south to Abakan by the police, and Life in the Diaspora the despondent people were told they could not be a registered parish because there was no priest.27 To this The parishes technically come under the jurisdiction day, Krasnoyarsk has no parish. of the Archbishop of Riga, Latvia, whose seminary must train Latvian, Polish, German, and Byelorussian students First Registered Parish for the priesthood. Effectively, there is no organization for any Catholics beyond the western borderlands, and Still, Catholic life endures. In 1977 after twenty-one even there the Church/Catholicism is restricted. A West- years of petitions, the Germans of Karaganda received German bishop commented that the survival of the Faith permission to build a church. Erected by donated labor in under these circumstances "is little short of miraculous" the evenings and on weekends and led by Bishop and is possible only because the many nationalities have Alexander Chira, last Eastern-Rite bishop of Uzhorod, sunk their differences and united in a common goal.84 who also had Latin-Rite faculties, the parish of 15,000 German-Catholic life, then, shares common dedicated their church six months later. characteristics with other exiled groups and has a few that are unique to it.35 The Mass: Eucharist is central to Catholic life, and the celebration of Mass miraculously continued in the labor camps. Today that probably still occurs, as the networks were well-established forty years ago. In the registered churches Mass is offered to packed congregations today. The regular celebration of Mass often brings back people who have strayed away or abandoned religion entirely.36 Despite laws that forbid the presence of young people under eighteen, First Holy Communion remains the Sacrament of the young, and altar boys serve faithfully.

The exterior of the Roman-Catholic Church in In churches deprived of or denied a priest, the Karaganda. Photo courtesy of the Byzantine Catholic vestments are laid out on the altar, and the congregation World. sings or reads the Mass, praying in silence at the place of 28 the Consecration. There are still many underground A Lithuanian priest, Fr. Albinus, serves as pastor. In priests who hold secular jobs in factories, work as 1967 verbal permission was granted to build churches in custodians or night watchmen many places, and travel Alma-Ata and Kustanay, but no priest can serve in them, 29 around circuits. These men celebrate Mass in quiet so the people gather for prayer services. A German homes in the suburbs or at the edges of farms in the priest, Pr. Michael Koller, the last surviving priest of the evening or early morning. Ordinary tables are adorned Diocese of Tiraspol, received permission to open a 30 with linen; candles in glasses of salt (candlesticks are church in Frunze, Kirgizia, and he still serves there. In expensive), holy pictures, and crucifix are set up, and the 1978 a large church of 350 square meters was rapidly "sanctuary" is ready. These underground Masses are built in Dushanbe, Ta-dzhikistan, and in 1979 a second often accompanied by baptisms and weddings. church was built in the suburb of Kurgan-Tyube, both by Germans. These were joined by a chapel at Vakhsh and The language is usually Latin, since little is three small "private places of worship," probably small shrines set up at homes.31 All in all, Soviet Cen

44

First Holy Communion of 115 children in the church in Karaganda, 1981. On the high altar are St. Anthony of Padua with the Christ Child (on the left) and St. Francis of Assist (on the right). A statue of St. Peter as on the far left and a statue of St. James on the far right. A sculpture of the Last Supper is at the base of the altar. Photo courtesy of the Byzantine Catholic World. known of Vatican II, but sermons are in Russian if the munities to be confessed, and many can do so only every few congregation is mixed. years. Karaganda's reputation of always having a priest has Holy Communion: With great care, priests will resulted in a literally steady stream of penitents seeking leave the Holy Eucharist behind so that the faithful can healing. have it on hand for the dying. Bishop Chira allowed laity to take Communion themselves regularly in his absence; such arrangements were up to the individual priest who made his decision after he became acquainted with people. Baptism: This Sacrament of Initiation is ad- ministered to people of all ages, literally. Many of the laity are reluctant to administer it, and all refuse to go to the Orthodox clergy. German communities have a lay elder who administers Nottaufe, baptism in distress, with water and the proper ritual, but when a priest appears or is found, the recipients usually want to be conditionally rebaptized. Confession: Every priestly account relates the strain of hearing confessions. People travel thousands of miles Bishop Chira is celebrating Mass in the Roman Rite. from isolated Catholic com Photo courtesy of the Byzantine Catholic World.

45 Marriage: Every priest spends his visits blessing between Poles and Germans. There is one church left, marriages—and then baptizing, confessing, and the cemetery chapel in Kishinev, and only one priest. In communicating the descendants and the original couple. Beltsy they rent a sports hall for Mass, in Rashkovo they Germans celebrate valid marriages called Nottrauung, in meet outside. The Kishinev chapel has been torn down which the couple exchanges vows before the parents five times. The police are especially harsh, and the who serve as witnesses. whole community was threatened with forcible Funerals: The lack of a regular clergy pains these deportation in 1979. Yet, when the army came to take three million exiles most especially at death. There are the priest away, young men who had already served still isolated groups, stranded on state farms in the vast stepped up to take his place. The priest and the young Asiatic wilderness, who have not seen a priest in twenty men were spared, but Mass is still said under roofs of years. The only consolation they have at death is to toss pine branches in rain and snow. into the grave a handful of consecrated earth mailed to The Diaspora Catholics have been among the most them for this purpose. Depending on the area, a priest abandoned in the world by the rest of the Church. might be able to appear at the cemetery, but funeral Sometimes not even knowing that Jesus was God and processions of religious import are banned, and those Man because there were no Bibles or prayer books left who die in hospitals are denied religious funerals (hence to them, they have clung to their Catholic religion, even the pathetic sight of the dying being carried home). though it means losing promotions or better housing. In Vocations: A familiar figure is the monaskka, a the face of ongoing ethnic discrimination and even the woman, usually Lithuanian, who has taken religious loss of their language, the Germans continue to hold to vows as a tertiary. Living in small communities and two negative classifications, like the Poles exiled before usually working as nurses or day-care workers, these them. An Orthodox priest in Moscow told foreigners of secret sisters work to pass on the Faith, illegally these people, "For those who suffer in the name of faith, teaching children and copying old cathechisms by hand. nothing can be worse than to be forgotten by one's Nuns are organized centrally as one community: there brothers." are no different orders. In their appeals for missals, Bibles, catechisms, Men aspire to the secular priesthood. Seminary Vatican II texts in their language or Russian, the exiles enrollment is limited by the government to ridiculously always add two items: publicity that they have survived low figures, and there are secret courses for those turned and prayer that they will continue to do so. down and secret bishops to ordain them. Sometimes these priests are recognized by the State, for a while or Notes permanently. Often they must join the underground clergy, and the risk of arrest "for impersonating a cleric" 1. Hansjakob Stehle, Eastern Politics of the Vatican, is very real. But vocations are high everywhere. 1917-1979, trans. Sandra Smith (Athens, Ohio: Ohio From Siberia to Europe; There are two traffic University Press, 1981), pp. 11-12. flows of Catholics: one in and to Soviet Central Asia, 2. Ibid., p. 15. the other along the Trans-Siberian Railroad to the 3. Prewar statistics are from The Catholic Encyclopedia churches of Moscow, Kiev, and Odessa. At some point (New York: Encyclopedia Press, Inc., and Knights Siberian families or groups will buy the cheap fares and of Columbus, 1913), Vol. 13. p, 765. Postwar figure go into these three cities to receive the Sacraments, is that generally agreed upon. especially if they are not on an underground circuit. 4. Ibid., p. 767. They are easy to identify in the three surviving churches: in a church for the first time in twenty, forty years or in 5. James J. Zatko, Descent into Darkness; The their lives, the whole group lies stretched out in Destruction of the Roman Catholic Church in adoration for hours and hours before the Mystery of Russia, 1917-1928 (Notre Dame, Indiana: which they have heard or dimly recall: the Real Presence University of Notre Dame Press, 1965), p. 87. of Christ in the tabernacle. Foreigners or local Catholics 6. Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 14, p. 739. are moved to tears at the sad sight: decent, law-abiding 7. Zatko, pp. 87-88. people, denied their most precious right by the State 8. Stehle, pp. 40-41. they have quietly served. 9. Zatko, pp. 119-124. Moldavia: The only concentration of Russian 10. Ibid., pp. 154-168. Germans left in the European Soviet Union is in the 11. Dennis J. Dunn, The Catholic Church and the Soviet Moldavian Republic, once called Bessarabia. Moldavia Government, 1939-1949 (New York: Columbia had 200 Catholic churches in 1945, and now there are University Press, East European Monograph 30, 1977), 15,000 Roman Catholics here, divided especially chapters 1 and 2. 12. Stehle. The major account of d'Herbigny's ill-fated project can be found on pp. 85-99. 13. Dunn, p. 40. 14. Ibid., p. 41.

46 15. Ibid., p. 42. 23. Fr. Wladyslaw Bukowinski, "The Life of a Polish Priest in 16. Robert Conquest, The Nation Killers: Soviet Deportation Kazakhstan," trans, Janet Curtis, Religion in Communist of Nationalities, rev. ed. (New York: Macmillan Co., Lands, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Spring 1984), p. 100. 1970), pp. 107-108. 24. Ibid., p. 101. 17. Janice A. Broun, "Latin Catholics in the Soviet Union," 25. Ibid. America, August 23, 1980, p. 66. 26. Fr. Walter Ciszek, S.J., with Daniel Flaherty, S.J., With 18. Helene Currere d'Encausse, Decline of an Empire: God in Russia (Garden City, Kansas: Image Books and The Soviet Socialist Republics in Revolt, trans. Martin America Press, 1964), see chapter 4, pp. 262-297. Sokolinsky and Henry A. La Forge (New York: Harper & 27. Ibid., pp. 299-306. Row, 1979), p. 200. 28. Pekar, op. cit. 19. Fr. Athanasius Pekar. OSBM, "Testimony to Bishop 29. Bukowinski. pp. 101-102. Alexander Chira," Byzantine Catholic World, September 30. "Fr. Jozef Swidnicki," KNS, May 15, 1986, p. 14. 8, 1986, p. 8. 31. Ibid. 20. Broun. p. 67. 32. Broun, p. 68. 21. Gerd Stricker and Walter Sawatsky, "Mennonites in 33. KNS, May 15, 1986, op. cit. Russia and the Soviet Union: An Aspect of the Church 34. Broun, p. 68. History of the Germans in Russia," Religion in 35. All information in this section is from Broun, pp. 68-70, or Communist Lands, Vol. 12, No. 3 (Winter 1984), pp. Bukowinski, pp. 102-106, unless otherwise cited. 293-311, note 37. 36. Pekar, op. cit. 22. Marie Sapiets, "Superintendent Haralds Kalnins and the Lutherans East of the Urals," Keston News Service (KNS), September 4, 1986, p. 15.

Christ is Risen* Truth*

Christ needs neither the zeal of one of little faith Nor the I knocked for long at the door of "Wealth," hypocritical decorum of the pharisee; But a porter angrily shook his fist at me. Only good deeds are pleasing to him, I wanted to gaze upon "Joy" with my own eyes, Faith without works is dead. But I was told, "You are unknown to us!" Think of all those whose lot is heavy, I came to the palace where "Fortune" resides, You, to whom destiny was kind and whom it But the entry had been nailed shut long ago. exalted! I wanted to enter the dwelling of "Love," Think of them on the day when the dead Will rise But I heard a voice behind the door, "First you pay!" by Christ! At the door of "Honor" I was told, And may you be revived by the blessing of God, Like "There is no admittance here without patronage!" the frozen earth by the rays of spring from I wanted to enter the temple of sacred "Glory," But I was not allowed to pass without an enormous heaven, bribe. And you will exclaim, "In myself is Christ And now I have stumbled on the hut of "Work," And risen today!" straightway, unchallenged, I walked in.

*See Poems to Pauline, page 33.

47 CONCERNING THE NAMING OF GERMAN SETTLEMENTS IN SOUTH RUSSIA* Translated by Erika Barton It would be an intriguing task to conduct research In the Odessa Region, also, many colonies were named into the origin of the names of all colonies. Perhaps after the places of origin of the immigrants: these lines will provide an impulse for some to reflect on Karlsruhe, Miinchen, Landau, Kassel, Worms, Neu- how the name of their village came about. Only the most Stuttgart, Durlach, Heidelberg, Rastatt, Suiz, Speyer, important types of names will be mentioned here. In the Baden, Kandel, Selz, Strassburg, Elsass, Berlin, name we often find a piece of local history. Danzig, Darmstadt, Mannheim, etc. A large number of colonies were named after The attachment to the old villages went so far that people's hometowns in their home countries. So these combination names were formed: Kronstal, after the names give us a clue as to the origin of the inhabitants. mother colonies of Kronsweide and Rosen-tal; The Mennonites were especially firm in their at- Neuhorst, after Neuendorf and Schonhorst. tachment to the names of their original home area, as Often the location of the colonies determined the some examples from the Khortitsa area prove: choice of a name: Klosterdorf [Convent Village]— near Einlage [Inlay], so named because of its location in a a monastery; Bergtal [Mountain Valley]; curve of the Dnieper River, after a village by the same Schonfeld [Beautiful Field]; Schöntal [Beautiful name situated in a similar manner on the Nogat River in Valley]; Friedental [Peace Valley]—"in a graceful, West Prussia; Burwalde, a name with the first syllable peaceful valley"; Heuboden [Hayloft]—because the site corrupted by the Low-German dialect. It should have provided much hay. Altonau (Molochna) meant "All- been Barwalde [Bearwoods] after a village in Prussia. Too-Close" to the Nogay [Tatars] who still inspired fear Neu-Osterwick was named after the village Osterwick at that time. in the Gdansk Basin. Weinau [Wine Valley] [was named] after the The same is true for the Mennonite villages along the occupation [viniculture] of the first inhabitants in their Molochna River: Halbstadt, Muntau, Schonau, places of origin in Wurttemberg (Stuttgart); Lichtenau, Lindenau, Fischau [the "-ay" suffix means Rybalsk (Ryba == fish)—because the inhabitants prior "meadow"], Ladekopp, Mtinsterberg, Lichtfelde, to settlement by Germans made their living from fishing; Neukirch, Margenau, Riickenau, Grossweide, Waldheim (Molochna)—named by settlers from Pordenau, Sparrau, Ohrloff—all are names that we Volhynia who came from forested areas; find again in West Prussia around Marienwerder [now Schlangendorf [Snake Village]—"You built your Kwidzyn] and Danzig [now Gdansk]. village like a snake," everything side by side, as stated in The Mariupol Region shows similar features: the chronicle. Tiegenhorst, Rosengart, Grunau, Rosenberg, The origin of the name Waterloo is interestingly Wickerau, Kampenau, Mirau, Darmstadt—only different. The colonists had been very obstinate toward here the communities are Protestant. Colonial Inspector Krüger. Therefore, he likened them to Zürichtal [Zurich Valley] in the Crimea was settled the inhabitants of the town of Waterloo in Belgium who, by forty families from Switzerland. during the siege, had obstinately refused to surrender, The inhabitants of Altonau came from Nassau- and he named the colony Waterloo, which was confirmed by the authorities. Usingen. In Bessarabia some mother colonies were named in Hochstädt was named after the first mayor's remembrance of the Napoleonic campaign (1812): hometown, Hochstädt on the Rhine. Borodino, Beresina (battle on the Beresina River), Paris, Leipzig, Tarutino (place near Moscow), Brienne-Arzis (in memory of the battle, which took *This article is a translation of “Etwas über die place in 1814 near Arzis in France), Kulm, Katzbach Namengebung der deutschen Kolonien in Südrussland" (remembering the battle on the river Katzbach in in Heimatbuch der Ostumsiedler Kalender 1954, edited Silesia), Fere Champenoise (after a French town). by E. J. Schleuning (Stuttgart: Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Many villages were named after famous person- Ostumsiedler, 1954), pp. 44-45. Used by permission of alities: the Landsmann-schaft der Deutschen aus Russland. a) From the ranks of the colonists: Konteniusfeld, Molochna—after the well-known Kontenius, who did so much for the welfare of the colonists;

48 Ludwigstal, Grunau—after the first mayor of the tal, Friedenstal, Gnadental, Gnadenfeld, Heimtal, village; Freudental, Lustdorf, etc. Friedrichsfeld, Molochna—after the first mayor, In other names the character of the land finds expression: Friedrlch Lupp; Schönwiese [Beautiful Meadow], Schönhorst, Blumengart Mathildendorf, Sofiental, etc. [Flower Garden], Rundewiese [Round Meadow], b) Members of the imperial family: Reichenfeld [Rich Field] (because of the abundant Alexanderwohl, Molochna—"The Emperor vegetation), Gruntal, Rosental, etc. Alexander wishes you well [wohl}"; Many daughter colonies were named after the mother Mariental, Molochna—after the Empress Mother colony with the prefix Neu- [new]: Neu-Arzis, Neu-Schönsee, Maria; Neu-Landau, Neu-Liebental, Neu-Stuttgart, etc. Alexandertal, Alexanderhilf ["-tal" = "valley"; "-hilf" The attachment to these names, which were transferred = "help"]-"In memory of the reign of Alexander I." from the place of origin or newly assigned, was so Gnadenheim [Home of Grace]—"You enjoy the good pronounced that one finds these names every place where the graces of the father of the country no less than the colonists found a new home, whether on the Don, in the Ural, people of Alexandertal." (Kontenius); in Siberia, or in America. Thus one can follow not only the Elisabethtal—after Empress Elisabeth, [also] worldwide wanderings of the colonists but also of the place Elisabethdorf; names. Marienf eld— after the spouse of the successor to the In the years before the First World War, many names throne; were Russianized. Alexanderhilf became Alekseyevka; Helenendorf or Helenental—in honor of the favorite Neuburg, Vladimirovka; Blumen" hein-i, Verbovoye; sister of Alexander I, Helene. Schonfeld, Krasnopol, etc. But in everyday speech the Widespread are the names formed by combining the German names were generally used. lp** words Hoffnung [hope], Frieden [peace], Gliick [fortune, luck, or happiness], Liebe [love], Heim [home], Gnade [grace], with Tal [valley], Berg [mountain], Dorf [village], Fold [field]: Hoffnungs-tal (in view of the hope for a happy future), **The author is identified only by these initials. Hoffen-tal (Kontenius: "Here is the hope of your in- dustriousness"), "Glücksdorf, Glückstal, Lieben-

Truth* Laziness flees from work As darkness does from the sun; Laziness is the foolishness of the body, Foolishness—laziness of the mind.

*See Poems to Pauline, page 33. 49 FELIDA MEMORIES Amelia Krieger Werre Using the six installments written by Mrs. Werre under the same title from the Hazel Dell [Washington] News as the framework for this article, we have added in italics other pertinent information also provided by Mrs. Werre. The installments appeared in the December 14, 21, and 28 1977) and January 4, 11, and 18 (1978) issues of the newspaper. They are reprinted here by permission from The Columbian, Vancouver, Washington. Amelia Werre sat in the living room of her tiny Sherwood, Oregon, farmhouse and recounted the story of the people of Norka, a "little German nation" along the Volga River. The land belonged to Russia but had become a German enclave in the 1800s. It was there that her father was born. Near the turn of the century, however, he boarded a train to Hamburg and booked passage on the steamship [Normannia in May 1890] for the trip to America. He was married twice and eventually moved to Felida [Washington] with his family. Mrs. Werre, then Krieger, was born in 1902. [From the age of 1 to 17 (1903 to 1919). she lived with her family in the Felida area.] More than seventy years later she wrote her memoirs of her youth in the growing farm community. Amelia Krieger Werre with her nephew's daughter, Today, Mrs. Werre is [one of the approximately Christine Monroe. 12,000 individual members of the] American Historical He had three young daughters by his first marriage. Society of Germans From Russia, an organization My sister Pauline was born June 11, 1900, and I came to formed to preserve the culture and history of its be the last daughter, born August 15,1902. members, [some] of whom are descendants of the people Father, in his disappointment in not having a son, of Norka. [asked], "Must I work for petticoats all my Amelia and Gottlieb Werre, a farmer and blacksmith life?" gifted in the use of tools, were married in 1930. He died Father's mother lived with them, and she did not in 1971. strive for peace, happiness, or harmony in the home. It Her sister Pauline, often mentioned in the memoirs, must have been when I was an infant that Mother asked is the mother-in-law of Apollo 15 astronaut James B. her if she would watch us while she went to the store. Irwin. The answer she got was, "I raised my children; raise yours!" Flooding Every Spring When an opportunity arose to get away from these My father, Henry Krieger, came to the United States unpleasant situations by moving to a small farm seven in May 1890 and settled in Sutton, Nebraska. Later he miles northwest of Vancouver, Mother was all for it. moved to Grand Island, Nebraska, and then to Portland, I was ten months old when my family moved to Oregon. Felida in June 1903, into an old T-shaped farmhouse. He had been a widower for three years when he There was a big kitchen on the long side with two small proposed to his second cousin, [Katherine Elizabeth bedrooms in the rear and a living room Krieger], whom he had known from childhood. They with adjoining bedroom in the other part of the "T" were married July 31, 1898. Mother was already thirty- Some of my earliest recollections are of a bitterly four years old when she came from Sutton, Nebraska, to cold winter when the news spread that the Portland for their marriage,

50 Columbia River had frozen over. Some of the young became a busy railroad station with a wireless telegrapher. men of the community had taken long poles and made it Besides the mail sacks, milk cans, boxes of carp, and other across. produce were shipped from Felida north to Seattle or south to A calf was born during this cold spell. Father knew it Portland. For years two long logging trains from Yacolt, one could not survive in the barn, so he brought it into the in the forenoon, the other in the early afternoon, came to the kitchen; straw was put in a corner for its bed. He would Lake River siding at Felida, where they were run onto a spur carry it to the barn to suckle^ then bring it back into the and the logs dumped into the river by a moving donkey house again. engine. To augment the meager farm income, Father would They were floated into Vancouver Lake, where they were return to Portland to work for Knight Packing Co., where corralled in booms and finally rafted and towed downstream. his brother Adam was foreman. He did whatever work he There was a large, high water tank near the Felida station, was assigned, but one job in particular was to sharpen which was filled from one of the many springs corning out of the millstones that were used to grind mustard seed to the hillside. The trains [frequently] stopped there to take on be made into prepared mustard. Father would complain water. that the millstones were run until all the lines were Cattle would often wander onto the tracks and were killed. obliterated. Sharpening them entailed cutting with a cold The mentally-retarded son of the Matt Andersons often chisel and mallet a series of curves in graduated depths stopped trains, as he paid no heed to the distress whistle of the from the center of the millstone to the edge on the inside engineers. of the stone. Our nearest neighbors were Frank Corman, his wife He helped make dill pickles in the fall. He also put on Maggie, and their children Clyde and Edith. rubber boots and tromped shredded cabbage in big tanks. Edith was Pauline's age and died of tuberculosis when He salted it, and it was left to ferment and become she was fourteen or fifteen years old. Their farm sauerkraut. Later on, it was transferred into small kegs adjoined ours on the west and some on the north. Mr. and other containers and shipped throughout Oregon. German's farm ran down to the bluff and how far down After he finished work on Saturdays (there were no to the Lake River I don't know. He, too, was hard 5-day weeks then), he would take the Vancouver pressed for money, and one year he offered to sell streetcar—which ran on Williams Avenue in Portland to Father an acreage bordering on our west side really the ferry depot—then the ferry across the Columbia cheaply, but since Father could not raise the money, River to Vancouver. From there he walked home via the much as he would have liked to have had the additional railroad tracks. acreage (he had only 19 acres), he could not take From Williams Avenue the streetcar ran over a long advantage of the bargain price Mr. Corman offered. It wooden trestle with a built-out portion to enable wasn't too long afterwards that the railroad company streetcars to pass. Before dikes and the Bonneville Dam, bought the right-of-way land at the edge of the bluff (and this area flooded every year in the spring. extending to the edge of Lake River) from Mr. Corman It must have been in the years between 1908 and and paid him well for it. If memory serves me right, there 1911 that a double railroad track was built north from may have been a yearly royalty paid, also, since from Vancouver to Seattle, skirting the bluffs and near Lake then on Mr. Corman took life easy while Father worked River. The Greek laborers working on the new railroad from early morn till late at night to make a living. often came up the canyon to our house to buy eggs and Every June, with the melting snows in the Cascade other produce. Mountains and the swollen rivers feeding the Columbia River, They complained bitterly about their itching legs. there was high water on the lowlands between the Columbia, Father told them it must be poison oak, as the hillsides the slough, and Lake River. The dairymen living on the were covered with it. bottoms along Lake River and Vancouver Lake were in As the bluffs were cut back to make room for the trouble and had to move their herds to higher ground. second track, it made the possibility of slides a constant Lake River would always go over its banks and come up to danger during heavy rains when the ground was soaked the bottom of the railroad tracks. We could see big, fat, golden and unstable. The rumble of heavy freight trains could carp swimming lazily about. My sister and I would dig worms trigger a slide onto the tracks with danger of a and go fishing in Lake River after the water went down. We derailment. My father was hired to patrol this area on would clamber out on the logs lying in the river. foot during the night. He was given explosive clamp shells to clamp onto the rails when engineers had to be warned. As the countryside became built-up, Felida

51

Pilings along Lake River near Felida Moorage, circa 1900. This was dangerous—they could have rolled and thrown One of the men who came to the farm with a pack on us off, and neither one of us could swim. his back, walking the railroad, was Conrad Gold. He was One spring Sunday afternoon, Father went fishing from Austria and spoke beautiful German. He was with us. We walked what seemed like miles trying to working to earn enough money to pay his fare back to find a good fishing spot. Pauline thought of holding onto Austria, where he had a wife, two boys, and a girl. He some willows alongside a boom log so that she could get intended to walk to New York and take a ship from there. onto the log. It moved and Pauline went in over her He did get home, as his family sent us some flower head. Father grabbed her by the ears and pulled her out! seeds. After World War I broke out, however, we never No fish that Sunday. heard from Conrad Gold again. Another helper was Mr. Ward, a short, stout man. He Buggy Was Dynamite Casualty slept in the barn in his blanket and dirty quilt. One night the cow got loose and found his^ long Johns—which she Mother used to be scared to be left home alone with chewed for their salt content. The next morning Mr. two small children. Ward was quite grumpy as he tried to warm himself by Hobos walking the tracks with their bedrolls on their the cook stove. backs would find their way up the canyon and ask for a He was very handy around the farm and helped with handout. They were always fed, never sent away hungry. the fall butchering and land clearing. He made a sled out Some would ask for work, and if Father could afford to of green hazelnut wood, bent the runners over a fire, built hire them to help clear ground, he would. a framework over the runners, and then added seats. Others offered to split wood for their meal. Only Mother made good use of empty 50- and 100-pound once did Mother refuse to feed a hobo, and after-ward flour sacks to make underwear for us, pillow cases, and she was conscience-stricken. It was against her religion even sheets. I cannot recall that we had even one store- to turn the hungry away. One night, Mother, not wishing bought sheet while living on the farm. She even made to open the door to a knock, told a hobo to go to the next some especially nice sacks into tablecloths with a house, and he happened to go to Mrs. .Randolph, a hemstitched edging. neighboring widow, who lived alone. It wasn't long Mother always made Sunday special, especially the afterward that she let Mother know about it. meals. She always had a white tablecloth on the

52 table. Even the beds were made up special. load up his wagon. The next morning he was up before My sister and I were taught early to respect the dawn and started for Portland, and often it was dusk bedding—we were not allowed to sit or wallow on the before he came home. He would take along whatever beds made up with quilts, as that would mat the fluffy else there was to sell: vegetables, berries, honey, cotton or woolen filling, reducing [its] warmth as well as potatoes, eggs—whatever produce there was to bring in soiling the covers. Bedding has always been expensive, much-needed cash. Father would set the ladder and hold and it's a chore to replace a soiled or worn-out cover. As onto it while I picked the last cherries on the tips of the a child in the cold winters, I can recall that Mother made limbs. The orioles came to get cherries for their nestlings up my bed with a sheepskin coat that Father had brought too. One year a newspaper reporter came to ask Father with him from the Old Country. The sheepskins had been what he had in his wagon, and he was impressed with tanned, and when made-up into coats, the wool was the nicely packed apples. It was many years later that worn on the inside for extra warmth and the tanned hide the Vancouver Columbian carried a brief notice of Henry on the outside as a windbreaker. She also had goose- Krieger on his way to Portland with his wagonload of nice feather beds and pillows, which she had brought along apples. from Nebraska as her dowry. We never lacked for bedding, as Mother was resourceful and never let anything go to waste. She pieced together all usable parts of worn-out woolen clothing and made warm quilts out of them. Mother learned to knit in childhood, so she knitted socks for Father, stockings for Pauline and me, and mittens for all of us. My! How that wool on our legs itched! When Father wasn't working for Knight Packing Co. he was home clearing land to raise hay for the cow as well as potatoes for home use and to sell. Later on, he set out a fruit orchard. There were three kinds of cherries and pears, crab apples, plums, and prunes, besides many varieties of apples. When he passed produce stores, he would observe names of apples on the boxes and order accordingly from agents who came by selling fruit trees. Most of the apples that he planted are no longer on the market, except the Rome Beauty and Jonathan. One apple, the Waxen, was a crisp, tart- flavored apple of medium size. Its skin was a pale Henry Krieger on his way to Portland with farm produce. greenish-yellow. There was a good market for them, as the German people prized them for pickled apples. A The Henry Miller family also peddled apples and light syrup was spiced with anise, star anise, licorice produce among the German people in Portland. Often root, and cinnamon bark. These were put down in a they would try to bargain with Father, telling him that small, wooden barrel, weighted, and left to cure, which Millers sold produce at a lower price. The answer he took up to three months. They had to be sound— no gave them was that they should have bought the lower- worm holes that would permit the syrup to soak in. They priced produce. It was inferior to what he peddled. were a real treat in the winter. At first Father cleared land by blasting out the stumps, After apple trees and the others began to bear, they which burned. Later he acquired a stump puller, and clearing had to be pruned and sprayed. Pauline and I would land became easier, as he used the dynamite to blast out or pump the sprayer handle until we were pretty tired. The split the larger stumps, and the smaller ones could be removed apple trees were sprayed in late spring with arsenate of with the stump puller. lead. There was always a lot of quack grass under the Blasting with dynamite was a dangerous job. A hole was trees. Dolly, the horse, had been tied out under the trees dug under the stump with a long-handled, half-round blasting to eat the tender quack grass and was poisoned, as not spoon. Father would tie together the last bunch of dynamite to enough time had elapsed to make the poison on the go into the hole, and in one stick he would insert a blasting cap ground ineffective. to which a fuse was attached. The hole was filled with dirt and Apples were picked, sorted, and packed. The day lightly, but firmly, tamped, the before he intended to go to Portland, Father would

53 fuse was lit, and everybody ran for cover. Often a always something that had to be done. number of stumps were set off at once, so it was essential that count be kept of how many had blown up. Bees Swarm as Days Warm Once Father miscounted and started walking toward a loaded stump. When he noticed his error, he made a hasty retreat. The stump went off with a roar, showering Father was also interested in honey bees. When we pieces of tree and clods of dirt all around, but left the farm, there were around fifty hives. fortunately he escaped injury. When the warm days of late spring came, the bees There was a high stump near the chicken house, and began to swarm, and we made every effort to hive them. one day Father decided to blast it out. Our buggy was That meant watching when they were swarming to sitting nearby, so Father moved it to what he thought see where they would settle. If they settled on a low limb was a safe distance. or the filbert trees, Father had no trouble transferring He set the charge off, and when the big pieces all them into a new hive which had been prepared for them. came down, a large chunk landed in the middle of the Purchased foundation wax was inserted into the buggy and wrecked it beyond repair. After that our frames, from which they could proceed to build the transportation was by wagon or train. Reaching the train combs. We often banged on tin pails or dishpans and depot required a long walk through the canyon and on rang cow bells, supposedly to confuse them and cause the tracks for more than a mile. them to settle. When we used dynamite in the winter, it was If the queen bee wouldn't stay in the new hive, all the necessary to keep it from freezing, so Mother often kept workers would follow, and nothing could stop them. If a it in the warm kitchen—which was a scary situation. hive swarmed too often, thus weakening the colony, Everyone had respect for the blasting caps, and they father would don his bee clothes, hunt out the queen and were handled with great care. queen cells, and destroy the young queens. When Father did not have anyone to help him saw a When one container with boxes was full of honey, he tree down, Mother would often help pull the long saw would place another on top of that. Each box was back and forth. prepared with a piece of foundation wax as a guide. It There were no chain saws back in those days. Often was one of my jobs to insert foundation wax into frames when a stump didn't blast out or split up as was and pound boxes. expected (when the charge wasn't effective), all the Father would sell pound boxes as well as strained other stumps and trash were piled around this particular honey. He drove miles to borrow a honey extractor and one, and the pile was set on fire. After a lot of stoking canning knife. He would put on his bee hat—which had and moving heavy pieces, we finally burned out the a fine mesh veil around a tight fitting coat and gloves. stump and the pileup. Father was only a slight person, He then proceeded to open hive after hive to take out and he would often mention it wasn't a man's strength two or three frames heavy with honey, brushing off bees alone, but knowing how to apply what strength he did with a soft brush. have that was effective. He took the frames to the house and with the heated Father always spaded a patch of ground in early canning knife sliced off a thin layer of the sealing wax, spring to plant lettuce, radishes, onions, and early set the frames into a honey extractor, and turned the potatoes. Later on, a larger garden was planted, crank. The centrifugal force would push the honey out. especially lots of cabbage, root crops, squash, This was strained and bottled to be sold. Mother also cucumber, and potatoes. Big crocks of sauerkraut and clarified and melted the wax and later sold it to the lots of dill pickles were made in wooden kegs. The root druggist in Vancouver. vegetables and potatoes were stored in the cellar. In the How good a piece of fresh, homemade bread, spread hot summer months. Mother also stored the cream, with honey, and a glass of milk used to taste! milk, and other foodstuffs here or hung butter in the well. Bee stings didn't bother Father much, but I was very Sometimes the seasons were right, and watermelons allergic to them and would swell horribly when stung. I were raised. Those that didn't mature were pickled sat in bed more than once with a swollen leg, unable to whole in a salt brine (maybe some dill was added???). It walk. If a hornet or yellow jacket stung me, I was in took months to cure through, but the finished product trouble—my body would be covered with welts. So I was entirely different from anything else. Enough beans came to detest all bees and was afraid of them. were raised for dry beans, and also snow peas were grown. Work never ran out for Mother; there was

54 Once, when Father was robbing the bees, he forgot to her leg was turning purple, very painful and swollen. remove the pet lamb that was tied in the area. When he Now, what to do? She had a cabbage patch nearby, so noticed that the maddened bees had attacked the lamb, he she kept breaking the large, cool, outer leaves off and came to the house and told Mother to get the lamb to placing them over the affected area. It drew the heat out, safety. the pain lessened, and finally the swelling went down. The only time I know of when a doctor was ordered was when Pauline was seriously ill with membranous croup. She must have been between four and five years old. Mother often said that I kissed Pauline during her serious illness, but fortunately I was immune. Pauline had a beautiful singing voice as a small child and was often coaxed to sing, but after this serious illness, her vocal chords were scarred, and her beautiful voice was marred. When Father acquired more cows, Mother churned the cream and made butter to sell. At first the milk was put in a shallow pan and left for the cream to rise to the top in a thick crust, which was skimmed off with a flat, perforated skimmer. Later on, Father bought a cream separator. The footed base of the separator was bolted to the floor, an iron receptacle (or bowl) sat on the base, Mother bundled up the best she could, with her face from which an arm extended upward to form a platform shielded so she could just see, cut the lamb loose, and to hold the large receiving milk tank. The bottom of the headed for a burning stump that was smoking. The bees receptacle contained the gears into which the threaded did not like the smoke and left the lamb. It wobbled for a shaft of the steel bowl containing the many perforated day or two, but the poison wore off. cups fitted, also from which the crank extended to turn We were surrounded by forests. In the fall, loggers the separator. The bowl had a rim into which a heavy, would set slashings on fire, and for weeks the air was blue round rubber band fitted, then a heavy steel cover went and acrid with smoke from the burning slash and pitchy on over the bowl. Finally, a small, round, flat steel disc snags. Mother was always afraid that the fires would get about one inch thick, with a half-inch opening in the away and burn us out. She would dig a hole in a large bare center and two smaller holes, completed the bowl spot and bury valuable possessions. assembly. This was tightened down securely. The cream and milk came out of the smaller holes. To assemble the rest of the separator, two hollow spouts, maybe 10 inches long with a wide, flat, round flange fitted on top of the receptacle (and over the bowl), then a smaller, wide mouthed funnel, which contained a float valve. (The funnel led the milk into the bowl, which contained the many, small, perforated cups.) This was fitted under the milk tank. It was hard to begin turning the crank, but when it had reached a certain speed, it became easier to turn. Then the faucet on the milk tank was opened, allowing the milk to flow into the funnel, where the float valve regulated the flow into the inner parts of the separator. Meanwhile, the crank-turning continued until all the milk was separated. The cream was funneled into a cream crock, the milk into the empty milk pail. Fences were very inadequate. The first ones that I can Once a week Mother would churn the cream, at first in a tall, recall were split rails laid in zigzag fashion. Later on, narrow crock with a wooden paddle; barbed-wire fences came on the market. One night our later on a regular wooden churn with paddles was purchased. cow was out, and Mother tromped through the brush over When the cream separated into butter, Mother would run the logs and whatever else looking for it and was either bitten buttermilk into crocks that or stung by something. By the time she got back to the house,

55 had held the cream. Then she would work the butter until it would collect in the bottom of the kettle, then the butter was fine-grained, and all the buttermilk was out. Finally it was was poured into an earthen crock and stored in a cool washed in the cold well water. It was then salted and ready to place. So she always had clarified butter on hand for mold. cooking and baking. The whey from cheese-making and Mother's butter was highly prized, and there was always a the buttermilk were fed to the pigs or the chickens. ready sale for it. Some people took their butter to the Felida Mother did her cooking on and baking in an old-fashioned country store. Among them was a bachelor. His butter was so cook stove. Years later, Father bought a range with a lot of strong that the grocer tossed it across the road into the ditch, as scroll designs on it. She was proud of her new stove and spent he did not want to lose a customer who might refuse to buy the a lot of time keeping it spotless and polished. This was an bachelor's butter. annoyance to my sister Pauline, who told Mother that the A customer in the store asked what he threw out, as his stove was her idol! Pauline received a smart slap in the face, dog was eating it. When he was told it was rancid butter, the which she remembers to this day. customer threatened to shoot the grocer if his dog died! One day, after churning butter, Mother asked me to carry Mother knew how to use milk—nothing went to the buttermilk, which she had put in a two-gallon crock. I set waste. From the sour, clabbered milk, she would make the crock on my hip to carry it, but it slipped out of my hands cottage cheese (by heating it slowly on the back of the and fell to the floor. The buttermilk splashed up the front of cook stove to a good warmth, then pouring it into a bag my mother's range and over part of the floor. She was so to drain dry). She would break up some of the curds, mix horrified she was almost speechless. All she could say was, "I them with cream (preferably sour) and, when available, have never seen anything like this!" chives, and have fresh cottage cheese. She would use some of the curds to make a topping for a coffee cake; From Stuck Pig to Waterlogged Dog often the curds were used to make a filling for dumplings. (Oh! how good and nutritious these were!) I Everything was in readiness when butchering day arrived. have tried to duplicate the cottage cheese fitting and The knives had to be sharpened, and that meant that either my topping for coffee cake, but the art is lost. She would rub sister Pauline or I had to turn the old grindstone till our arms other curds between her fingers till they were fine- were tired. textured, then put them into a wooden chopping bowl, Water was heated to boiling in a great iron kettle and cover the bowl and set it in a warm place. Every morning rigging set up to lift the dead animal off the ground into a she would work the curds over. In about a week's time barrel of hot water, out again, and onto a table, where it was the curds would cure. (They turned a "dirty" light yellow cleaned. The pig was gutted and hung up to cool. Casings and smelled!) Then she would heat a big spoonful of were purchased for sausages, and whole pepper was ground in butter in the frying pan, add the cheese curds, and watch our old coffee grinder. while they slowly melted. Finally, an egg or two was It was a big job scrupulously to clean the pig's head beaten up and stirred into the hot curds, then poured into and put it on to cook with the heart. The liver was a dish to set. When it was cold, it could be sliced with a cooked separately. When the meat was tender, it was knife and was a welcome treat to eat with apiece of fresh removed from the liquid and allowed to cool, All the rye bread. In the summer she would make up some of bones were removed; some of the fat was removed; all the dry curds by pressing them into hard balls, wrap the meat was chopped, seasoned with salt, pepper, and them in apiece of white cloth, put them into a crock with allspice; the ground liver was added (and if the mixture a tight cover, and set them in the cellar. She would take seemed dry, some of the liquid—which would set like these balls out, maybe once a week or even two weeks, gelatin—added), then stuffed into casings and cooked in wash them off in clear water, and set them out to dry off. heated liquid. These were then hung in a cool place to They were then rewrapped and put back into the crock. use as needed. The shoulders and hams were trimmed It took months for them to cure, but finally they became and scraps used for the Polish sausage rings. Father cheese; they could have been classed as a mild always bought beef to be used in making the Polish Limburger cheese. sausage. It was seasoned with salt, black pepper, and a At times it wasn't handy to take the butter to little garlic (finely minced, to which a little hot water was customers in Portland, so Mother clarified it, which was a added to draw out flavor), and the whole mass worked way of keeping it from becoming rancid. She placed the thoroughly. It was stuffed into casings and hung in the butter in a large, granite kettle, set it on the back of the smokehouse to cure with apple wood smoking slowly. wood-burning range, and let it heat slowly. Finally, a light golden-brown sediment

56 Generally, only one hog was kept for family use, the others which we did on our knees. Mother was busy with baking, sold. The shoulders, hams, and bacon were thoroughly rubbed cooking, and many other chores. When Father was gone, she with coarse salt and then put down in a wooden barrel. had to milk the cows, while we helped with the feeding of the As they were curing they were turned frequently and animals and chickens. shifted. The bacon came out first, but the heavier pieces took Once while cleaning out the pigpen with a pitchfork, [I longer to be cured by the salt brine. When curing was frightened a little pig] and speared it lengthwise. I don't complete, everything was hung in the smokehouse. We used to remember who did the most screaming, I or the pig. be fond of the sausage, and it was a welcome treat in our lunch Fortunately, it didn't die. boxes. The leaf fat and fat scraps were ground, and Mother would render them for lard. Mother would salt down all the bones from which the meat had been cut for the sausage and, during the winter months, would use them as the basis for cooking lentil or china-pea soups, as well as split-pea soup. More often than not, the split-pea or bean soup was made with a hambone. When we had beef Mother would cook sauerkraut soup, which was a favorite of Father's. Sauerkraut was also cooked with the spareribs or fresh pork and served with mashed potatoes. If Mother happened to be baking white bread at the same time, she would put raised-dough dumplings on top of the hot kraut to steam. On a Saturday evening the menu was often raised doughnuts and fruit soup. A variety of dried fruits {prunes, raisins, peaches, apples} was cooked until soft. The soup was thickened with flour Father would never take time to make a swing for us. mixed with cream and seasoned with cinnamon and a Pauline, being of an inventive mind, set a ladder against part little brown sugar. In a crock bean pot she baked beans, of the house, from which she suspended a swing made out of a which were seasoned with honey and—no doubt— light chain that was mended with wire. On a Sunday morning I some bacon or smoked shoulder bone. I could never was swinging when the wire broke and tore into the inside of bring myself to eat pickled pig's feet; they went against my arm at the elbow, exposing the arteries—an area the size me. of a [silver] dollar. Meal planning must have been a real challenge for Mother, I did not know this had happened till the blood was especially when the meat supply ran out. We were always glad running down my arm. My parents took care of this big when the young roosters were big enough to butcher so that wound, bathing it with alcohol, then dusting it with a strong we could have fresh meat. Of course, we always had cottage germicidal powder. It was then bandaged with a clean, white cheese, and in the spring when the chickens began laying cloth. It healed without infection, but I carry a big scar as a again, there were eggs. reminder. Father brought home an orphaned lamb that we raised on The first thing Father did in his excitement was to grab the bottle, and it became a great pet. When he finally butchered Pauline and give her a horrible spanking. He was quick- it for meat, we were heartbroken and did not want to eat it. tempered, and his word was law. He had been head of a Come early spring, there were great smelt runs, and household since his father died when he was twenty, and he we always had more than enough of them to eat. No one took his role seriously. was limited as to the amount of the catch, and no doubt a Whenever we had sore throats, he would fill a glass tube lot of them were wasted. Father must have bought these, with a small amount of sulphur. While we held our breath, he as I can't recall that he ever went smelt fishing when the would puff the sulphur into our throats. It really helped, but smelt were running. what a time we had to get our breath again! It was always a My sister Pauline and I learned early to keep the house neat frightening experience. Fortunately, we never suffered any and clean. Saturday morning it was our job to scrub the kitchen broken bones. floor with a brush— Our water supply was a 45-foot-deep dug well on the south side of the house. Boards had been used for making the well casing. They finally rotted, and one long, rainy winter when the ground

57 was waterlogged, the pressure of the earth against the pieces of bark or knots from rotted logs. While clearing rotted wood caused it to let go, and big portions of dirt land. Father would cut the hazelnut trees and other small splashed down into the well. My bedroom was on that hardwood trees that were poles and bring them home. side, and I could hear the earth plunging into the well, Later on, when he had time, we would hold one end up and it frightened me. It was too dangerous to try to high so that the short end was over the chopping block. repair this damage, so Father dug a new well northeast Father would give one big whack with the axe and cut of the house. It wasn't satisfactory, as he struck poles into firewood. quicksand, and the water was never clear or tasted as When Father would haul produce to Portland, he good as from the older well. often brought home the sons of customers or friends for There was no cover on the well casing that was a week or two on the farm. They found it so lonely that above ground, and Mother often pleaded with Father to they often sat down and cried that there was no one to cover the well, but to no avail. She worried that one of play with! Others were afraid to step out of the house us would fall into the well. Once she caught Pauline after dark, and one boy "used" Mother's milk pail! Poor standing on her little rocking chair, reaching for the rope Mother, she had to put up with a lot. to which the buckets were fastened. There were two One late fall or early spring, Father went to visit a upright posts from the well casing and a two-by-four relative who lived on the Columbia River near Astoria. across the top, from which a pulley was suspended, and On the way home by river boat, he met a passenger who a rope, from which hung two buckets that were used to could play the zither so nicely that Father invited him to pull up the water hand-over-hand. This was quite a our home so that we could hear the musician play. chore on days when Mother had to wash on the Mother gave him supper, but he had had one too washboard over a wooden tub. It was an all-day job for many to drink and vomited [all] over the floor, much to her. his embarrassment and Mother's disgust. He did not stay We had a black cocker spaniel [that] loved to chase long. Afterwards Father managed to buy us a zither, and the cats—which he did all too frequently. One day, my sister and I learned to play a little on it. while chasing a cat [that] had climbed up the post and Another interesting character who stayed for a while sat on the two-by-four over the well, he plunged into its and helped Father work was quiet Joseph Hutto. Father depths, howling as he went down. used to kid him to get him to talk, but he failed. He It was my sister Mary who ran to our neighbor, Mr. seemed to be lost in his thoughts all the time. Father Corman, and in her excitement told him, "The devil, the tried to get a rise out of him when he would kid him about devil, the dog is in the well!" He came over and let a "Maria," but Joseph Hutto would only reply, "Yes, she ladder down into the well by a rope so that the dog was called Maria." He, too, spoke German, but I don't would have something to hang on to, and a wooden tub know what country he was from. He had been a hobo so was lowered for him to climb into. He was finally long and was so starved that he would put bacon grease hauled up—a very wet, cold dog. Mary worked the rest in his coffee to appease the gnawing hunger. This of the day trying to empty the well so that we could have continued until his body received the necessary clear drinking water. requirements, then he let up. I can't recall How long he stayed. He slept in the barn. Drunken, Zither-playing Guest Left Hastily Mother baked all her own bread, white and rye, for which she used her own starter. She would bake coffee One year Father rented the farm to Walter Ogburn. cake on weekends or holidays, also raised doughnuts. For a while we lived in a large tent set in a grove of She baked large quantities of honey cookies but seldom trees. Later on, after school was out, we moved to cakes. We had no walnuts to use for baking, as they Portland, and Father worked for Knight Packing Co. We were too expensive; raisins were also scarce in our attended Woodlawn School that fall, but I was sick most home. With our help, Mother peeled a lot of apples, of that winter so lost a lot of school. The only quartered them, and then cut them into eighths. These schoolmate I remember was a lame girl named Leila were dried on the roof of the lean-to of the house. We Burland. Father had brought Katie the cow along to would get dried prunes from the dryers. One fall we had Portland, so Pauline and I used to peddle the milk to such a big crop of pears and no time to take them to customers. This must have been in the year 1911. market, so we peeled and halved boxes full and took Often while Father was working for Knight Packing them to the prune dryer, which was drying prunes at that Co., or in early fall for Mr. Anderson in the prune dryer, time. They dried to a flat, golden slab and were sweet as our wood supply would give out. This meant that we had sugar and so delicious. For our nut supply we to scrounge in the woods for

58 gathered wild hazelnuts in the surrounding woods; money. She had us make up May baskets and deliver they were similar to filberts, smaller but more flavorful. them to the aged. She was very handy with the needle, Pauline and I would take small #5 lard pails and head for crochet hook, or tatting shuttle; her hands were never the wild strawberry patches come late May or early June idle. While Mr. Gibson read a new book to her in the and come home with our pails full. Mother would make evenings, she would be busy quilting, etc. Marian, her these into strawberry dumplings, and how we enjoyed youngest daughter, was our schoolmate. Marian would them! The delicious wild blackberries (not the play the organ at school for assembly or Christmas evergreens) could be found in abundance in logged-over programs. Pauline and I would have given our eyeteeth areas or along creek bottoms. Uncle Adam and his two for a piano to learn to play, but Father was too poor to daughters would come from Portland on weekends and afford such a luxury. pick them by the gallon to take home to can, make into Later on, Felida had a new church built by the jam or jellies, or to make into pies. There is nothing to be Methodists, but with the advent of the automobile, the had that is tastier than the real wild blackberries found in young people found other places of amusement, and the West, but it is getting harder to find them. church attendance dwindled to where it could no longer There was no electricity; kerosene lamps, hanging or support a pastor. Finally the church, too, was torn down. standing, were the order of the day. The lanterns used The railroad depot, at the bottom of a long, steep grade, outside or in the barn required daily filling, wick and the nearby rooming house for the loggers that trimming, and chimney cleaning. If the wick was turned unloaded the logging trains were the sum total of Felida's up too high or a strong draft hit the lamp, it would buildings, besides the three-room schoolhouse. smoke, and the chimney was blackened. There was a blacksmith in the nearby community of It must have been around 1914 when agents came Lake Shore. He also assisted when a farmer's cow was in around selling lamps with mantles. At first kerosene, and need of calving help. Only those farmers who had a large later white gasoline, was poured into the lamp bowl, and dairy had a herd sire, and the rest of the people had to air was pumped in through the small thumbscrew lead their cows to the dairies when they were bulling. opening. They gave off a brilliant white light. Lake Shore also had a sulphur-spray manufacturing We were taught always to be careful when around a plant. Since prune trees were the major crop in dark lamp or carrying one, for the fire danger was great. County at that time, the prune trees were pruned early in Kerosene often was used when a wood fire was slow the year. In April or early May, all the prune trees were starting. In later years some people tried this with sprayed with the lime-sulphur spray. The trunks and gasoline, much to their sorrow. limbs of the trees were glistening clean, and not a bit of We had no telephone, but our neighbor Mr. Corman moss was to be seen on them. did, a wall-type that had to be cranked to get the It must have been the second or possibly the third fall operator. We had to walk a mile to get our mail, which that the folks lived on the farm, when Mr. Anderson, our the carrier delivered via a horse and buggy. On the way neighbor, asked Mother to pick up prunes for him. His we would loiter, pick wild strawberries to eat, and kick wife knew I was very young, but never offered to keep over huge ant hills. me in the house. So Mother put me under the prune There was a general merchandise store at Felida, and dryer on the dry ground. Later when she came to check it carried a large variety of items. Pictures that one sees on me, I was wet, muddy, and had cried myself to sleep. now of that era are true to life. Barrels stood about She reasoned rightly that what she might earn would be containing food items; there was a coffee mill to grind at the cost of my health, so she picked me up and, with the roasted coffee beans and a large round disk on which Pauline, headed for home. It wasn't very long afterwards huge cheeses were kept under glass cover. An attached that Mr. Anderson followed her home and offered to keep knife would cut off a wedge as ordered. The grocer also me in the house while she was picking up prunes, hut would take butter and eggs in trade. she refused. It may have been the same fall that Mother Near the store was the large two-story IOOF Hall, in picked up potatoes for Mr. Hansen; however, Mrs. which social functions were held. A small country church Hansen kept me in the house with her daughter Reta and was adjacent. diapered us both. We still keep in touch with one Pauline and I attended Sunday school quite regularly. another. Mrs. Gibson, a neighbor, was our Sunday school Father would often work for Mr. Anderson in the teacher. She organized us into a club and taught us prune dryer. My sister Pauline and I would pick up drills, etc., to put on programs to earn prunes for the neighbors. One fall Mr. Anderson asked Father to pick up walnuts for him, but

59 as Father was busy, I offered to pick up the walnuts and by the thousands and turned to other crops. Red was accepted. I put in a long day running from tree to tree to pick Peppers "Cured" Sausage Thief up every walnut. Later on when Mr. Anderson came to pay me, he asked how much I wanted. I reasoned that I had done the same job that Father would have done, and No work was ever done on Sundays except care of asked him for the same wages—$2—which he would the livestock. After my sister Pauline and I went to have paid Father. He was taken aback but didn't say Sunday school, Mother would entertain us at home by anything. He paid me but never asked me to pick up showing us the pictures in her little trunk or teaching us walnuts again. to read German out of the German Bible. Since there were so many acres planted to prunes, Our parents sang hymns, and their voices har- there were many prune dryers in the Felida area and monized beautifully, so Pauline and I both grew up roundabouts. They were stoked with cord-wood and loving to sing. We were always called on at Christmas great, long rows of cordwood surrounded the prune time to sing in German for the church program. dryers. During the drying season it was a common Other times we were discriminated against by the occurrence for a prune dryer to catch on fire and light up other students, as we were of German parentage and the skies at night. This was the case with Matt maybe not as well dressed as others. Father insisted that Andersen's dryer. Since there was no fire-fighting we speak German at home, so I could not speak a word equipment, it always meant a total loss. of English when I started school. During World War I prunes brought a good price, up Like all children, we had to go to school. Our three- to 25 cents a pound. But in another ten years the price room schoolhouse must have been 1 1/2 miles from our went down to 5 cents or less a pound. Then a blight house, and we had to walk both ways, rain or shine. Our struck the orchards, and they no longer produced, so wraps were hung in the hall, and our lunch boxes were farmers grubbed them out put on the shelves.

Felida schoolhouse.

60 Often when I sat down to lunch, to my dismay I boys. found that my goodies had been taken out. Late every One afternoon on the way home from school, Pauline fall my parents made Polish sausage, as well as liver finally had enough and turned on our tormentors and knocked sausage. When the sausage consistently was missing, I the wind out of one of them. She pummeled him as he lay on finally complained to Mr. Sprecher, our teacher. He told the ground. After that we had some peace. me to doctor it up with red pepper. Slits were cut into the In the fall and winter, the big boys would play shinny; sausage and were filled with red pepper, then the meat come spring baseball took over. The girls also had a was pressed back into place. It wasn't long afterwards place to play baseball and another spot for hopscotch or when the culprit let out with "Wow! Red Pepper!" After rope jumping. The smaller boys also had a baseball that Ross Taylor was called "Red Pepper" by the other diamond. At times ring games were played, also dare boys. base, or andy over. The bigger boys, weather permitting, used to sit It was so calm and peaceful there—the logs were outside along the Hathaways' barnyard fence to eat their moss-covered, with wild flowers blooming round about lunches, and often I would see them toss out their and lovely ferns. One winter I can recall that Salmon sandwiches, biscuits, etc., onto the ground, later to be Creek froze over, so Mr. Dale led us children to the creek eaten by dogs or chickens. Our parents taught us to bring where the older boys were ice skating. I never had a pair home every scrap of bread left over from our lunch and of ice skates or roller skates so never learned this sport. that it was sinful to waste bread or throw it on the Our school was on a road at the head of a long, steep ground. To this day it goes against my grain to see grade, and when there was snow what fun we had precious bread so used. sledding down, but walking up the long hill was hard The drinking water for the school was from a ram set work. in a spring in a deep canyon some distance from the We were well-taught in our country grade school—we school. could write a legible hand and out spell any grade school We had cold running water in the corner of each graduate of this day and age. Later, when I went to business room, but no common drinking cup. Each one of us had college after my parents moved back to Portland, I had no a small, folding drinking cup. Towels were on a towel difficulty transcribing my shorthand notes and spelling cor- rack, and the ends were sewed together. We would take rectly letters dictated to me. turns taking them home to launder. Each room had a There was only one other German family of our large furnace that was enclosed with a high jacket. It was German background who lived in Felida, and it was a stoked with wood. It seemed to throw out enough heat large family. Everybody worked hard at the Millers. Freda that we were all comfortable. was my age and was assigned certain household tasks At the end of the eighth school year, students had to before she left for school, even if it meant being late. graduate and get a diploma. Since we all had a good There was no loitering on the way home from school at foundation in schooling, very few failed to pass the test. night either, as she knew if she didn't get the chores There were no buses to pick up the students to take done, there would be punishment meted out. Freda them to high school in Vancouver, so very few of us had confided to me that at times Mrs. Hansen would come the opportunity to go, which I have always deeply out of the house to chat with her when she cut through regretted. their farm, and she ran into trouble when she got home. Mr. Dale, who taught the upper grades, kept the boys Later on, Reta wondered why Freda never cut through under control. It was his habit to pace the room with his their farm any more on her way home, and I volunteered trusty switch in hand. the information that Freda had given me. Reta asked Many times in our long walk home from school, two Freda about it, and Freda denied it, so I was made into a boys, Roger Beall and Leslie Davis, would slap us, pull liar. I had hard feelings toward Freda for many years. But our braids, splash mud on us, and push us down. We it was a good lesson for me; I learned to keep my mouth were too timid to go to their parents and complain, and shut about things that didn't concern me. our parents, speaking only broken English, never made When Mane Miller, the second-oldest daughter was any attempt to interfere. We would complain to our married, we were invited to the marriage ceremony in the teachers, but that only worsened the situation. They Miller home. It was a clear, cold, moonlit night, and all made my life a living hell, and I later remarked that I four of us walked to the wedding. All the Miller relatives could see Roger Beall drown and not stretch out a came from Portland and stayed most of the night, eating helping hand-such was my bitterness toward these two and drinking, as there was an abundance of food and devilish drink. I can

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Amelia Krieger and her mother at their Felida home in 1915 or 1916. remember the antics of one guest who had too much to in the home, as Mrs. Moody was recuperating from an drink and some of the foolish things he did. This left a illness or surgery. They were a nice family, and I liked it memory that stuck with me, and years later when I was there. One Saturday afternoon I had walked home, and I getting married, I decided that this family would not be had baked a cake for Mother. The kitchen became quite among my guests to embarrass me before my friends. warm, and as I returned to go back to the Moodys, being It seems now that in the years living in Felida, we had overheated in the cold spring air, I caught a terrific cold, a lot more fog than where I live now in the Sherwood, which I could not shake. My lungs became involved, and Oregon, area. I can recall one November in 1916 when a after the parents moved back to Portland, it must have pea-soup fog lasted for a week before it finally lifted. been at least three years before I finally regained my That winter Pauline brought her boyfriend out and asked health so that I could enter business college and finally Father for permission to marry, as she was under age, go to work. I never was as robust as Pauline; she took but Father would not give his permission. She managed after Mother's side of the family and I after Father. to overcome this obstacle and married her boyfriend In January of 1917 the first Interstate Bridge across anyway in January 1917. Pauline had left home at the Columbia River was opened, and it brought a great fourteen to work for a family in Portland, hoping to attend change as automobiles became more numerous. Father Girls Polytechnic School, but as she was out-of-state, never owned a car, and we often wondered, with his she would have to pay tuition, and there was no money temperament, if he could have learned to drive. for that, so she continued to work in homes till she After the end of World War I, when the traffic married. This left me alone at home with the parents, so became heavier, Father mulled over his situation. He had I became a quiet, serious person. Father was so strict no son to help do the heavier work, and he was getting with us; we didn't dare giggle like other young girls do, older. When Henry Miller and his two strapping young so to this day I seldom laugh. sons came and asked Father if he would sell the farm to It used to be a long, tiresome trip to Portland by horse and them, he and Mother talked it over, and the answer was wagon over graveled roads. The sharp rocks were hard on the "Yes." horses' feet, especially those on long, steep Joe Hill. Then They packed what they thought could be used in there was the ferry trip over the Columbia, and another long Portland, and all the antiques of those years were left trip to northeast Portland, where the German people of behind. I can still see in my mind's eye our beautiful, Father's acquaintance and his customers lived. light-colored Jersey cow that was so tame, looking so It was the last spring that we lived in Felida that a sad and forlorn when we left Felida. family in the community hired me to help

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