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VOLUME 39 NUMBER 5 PAGE 39 ISSN 8756 811X DECEMBER 2019 Wishing you the Peace and Joy of the Season.

Welcome to the 2019 In This Issue:

Story of 's song: Christmas Holiday Penn Pal "Stille Nacht" p. 40

The , p. 44

Members' Corner Christmas Stories p. 45

President's Perspective: A Moravian Christmas p. 48

Contact information p. 50

Our Mission:

▪ To promote interest in the research and study of all German-speaking peoples who migrated to the Americas

▪ To exchange and preserve information relating to the history and culture of German-speaking families

This season was important to our German speaking immigrant ▪ To provide appropriate methods, tools and resources to assist ancestors and it remains important to many of us. They brought members in achieving their

music, special foods, and the Christmas tree when they came to research goals

Pennsylvania - traditions we still enjoy. In this issue we present ▪ To encourage fellowship among a history of the most famous , . Also, members examine how the Christmas tree became a part of Christmas, take a look at some family holiday traditions of your PA Chapter board members, and cook up some good recipes!

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The Story of Austria’s song: “Stille Nacht”

By Hyde Flippo, Published in 'The German Way and More'

Original article at: https://www.german-way.com/history-and-culture/holidays-and-celebrations/christmas/stille-nacht-silent-night/

The world’s most famous Christmas song, “Silent Night,” comes to us from Austria. Called “Stille Nacht” in its original German, this beautiful Christmas carol is now sung in over 140 languages. But the familiar melody we recognize today as “Silent Night” or “Stille Nacht”, is not quite the same one that Franz Gruber composed, and although the song was not truly “lost” or “forgotten” — as legend would have it — the world-famous carol did take many years to become as well known and as ubiquitous as it is today. In the intervening years is known to have written a “Stille Nacht” arrangement around 1820, and new hand-written arrangements by Franz Gruber appeared before his death — one for a full orchestra in 1845, and another for organ in 1855. By 1900 “Stille Nacht” had made its way around the entire globe. But we should start at the beginning.

On a cold in 1818, twenty six year old pastor Joseph Franz Mohr walked the three kilometers from his home in the Austrian village of Oberndorf bei to visit his friend Franz Xaver Gruber (1787-1863) in the neighboring town of Arnsdorf bei Laufen. Mohr

40 brought with him a poem he had written some two years earlier. He desperately needed a carol for the Christmas Eve that was only hours away. He hoped his friend, a school teacher who also served as the church’s choir master and organist, could set his poem to music. And one of the many amazing things about this carol is that Franz Gruber composed the “Stille Nacht” melody for Mohr in just a few hours on that December 24, 1818.

Recent flooding of the nearby Salzach river had put the church organ out of commission, so Gruber composed the music for guitar accompaniment. A few hours after Gruber finished his composition, he and Mohr stood before the altar of the St. Nicholas Church in Oberndorf to perform their own work. A local choir group backed them up as the sounds of the brand new carol, accompanied by the guitar, broke the silence of that “Stille Nacht.”

Composer Franz Xaver Pastor Joseph Franz Mohr Gruber (1787- 1863) (1792-1848)

Historical photo of the Nicola-Kirche (St. Nicholas Church) in Oberndorf, Austria, site of the premiere performance of “Stille Nacht” in 1818.

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Nicholas Church was demolished in the early 1900s. The Salzach River (which also flows through nearby Salzburg), has a tendency to flood. For this reason, the entire town of Oberndorf was relocated to a less flood-prone location some 800 meters upstream in the 1920s. Around the same time, a new church was constructed, and a small memorial chapel, the Stille-Nacht-Gedächtniskapelle, replaced the original Nicola-Kirche. (See the photo on p. 43 of one of the stained-glass windows in the chapel depicting “Vikar Josef Mohr” and the former church.)

For many years in the latter half of the 19th century, when the carol was beginning to become more popular, people who knew anything about “Stille Nacht” assumed the melody must have been composed by a more famous

The Silent Night Chapel in composer, possibly Beethoven, Haydn, or even Mozart. Oberndorf. To listen to Silent Although Gruber had made a written claim as the composer Night being sung as it would prior to his death in 1863, doubts lingered on into the 20th have been, that first time, in 1818 century. The question was officially settled only several click below: years ago when an arrangement of “Stille Nacht” in Joseph https://www.youtube.com/watch?v Mohr’s hand was authenticated. In the upper right-hand =_oS5fHnqJGA corner of the arrangement Mohr had written the words, “Melodie von Fr. Xav. Gruber.”

“Stille Nacht’”–The Song: Around 1832, when Gruber’s melody was performed by folk singers from Austria’s Ziller Valley (Zillertal), several musical notes were altered, and the “Silent Night” melody became what we know today. Austria’s Stille Nacht Gesellschaft (Silent Night Society) not only works to protect the Mohr-Gruber legacy—it encourages the use of the original notes that Gruber composed.

In Austria “Stille Nacht” is considered a national treasure. Traditionally the song may not be played publicly before Christmas Eve, and any commercial use of the 180-year-old carol is verboten. Contrast that with the situation in most other countries, where you are likely to hear “Silent Night” playing in the local shopping mall or even as part of a radio or TV commercial. Nevertheless, “Silent Night” enjoys a revered position among Christmas carols all over the world, no matter what it may be called or in which language it may be performed.

Franz Gruber was born on 25 Nov. 1787 in the Austrian town of Hochburg. He became a teacher and later moved to Arnsdorf. The rooms where he lived and worked can still be seen on the second floor of the Arnsdorf schoolhouse. But Gruber obviously did not spend all his time composing music. He fathered a dozen children by three different wives! In 1839 the Gruber family left Arnsdorf for , just south of Salzburg. His grave now lies next to the family’s former home there and is adorned with a Christmas tree each December.

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Joseph Franz Mohr was born an illegitimate child on 11 Dec. 1792 in Salzburg. He became a Catholic priest in August 1815 (only after receiving the special papal dispensation then required for illegitimate persons entering the priesthood). Mohr’s final resting place is in the tiny Alpine ski resort of Wagrain where he died penniless in 1848. He donated his modest earthly fortune for the education of the children in the community. Today the Joseph Mohr School stands as a fitting memorial—only yards away from the grave of the man who wrote the words heard round the world.

The first known performance of “Stille Nacht” in the United States took place near New York City’s Trinity Church. In 1839 the Rainer family singers of Austria included the German version of “Stille Nacht” in their repertoire during an appearance at the Alexander Hamilton Monument near the church, some 24 years before an English version of the carol would be published. The “Silent Night” translation that we sing today in English first appeared in 1863—the year of Franz Gruber’s death, and some 45 years after the song’s initial performance in Austria. The English- language author was unknown until 1959, when it was determined to have been the Episcopal priest John Freeman Young, assigned at the time of his work to the same Trinity Church associated with the 1839 performance of “Stille Nacht.” Reverend Young apparently enjoyed translating European hymns and carols into English, and it is his 135-year-old “Silent Night” text that is found today in most hymnals and Christmas carol collections published in the English- speaking world.

The first performance of “Stille Nacht” in 1818 featured guitar accompaniment and this is reputed to be the guitar that was used by Franz Gruber the first time Silent Night was sung.

Interior of the Silent Night Chapel in , Austria. The stained-glass window depicts Josef Mohr, the author of the lyrics for “Silent Night” .

With thanks to “Silent Night” historian Bill Egan for his information. Guitar and the interior of the Silent Night Chapel photos are courtesy Bill Egan.

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The Christmas Tree By Marcia Dreisbach Falconer

Many modern-day originated in German speaking areas of Europe. The Christmas tree is one. Its origins are shrouded in the pre-Christian past where the short days and long nights of winter caused people to believe the sun was dying. Efforts to revive the sun by lighting great bon fires merged with the need to survive the cold winter. The only trees that seemed immune to winter death were the evergreens. To celebrate and insure continuing life, people carried large boughs of fir trees into their houses. The branches brought cheer but also brought the smell of fresh pine into living areas that reeked of unwashed humanity and animals.

When came to the church recognized that people needed celebrations at this darkest time of year. It wisely melded celebrations of the rebirth of the winter sun into celebrating the Birth of Baby . This included having large fir branches, decorated with candles, inside churches. Fir trees have natural decorations in the form of pine cones but specific Christmas tree decorations may have begun around 1000 AD. About this time the feast of Adam and Eve became part of the December 24th celebrations and apples were added to decorations in the church. People began putting apples on the fir boughs inside their own homes and other decorations of nuts and baubles soon followed, but somehow the apple was special. Even today German Christmas trees have little, red, wooden apples as part of their decoration!

Christmas trees are found in records by the early 1500s. In 1510 Latvian merchants erected a tree in the market square in Riga, decorated it with roses, danced around it and then set it on fire! At this same time period, Christmas trees were being sold in the markets of Alsace (then part of what is now Germany), where laws limited their size to "8 shoe lengths", about 4 feet. By the 1600's Christmas trees were common in German homes and were decorated with apples, nuts, paper strips, hard sugar candies and hand-carved wooden ornaments.

Pennsylvania was flooded with German immigrants in the 1700's, bringing Christmas customs with them including gift-giving, special sweets, and a decorated tree in the house. Public Christmas trees also started in PA. German communities. As early as 1816 a Christmas tree was set up in the square in Easton, PA. For English settlers, Christmas was a solemn day of prayer, with no celebrations, no big dinner and definitely no Christmas trees or presents for children. This was to change, thanks to the Royal Family in England and, oddly, to the US Civil War.

In the 1840's Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, who grew up in Germany, had a decorated Christmas tree set up in the palace each year. Drawings of the tree and the royal family were circulated around London and soon all of London's high society had to have a Christmas tree. In the United States the concept of the Christmas tree was spread by Civil War soldiers from Pennsylvania who brought this tradition with them wherever they went. By the end of the 1860's the Christmas tree, as we know it, had arrived.

With Thanks to National Christmas Tree Association: http://www.realchristmastrees.org/dnn/Education/History-of-Christmas-Trees and to History Today,https://www.historytoday.com/archive/first-christmas-tree

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To help you get to know your board members a bit better, we include Christmas memories they shared with us. To contribute to Members' Corner send an email to [email protected]

A Christmas Memory - Ken Weaver, Membership

Growing up in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country (Lancaster County, to be exact!), I can remember no bigger Christmas tradition than cookie baking day! Our kitchen turned into a commercial bakery with my mother, me and my siblings, and grandmother all engaged in some cookie-related activity. Two of the most popular recipes that were handed down from my grandmother included Sand Tarts and Snickerdoodles. While the latter is the easier of the two to make, the trick to successful Sand Tarts is rolling the dough almost paper thin. And the absolute fun part of the Sand Tart production was choosing from the many, many cutters that my mother had amassed over the years.

Christmas in the 'Good Old Days' - Charlene Loiseau, Secretary

We opened family presents on Christmas eve after a bowl of oyster stew, homemade bread and a sweet dessert then spent the evening playing canasta or sitting with a bowl of buttered popcorn and a cup of hot cocoa listening to the radio. Some years we made the trip to see relatives – I loved those times because then Santa came twice! He came to our house the day before we left so that he could deliver my presents to me at home, then at the cousin’s house where we were staying he brought a small gift for me along with the gifts for the cousins so I would not feel left out. Later that day the relatives would all get together and after a community meal at an aunt’s house there would be a gift exchange – there was a name drawing at Thanksgiving – everyone got a gift from a secret pal. I hoped I would get a gift from my cousin who lived in New York City because her gifts were always different from what we saw in our rural area. The rest of the day the adults would play cards and the children would play with their new toys or go outside and make snowmen or have a snow ball fight. The most fun was when we were at one of the houses in town, an uncle would tie a sled on the back of his car and pull us through the empty snow covered streets of the small town.

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Christmas - All Over the Place - Diane Nielson, Vice President

My memories of Christmas are all over the place. Not as in chaotic but as in many locations. My father was an officer in the U.S. Army, researching infectious diseases. From the age of 2 years old, we moved every one to four years. We had old-fashioned in Ohio with my grandparents, filled with warmth and good smells. We had Christmases on military bases where the local community would gather as family. We had Christmases where we went to listen to mom and dad sing in a chorale production of Handel’s Messiah. We had Christmases with snow, Christmases with palm trees and lush jungles, Christmases in deserts. We would bake for the five of us, we would bake for 50 people. We would wait anxiously for news from home; to hear how the grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins were doing. Packages of goodies from grandparents would arrive with letters, tape recordings, and presents. Due to the distances they traveled, sometimes the packages arrived with heartbreaking results; a box of soaps and chocolates that was indistinguishable from the other after melting and mixing over the 9,500 mile journey. But the one consistency was my family; my mom, dad, sister, and brother. My parents always made it special and magical. No matter where we were currently living, we would take time out to get together with friends and neighbors for parties, sing Christmas carols while my mom played the piano, bake cookies and candies, make decorations for the tree and home, open presents Christmas morning, and play games together the rest of the day

Photograph to right is my sister, myself, and my brother; in front of our Christmas tree. I was 8 years old and we were living in Wheaton, Maryland while

my dad worked at Walter Reed.

The Christmas Putz - Marcia Dreisbach Falconer, Penn Pal Editor

My favorite part of Christmas was playing with the "putz". A large piece of plywood was set on boxes at a particular place in the living room. The Christmas tree, which reached to the ceiling, was placed at one end. The plywood was covered with white cotton and train tracks were laid down. We had an O-gage Lionel train with boxcars, lumber-hauling cars, passenger cars, cars with coal hoppers and an engine that puffed smoke. A large oval track went around and under the tree. There was a figure 8 track inside the oval and switches to make the train go different ways. In the middle of the putz was a "lake" made of a large mirror and sprayed with fake snow. Along the tracks was a village with a church and many houses, all made of cardboard with glitter on the roofs and with a hole in the back for a light bulb. There were little people, too big to fit in the little cardboard houses, but fine nonetheless. Fake fir trees tipped with fake snow were randomly distributed. A wooden manger scene also was under the tree. It was crowded. Mary, Joseph and the Baby Jesus, 3 Wise Men, 4 shepherds, a small flock of sheep, a donkey, 2 camels and 3 standing angels all jostled for space. A tin star was at the top of the stable and dry grass covered the floor. I played with all of this for hours. 46

Memories - Doris Glick, Past President, Member-at-large

Having grown up during WW ll, Christmas was tinged with sadness for the missing brother who was a rear seat gunner on a air craft carrier. We always baked something and put other things in the box, such as candy, cigarettes and chewing gum to send to him. I recall my mother playing the piano and all the rest of us singing . One year my father made a doll house for my sister and one for me. It had to be my most favorite present ever. I played by the hour with it. I still have the furniture. I plan to give it to my great niece.

Mince Meat Pie - Lloyd Shenberger, Treasurer

My early memories of Christmas in York County, Pennsylvania, are cold weather, finding a suitable Christmas tree on the farm, and food. In my family, food was the center of every family event from baby showers to burials. For the holidays, food became even more important. Mother would outdo herself. One of the favorites was minced meat pie. This is a family recipe that has been handed down. My daughter and I continue the family tradition every year in Texas when we get together and prepare this holiday favorite. Most of my friends ask the same question, “Do you put meat in the pie?” Well…yes, there is meat in mince meat pie.

Mince Meat Pie 4 Cups Cooked Ground Beef (About 2 ½ pounds of Ground Chuck) 1 Cup Cooked Ground Pork (About 1 Pound Pork Roast) 1 Pound Cooked Raisins with the juice (enough to cover) 1 Cup Dark Brown Sugar 1 Cup White Sugar 5 ½ Cups Apples – Chopped 2 Teaspoon Cinnamon 1 Teaspoon All Spice 1 Teaspoon Cloves Salt to taste ½ Cup Whiskey or Bourbon

Brown meat and add salt while the meat is cooking. Mix ingredients together. Cook about one hour. Let stand in refrigerator at least one day. Makes five 8” pies or four 9” pies. Freeze unused mix for later. Place mix in an unbaked pie crust. Cover with pie crust. Bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake for 25 minutes.

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The President's Perspective - A Moravian Christmas

By Janet Rupert

One of my maternal lines traces back to German immigrants affiliated with the who settled in Northampton County, Pennsylvania area during the colonial era. Throughout childhood I heard the story of Count Nicholas Zinzendorf, an early Moravian leader, who on Christmas Eve 1741 gathered with a small group of pioneer missionaries in a log structure on the Pennsylvania frontier. The building housed the settlers and on the other side of a wall, their horses and cattle. The proximity of the animals reminded Zinzendorf of the stable where Jesus was born, and after leading the group in a hymn that included the line “Not Jerusalem, lowly 'twas that gave us Christ to save us,” he named the new community Bethlehem.

I have not found evidence that my ancestors were in that first group, but within a generation the Beutel/Beitel, Steiner, Giering, Buerstler and Leibert families were part of Moravian communities in Bethlehem, Nazareth, Emaus and Schoeneck. The religious and cultural traditions of those ancestors continued down through the generations to my mother, who made them part of our family’s Christmas celebrations.

We had a Moravian star in our home long before they became trendy (and before most people knew what they were). In the 1960s those stars, made of wax-coated paper points with cardboard bases, were only available from Moravian gift shops. Properly matching up the square-based long points and triangular-based short points and connecting them with metal brads required a great deal of dexterity and patience. After Dad inserted a low-watt light, the smaller fingers of one of us kids flattened the final brads in place, then we hung the star in the living room picture window above the sofa. Some holiday visitors hesitated to sit under that curious spiky object, although it didn’t bother family members. The paper points were too fragile for storage of the assembled star, so after the holidays we carefully pulled out all the brads, stacked the points inside each other, and returned them to the original box, ready for reassembly the next year. The tradition got much easier a few decades later when plastic-pointed stars came out. Assembling a Moravian star became the acid-test for new spouses in the family. At least they only had to do it once; the plastic stars are sturdy enough to store assembled. My husband and I hang ours on the front porch every year, and it’s the same one we received as a wedding gift over 30 years ago.

Moravians hold love feasts at various times during the year to celebrate special events, such as church anniversaries, festival days, special visitors, but the most well-known love feasts in the U.S. occur on Christmas Eve, to commemorate that first service in Bethlehem. Music and hymns, along with bread and a beverage, form the core of those celebrations. In our family, making Moravian Sugar Cakes became a big part of our holiday baking. I believe my mother got our recipe from her Moravian grandmother, and as with many recipes from that generation, the measurements and instructions are imprecise (add some flour, knead until dough doesn’t stick). If you add too much flour, the bread gets dry and hard; too little

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and it won’t bake properly. I learned to make them from watching Mom, scribbling down notes, and experimenting. My Mom’s version is below, with my notes added in brackets.

Making these is an all-day project; you do not want to start these when you get home from work. Trust me on that one. If I start at 8:00 AM, I’m usually taking the last pan out of the oven around 6:00 PM. It’s a labor of love and tradition, one that I’ve shared with the next generation. I flew to California about 18 years ago to give my oldest niece a hands-on lesson (and my brother now says that her sugar cakes are better than mine). Before she moved to China, another niece regularly joined me for the annual baking ritual. Since her kitchen there is too small for such an undertaking, I try to send one to her every year. On Christmas Eve, when I was growing up, we had our own love feast at home. After services at our church (not Moravian; there weren’t any near us), we gathered round our wreath, lit all four candles and the Christ candle in the middle, and sang carols, accompanied on the piano by Mom or my very talented older brother. If we had some on hand, we also lit small Moravian beeswax candles with their red paper ruffs around the bottom. Then Mom brought in the mugs of coffee or milk and pieces of sugar cake, which we shared to celebrate the birth of Jesus and the fellowship of our family. It was a lovely moment of calm amid the hectic activity of the season.

Last year my husband and I drove our two younger grandchildren home from Christmas Eve service, and while waiting for their parents, I served them Moravian sugar cake and mugs of cocoa, as I shared the story of the love feast. They really enjoyed it, and 8-year-old Jacob insisted we do it again on future Christmas Eves. Thus the tradition continues, even with these little people who are technically my step- grands and not biological descendants of Moravians. Love shines through when we share light, food, and family stories, regardless of ethnic origins or genetic connections. May you find opportunities to share your holiday traditions and family stories with those you love.

Moravian Sugar Cakes

Peel, cook and mash (about 1 1/2 lbs) white potatoes. Yukon golds also work well. Place 2 cups warm potatoes in a mixing bowl. (Some people use instant mashed, but I've not had success with that.)

While potatoes are hot add 3/4 cup shortening (scant) and 2 cups sugar.

After the mixture has cooled add 1 tsp. salt, 2 eggs, 1 tsp nutmeg.

Add some flour (about a cup at this point). Dissolve 2 pkg. dry yeast in 1 cup warm water with 1/2 cup sugar. Add to mixture (after it bubbles) and beat in thoroughly. Continue adding flour as long as mixer can handle it (about 4-5 cups). Place dough on floured counter or board and knead in more flour (another 1/2 to 1 cup). When dough does not stick to hands, place in covered pan to rise in a warm place. Let double in size, then break into pieces and place in a greased pie or cake pan and let rise until double again. Melt 1 stick butter and use spoon to dribble over top of cakes making butter holes occasionally.

Sprinkle top with brown sugar, fill in holes. Sprinkle cinnamon over the top. Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes until nicely brown (works best to rotate the pans top to bottom and back to front about halfway through baking). Remove from pans onto clean cloth. Can be wrapped and frozen for later use. Makes about 6 or 7 cakes.

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PA Chapter of Palatines to America

CONTACT INFORMATION

For more information about the Pennsylvania Chapter of Palatines to America or other subjects, please contact: [email protected], attention of the Secretary.

The Officers of the PALAM Pennsylvania Chapter: Janet Rupert, President Lloyd Shenberger, Treasurer Diane Nielson, Vice President Doris Glick, Member at Large, Past President Charlene Loiseau, Secretary Roberta Newcomer, Member at Large Ken Weaver, Membership Registrar, Marcia Dreisbach-Falconer, Member at Large, and Penn Pal Editor

Please keep us apprised of your correct email address. Send changes to: [email protected]

The newsletter will be sent to your e-mail address and is available on the national PALAM.org website. There is a $4.00 per year fee for those requesting a 1st class mailing of a paper copy of the newsletter. Please mail this fee directly to the PA Chapter of PALAM, PO Box 35, Temple, Pa 19560 ______Penn Pal is a publication of the Pennsylvania Chapter, Palatines of America. All rights reserved. Articles in this publication may not be reproduced in any form without written permission from the Pennsylvania Chapter, Palatines of America. Contact the Penn Pal editor at [email protected] to inquire about permission to reproduce.

Contributions to this newsletter are encouraged. Members may submit articles concerning family history and other genealogical or historical material and stories about your genealogical pursuits. If you submit material for publication, be sure there are no copyright laws restricting its use. If materials submitted are copyrighted, proof of authorization to publish must be provided; sources from other magazines must be cited so appropriate credit can be given. The editors reserve the right to edit all contributions submitted. Contributors are responsible for the accuracy of their information and for their opinions. There is no compensation for unsolicited articles. The editors reserve the right to publish or not publish articles.

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