Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia Vol. 1, No. 3 Winter 1978 TABLE OF CONTENTS PRESIDENT 'S MESSAGE Adam Giesinger. ............... ............. .... .. .......... .. ........... ....... i MAP OF THE AHSGR "MEET THE PEOPLE" TOUR TO SOUTH AMERICA.................. ... ..ii AHSGR TOUR GROUP I IN BRAZIL Emma Schwabenland Haynes ............…........................................ 1 EXPERIENCES OF GROUP II IN THE BRAZILIAN VILLAGES John C. Siemans ........... ..........................………….......................... .6 A DAY OF MEMORIES Richard Wilhelm ........................... ...…….…......….. ................. ....... .8 A REMARKABLE COINCIDENC Arthur E. Flegel ................…………....…........ .................................9 ANOTHER BRIDGE FROM SOUTH TO NORTH Peter Pauls Jr. Translated by Hilde Schwabauer ........…………......................... ............... 10 A DAY IN THE CHACO Ruth K. Stoll. ..................……….......…....................................... .12 CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION IN ARGENTINA Ardyce Welch ........................…………............. ................... ........ 15 MEETING THE PEOPLE IN ARGENTINA Marguerite Siemens .............……….............................................. 19 AN IRREVERENT MENNONITE CASTS SIDELONG GLANCES AT HIS VOLGA COMPATRIOTS Reuben Goerfz ........................……….….............................. ........ .23 MEMORIES OF CRESPO Ann and Bob Smith. .................………......................................... .27 FINDING FRIENDS AND RELATIVES IN SOUTH AMERICA Lydia Martin.........................………….... ......….. ......... .......... ........ .30 OUR VISIT TO THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH AT URDINARRAIN, ARGENTINA ON FEBRUARY 5, 1978 David J. and Lydia Miller .................……..............…..................... .33 BITS AND PIECES ......................... ..........…………………………………........................... .. .36 MAP OF THE RUSSIAN GERMAN COLONIES IN SOUTH AMERICA Cartographer, Karl Stumpp ..................……................................... .40 (Continued on inside back cover) Published by Ame rican Historical Society of Germans from Russia 631 S Street • Lincoln, Nebraska 68502 Editor for this issue: Barbara A. Amen © Copyright 1978 by the American Historical Society of Ge rmans from Russia. All rights reserved. PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE Dear Members of AHSGR: Our people, the Germans in Russia and from Russ ia, have a history of their own extending over a little more than two centuries. During the first century about 100,000 Germans migrated to Russia. The first of them, numbering about 25,000, settled on the Volga in the 1760's. The last of them went to Russia in the 1860's and settl ed in the province of Volhynia. In between, main ly from 1803 to 1825 , about 50,000 settled in the Black Sea region. By 1870, these immigrants and their descendants numbered 450,000, for the most part prosperous fanners, who wer e making an important contribution to Russia's economic life. During the second century the migration of Germans was from Russia, mainly to the Americas. Spurred by the tsars' abrogation of their privileges and the lure of free land over- seas, thousands of Germans left Russia to go to the United States, Canada, Brazil and Argen- tina. The movement began in the 1870's and continued without interruption to 1914, bringing some 300,000 Germans from Russia to the Americas. Between the wars and after the second world war, more thousands have come as refugees, to Germany and overseas. There are still 1,800,000 Germans in Russia, the majority of whom live in Kazkhstan and other parts of Asiatic Russia. Although an exact count is no longer possible, there is littl e doubt that their kin now in Germany and in the Americas number at least as many. It is one o f the ambitions of AHSGR to re-establish closer contact among the various frag- ments of our people, now scattered over many lands. We no longer have a common language. Probably a majority still understand some German, but many speak only English, only Russian, only Spanish or only Portuguese. To communicate with our kin in other lands wo shall have to become linguists. A few months ago two groups of our members, totaling 61 persons, undertook a tour to South America to attend the Germans-from-Russia centennial c elebration in Arg entina and to visit groups of our p eople in Brazil and Paraguay. Some of their experiences, intensely int eresting, are described in this issue of the Journal. In the future, if permission to travel around freely ca n be obtain ed, perhaps we shall or- gani ze a similar tour to Kazkhstan, the pres ent hom e of n ear ly a mil lion of our peop le . Wouldn't that be exciting? Fraught with much l ess difficulty wou ld be a tour to Germany to attend a convention of the Landsmannschaft der Dcutschen aus Russland, an opportunity to meet hundreds of our people who have return ed to their anc estral home land as refugees. To whet your appetite for such future ventur es, r ead now about the South American Tour! The season's greetings to all! Adam Giesinger Am erican Hist orical Society of Ge rmans From Russia ii AHSGR TOUR GROUP I IN BRAZIL Emma Schwabenland Haynes Our tour of Brazil began with visits to three unforgettable cities: Brasilia, the present capital of the country with its impressive modern architecture; Rio de Janiero, the former capital, famous for its beaches and the awe-inspiring statue of Christ overlooking the city; and Curitiba, which lies further south in the state of Parana. Of these three, I was particularly interested in Curitiba for personal reasons. Back in 1922, during the Russian famine, one of my father's cousins, August Schwabenland, fled from the Volga to Germany and later emigrated to Brazil where he married a German girl and eventually settled in Curitiba. He is dead now, but I knew that he had had a son. So, as soon as our plane landed I hurried to a telephone booth to see if I could find the name Schwabenland listed. Unfortunately, it wasn't there, but I did see such names as Schade, Schaefer, Scheer, Sche ldt, Scherer, Schmidt, Schipke, Schlemm, Schinzel, Schneider, Schreiber, etc., proving that many German people must live in Curitiba- Even while flying from Rio to Curitiba on Friday, January 2S, I had become conscious of how multiracial the area must be. Ernst Harder, our guide, was sitting across the aisle engaged in conversation with a young couple next to him. Suddenly he turned to me and exclaimed, "This young man is a Volga German!" I immediately tried to talk to him in German, but he shook his head and indicated that he did not understand. I then tried Italian, a language which I had learned while my husband and I were living in Italy, and to my amazement he could comprehend me. He said that his grandparents had come from a Catholic village on the Volga , that he had gone to Portugese schools, and that his wife was of Polish descent. They had been in Rio for a holiday with another couple who were also on the plane. The woman was the descendant of Volga Germans named Justus who had come from a Protestant village. However, she had married a native Brazilian and had joined the Catholic church. The two couples lived in Ponta Grossa where our group wou ld stay two nights later. We left Curitiba in the early afternoon and, after making a stop at Vila Velha with its famous rock formations, went on to Guarapuava. The landscape became more deserted after night fell, and as we pr eceded through the darkness many of us wondered what kind of accomodations awaited our group. To our pleasant surprise the hotel proved to b e extremely clean and "t he staff seemed genuinely glad to see us. The next morning we visited the colony of Entre Rios (not to be confused with the state of Entre Rios in Argentina where so many Volga Germans had settled). The area is inhabited by so -called "Donau Schwaben" (Swabians from the Danube) whose ancestors had left Germany during the l8t h century and settled in Hungary, southeast of Budapest. At that time there was much competition b etween agents of Catherine the Great and Maria Theresa to obtain as many immigrants as possible. Often families were divided, with some going to the Volga and others to Austria-Hungary. After World War I the area in which these people had settled was divided among Jugoslavia, Hungary, and Romania, Then came World War II and the defeat of Germany with its resulting tragedy for all German people of eastern Europe. Partisan uprisings forced these "Donau Schwaben" to leave in long wagon trains for Austria where they spent t h& next six years in crowded barracks. Those who remained behind in Jugoslavia were put in concentration camps and murdered. Finally through the Schweizer Europahiife arrangements were made to bring five hundred families to Brazil. The group landed June 6, 1951 and arrived in Guarapuava (Parana) three days later. Meanwhile, under the leadership of an engineer named Michael Moor, a Cooperative Agricultural Company was formed with an initial investment of 250,000 cruzeiros. Virgin prairie land south of Guarapuava had been assigned to the group, and it was here that the five hundred families settled. During the next few years they experienced the hardships of all pioneer people. The first job was to build houses and furniture. Entre Rios lies at the edge of a forest where trees were cut down fo r lumber and also to export for necessary cash. At first all work was done collectively and even all meals were eaten in groups, Poor crops, lack of roads, and other amenities of life induced some of the settlers to return to Germany or to move to the larger cities of Brazil. However, the others persevered and today the colony consists of five separate villages with comfortable wooden and stone houses; vast fields of grain, rice, and soy beans; large herds of cattle; beautiful churches; an excellent school system; and a constantly expanding economy .1 Our bus stopped at the spacious administration building of the colony and we were soon joined by Mr. Dithelm Hoff, the genial manager of the cooperative. He first led us to the extremely modern flour mil l where the grain is cleaned, dried, and carried on moving belts to storage areas and silos.