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Kaleidoscope of Experiences: Creating a Bavarian Story Of Margot Hamm, Michael Henker, Evamaria Brockhoff, eds.. Good Bye Bayern--GruÖ¼ÖŸ Gott America: Auswanderung aus Bayern nach Amerika seit 1683. Augsburg: Haus der Bayerischen Geschichte, 2004. 320 pp. EUR 18.00, paper, ISBN 978-3-927233-94-2. Reviewed by Alexander Freund Published on H-German (October, 2006) Does Bavaria have its own emigration histo‐ rather than German migration. In his own article, ry? The makers of this richly illustrated exhibition Raithel traces the development and causes of mi‐ catalog are certain that it does, and much of what gration from Germany and Bavaria and explores they present here supports their case. the emigrants' social composition and motives. The catalog surveys emigration from Bavaria More often than not, he breaks out of the Bavari‐ to the United States of America during the past an mold in order to contextualize better the phe‐ three centuries. In one way, this is a familiar sto‐ nomena he describes. This strategy allows him to ry. It begins with the group of emigrants from make some interesting observations when he Krefeld (Westphalia) who, led by Franz Daniel does focus on Bavaria. We learn, for example, that Pastorius from Sommerhausen (not yet Bavaria), South Bavarians were under-represented among founded Germantown in Pennsylvania in 1683. German emigrants throughout much of the three Two million more Bavarians and Palatines (the centuries. Americans' folk Bavarian image of all Palatinate was, albeit not continuously, part of things German (Oktoberfest, sauerkraut and Bavaria until 1946) followed over the next three lederhosen), the author concludes, is therefore hundred years. not based on "real emigration traditions" (p. 27). In another way, however, this story is unfa‐ Specific aspects of the migration are explored miliar, because little research has been done on in three shorter essays. Cornelia Wilhelm's survey the subject. Ten brief essays in the catalog's frst of German and Bavarian emigration laws and U.S. part shed light on some aspects of this story, from immigration legislation helps us understand bet‐ the changing socioeconomic and political condi‐ ter how laws on both sides of the Atlantic con‐ tions in Bavaria via Bavarians' experiences of trolled migration by imposing high "emigration travel to their acculturation in various U.S. lo‐ taxes" and harsh penalties for emigration agents, cales. As Thomas Raithel notes in the frst of these including the death penalty in late-eighteenth- essays (p. 23), the gaping holes in research make century Bavaria. Cornelia Oelwein's brief piece on this a difficult enterprise, and the authors succeed emigration agents in nineteenth-century Germany to varying degrees in writing about Bavarian shows how Bavarian agents from the 1830s on H-Net Reviews could be both helpful and destructive for mi‐ in rural areas, stores were often far and few be‐ grants. While agents were licensed by Bavarian tween. Bavarians in general were more prone authorities, their prices were not. Curiously, Oel‐ than other Germans to settle in cities, especially in wein ignores the history of international state and Cincinnati and New York. Don Yoder's article church agencies as well as of swindlers and smug‐ sketches Bavarian contributions and contributors glers in the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. to American culture. A different perspective is Marita Krauss's collage of mini-biographies of nu‐ presented by Udo J. Hebel, who traces the outlines merous Bavarians who fed the state during the of German migrants' representations of America Nazi era hints at the refugees' individual fates as in the form of paintings and photographs. While well as at the great loss of human life and cultural they mystified Amerindian culture and American riches to Bavaria. landscapes until the end of the nineteenth centu‐ Moving from the emigration aspects to that of ry, these Bavarian emigrants became ambivalent the actual journey, Horst Roessler documents how toward American modernity and postmodernity changes in transportation technologies in the mid- in the twentieth century. nineteenth century affected not only the travel ex‐ Frank Trommler concludes the catalog's frst periences of migrants, but also overall migration section returning to Pastorius and the beginnings dynamics. The port cities of Bremen and Ham‐ of German immigration. He shows that German- burg successfully attracted migrants by improving Americans forgot about Pastorius until the late conditions in cities and aboard ships. In the same nineteenth century, when they resurrected him as time period, however, in the late nineteenth cen‐ the personification of their origins in America. tury, conditions for landing immigrants worsened They thus created a new German-American iden‐ in the United States, as Barry Moreno shows. Cas‐ tity vis-à-vis the dominant founding myth of the tle Garden in New York City, the major port of dis‐ Mayflower pilgrims (p. 91). By the time of the Ger‐ embarkation for immigrants between 1820 and man-American tercentenary in 1983, Pastorius 1960, was set up in 1855 to help the newly arrived had been once again shuffled back into the find accommodations and jobs and to protect gallery. Trommler thus underlines what Nadel them from swindlers and crooks. In 1892, Castle shows in his article: By arguing that the Palatine Garden was replaced by Ellis Island, which fo‐ migration to the Hudson Valley in 1708-9 can be cused on weeding out the "undesirables." Both au‐ more usefully seen as the beginning of German thors, however, have little to say about Bavarian immigration to America--because most of the fam‐ migrants. ilies from Krefeld were Dutch (p. 67)--Nadel, like The last four articles illuminate Bavarians' ac‐ Trommler, exposes 1683 and Pastorius as found‐ culturation experiences in the United States. Stan‐ ing myths of German-Bavarian migration to ley Nadel vividly describes Bavarian immigrants' America. experiences in Colonial America, especially their The second part of the catalog consists of contact with the Mohawk and Seneca in the Mo‐ twenty-two short biographies of Bavarian mi‐ hawk River Valley, and the English immigrants' in‐ grants, based on published biographies and mem‐ creasing resentment of the (in Benjamin oirs, unpublished personal documents and oral Franklin's words), "Palatine hicks" (Pfälzer history interviews. These biographies show the di‐ Bauernlümmel) (p. 69). Jewish Bavarians played versity of migrations in the nineteenth and twen‐ an important role as peddlers and small-trades‐ tieth centuries, from the Bavarian soldier in the men in nineteenth century America, where Eng‐ post-Civil War U.S. Army, Christian Barthelmess lish and German farmers relied on them because (1854-1906) to the 2001 winners of the U.S. green 2 H-Net Reviews card lottery, Christina Siller and Rita Meeh. They teenth-century migrations and even less about mi‐ document the famous (the blue jeans "inventor" grations after 1945.[1] Levi Strauss as well as Las Vegas magician Do the exhibition makers succeed in creating Siegfried Fischbacher--of Siegfried and Roy) and the story of a Bavarian Amerika-Auswanderung? the obscure (gold prospector and Arctic explorer In one way, they do. They present a rich history of August Enders-Schichanowsky [1865-?]). All en‐ migration from Bavaria that can be traced back, if tries are accompanied by photographs, paintings not to Pastorius, then at least to early-eighteenth- or images of material objects. Taken together, century migrations. As such, the exhibition and these biographies allow the reader to think about catalog are part of a historiography that saw its and imagine the multiple forms, turns and mean‐ heyday in the 1980s, when the tercentenary as ings of migration during the last three centuries. well as new questions about immigration to Ger‐ The last section of the book is the actual cata‐ many led to major research projects at several log, which documents the exhibition's thirteen German universities.[2] At the same time, they are sections. These sections follow the migrants' jour‐ part of a new, popular interest in German emigra‐ ney from Bavaria to the United States and their tion history that has been marked most forcefully lives in the new culture and society. Although im‐ by the creation of emigration museums in Bre‐ ages of the exhibition artifacts are already gener‐ merhaven and Hamburg.[3] In another way, how‐ ously presented throughout the frst two parts, ever, the exhibition makers do not succeed in this last part contains another 350 images of arti‐ writing a new story of Bavarian migration, be‐ facts, ranging from a 1692 deed of sale from Ger‐ cause more often than not it is not clear what was mantown, Pennsylvania, to a Spencer carbine ri‐ specifically Bavarian about this migration--how it fle used by a Bavarian soldier in the American was different from and similar to migrations from Civil War or the desk and typewriter used by Os‐ other German and European lands. Nevertheless, kar Maria Graf during his exile from Nazi Ger‐ in creating this aesthetically pleasing and afford‐ many in New York. Like the second part, this last able catalog, and in amassing a great number of part invites the reader to retrace the migrants' artifacts from Bavarian migrations, they have laid many steps visually. a foundation that, I hope, will stimulate others to The catalog has some weaknesses. Although fill the research gaps pointed out in the catalog's the exhibition makers grab the reader's attention opening pages.[4] with the use of high quality visual images, at Notes times they do so aimlessly. A series of thirty pho‐ [1]. On German emigration after 1945, see tographs with no other explanation than "Cities, Alexander Freund, Aufbrüche nach dem Zusam‐ People, Landscapes in the United States, ca. 1900, menbruch. Die deutsche Nordamerika-Auswan‐ unknown photographer" that accompany derung nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg (Göttingen: Raithel's article on emigration from Bavaria, are Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 2004).
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