NEWSLETTER

BUKOVINA PEOPLE AND EVENTS

• We are pleased to welcome our newest member of the Lifetime Club, Mr. Dennis A. Gaschler of Hutchinson, Kansas.  His father, Tony, was very active in organizing attendance at our early Bukovinafests in Ellis. 

• The response from annual members to the dues notice for the current year has been very good.  We also received numerous orders for books.  Many thanks for your support.

•  Enclosed is an insert containing the complete program and registration form for the conference in Regina, DISCOVERING OUR LINKS TO EUROPE: An International Genealogy Conference in 2002.  There could be unforeseen events that may change program content or time.

• Dr. Gabi Lunte and her husband David Clemens announce the arrival of their son Niels born on October, 16, 2001.

• From time to time we receive gifts of books, family histories, and historical documents for the Bukovina Society’s archives.  One such recent acquisition includes Illustrierter Führer durch die Bukowina (Illustrated Guide through Bukovina) by Hermann Mittelmann, originally published in Czernowitz in 1907.  This book, a very beautiful, historic and informational work including pictures and background information about tourist sites, advertisements by the travel industry, and contemporary maps in color of Czernowitz and of Bukovina, is available from Verlag Mandelbaum, Ferdinandstrasse 25/2/605, A-1020 Vienna, Austria.  A second book, Czernowitz und die Bukowina (Czernowitz and Bukovina) by Helfried Seemann and Christian Lunzer with co-author Helmut Kusdat, contains reproductions of old photographs taken of the city of Czernowitz and small outlying Bukovinian villages mostly by Leon Koenig between 1890 – 1910.  The photographs are of excellent quality and give a realistic glimpse of life during those years.  Czernowitz und die Bukowina is available through Album Verlag, Seilergasse 9, A-1010 Vienna, Austria, Tel.Fax: (1) 513 64 91.

• The editorial staff welcomes manuscripts and memorabilia relating to Bukovina and/or Bukovinians for possible publication in the Newsletter and for its archives.

Os Bucovinos do Brasil (The Bukovinians of Brazil),
Professor Ayrton Celestino

In April of this year Professor Ayrton Celestino, member and first president of the Associacao Alema-Bucovina de Cultura – ABC (Bukovina–German Cultural Association) will make two public presentations of his book, Os Bucovinos do Brasil (The Bukovinians of Brazil), the first on April 4 in the Casa da Cultura (House of Culture) in Rio Negro, followed on April 18 by an appearance at the University of Contestado in Mafra to speak before an assembled group of students, professors and civic leaders.  An in-depth study of the history of the Bukovinians of Rio Negro and Mafra, the book represents the culmination of years of research undertaken by Professor Celestino using archival materials from Brazil, Germany and the Czech Republic, interviews, newspaper articles and manuscripts including those his grandfather, Ignatz Schelbauer as well as the publications of contemporary authors.

In Os Bucovinos do Brasil the author discusses the heritage of the Bukovinians of Rio Negro and Mafra to their ancestral origins in the Bohemia, their emigration in the early nineteenth century to Bukovina and their exodus later in that century to Brazil in their quest for land and economic opportunity. Settling primarily in the federal states of Parana and Santa Catarina, the Bukovinians first had to become familiar with the climate, flora and fauna of the region, so different from that of Bukovina. Professor Celestino takes us through their experiences with school, culture, religion, and society in their new homeland.

Os Bucovinos do Brasil, consisting of about 650 pages and more than 500 photographs, stands as the most authoritative source on the history, achievements and acculturation of the descendants of the immigrant generation who in 1887-88 left their ancestral villages of Pojana Mikuli, Gurahumora and Bori to take up a new life in Brazil. Detailing not only the history of Rio Negro, the book also traces the lives of individual Bukovinian families and their expansion to other localities in Parana and Santa Catarina.

While now thoroughly assimilated into Brazilian life, the descendants of the Bukovinian colonists have nonetheless retained an interest in and affinity for their roots. Through the ABC and individually, they have forged links to other Bukovinian societies in the United States and Germany and have kept alive their ethnic traditions and heritage by festivals, holiday celebrations and restoration of historic landmarks, all described by the author. Those individuals planning to attend the FEEFHS conference in Regina this coming July will have an opportunity to meet Professor Celestino personally.

Augustine Reunion
Wakeeney, KS. Fairgrounds - August 3 - 4, 2002

Frank Augustine informs us of an upcoming centennial celebration to commemorate the arrival of his grandparents, Michael and Anna (Adelsberger) Augustin in America in 1902. Michael, son of Ambros and Barbara (Paukner) Augustin was born on July 6, 1868 in Karlsberg, a German-Bohemian village in Bukovina. His wife, Anna, daughter of Ambros and Veronica (Pscheidt) Adelsberger, was born on February 2, 1875 in Karlsberg. The couple married on November 13, 1892, ten years before their departure for the New World.

Michael and Anna settled in Trego County, which lies southwest of the Society’s headquarters in Ellis, Kansas. Here they attended church, farmed, and raised their family of four daughters: Theresa (Weber), Johanna (Gnad), Veronica (Flax) and Barbara (Burns) along with seven sons: Ambrose, Ignatz, John, Jake, Joseph, Rudolf and Mike, all of whom remained in the Ellis area. Two children died in infancy: Mary on the way to America at age two, who is presumably interred somewhere in the New York area, and Anna, the youngest, who died at age four. Of their numerous progeny, Barbara Burns is Michael and Anna’s only surviving child.

The two-day Augustine family gathering is scheduled to be held at the WaKeeney Fair Grounds in Wakeeney, KS beginning on Saturday, August 3 at 1:00 p.m. The first day’s activities will include socializing, Mass, dinner and dancing followed on Sunday by a cookout. 

THE DAM
by Ruth Schmahl

 

By the time I was born in l906, my mother Maria Putz Frombach, who had married in 1896, had already given birth to five children. Two of her three sons died in infancy leaving my brother Paul with two older sisters, Martha and Mina. We lived in Edenwold (originally called Edenwald), about forty kilometers northeast of Regina. Edenwold, the second oldest German Protestant settlement in western Canada, was settled in 1885 by immigrants from Bukovina.  My grandparents, who settled there from Satulmare in 1885, were Philipp and Theresia Mang Putz.  Their daughter Maria married Peter Frombach, my parents.  My husband Fred Schmahl’s family came from Klocuczka and Kaliczanka, outskirts of Czernowitz.  His father Ludwig was a policeman in the Imperial and Royal (Kaizerlich und Koeniglich) Police Department of Czernowitz.  Ludwig brought his family to Edenwold in 1911 where his wife Katharina Knoblauch Schmahl had relatives, her mother and two sisters.   In a short time these families and other Lutherans formed the majority of Edenwold’s German population.

We lived on wheat farms surrounded by the Frombach family-owned homesteads of my Uncle Jakob to the west and Uncle John to the east. At that time a dam separated our homestead from that of Uncle John. This dam was eventually destroyed by years of springtime flooding and by nest-building beavers. I still recall the day when the overflow from other dams caused some fish to be deposited in our dam and, much to our surprise, my sister Martha went fishing and caught two pickerel! Changing seasons meant changing activities at the dam.

In spring the water was quite deep (well over our heads), very cold and crystal clear, tending to turn a brackish color as summer approached. In fact, I can still recall the swampy taste of the water in that dam.

In summer we brought the cows to the dam where they would stand in the water, cooling off while they drank. When our chores were done, we would race down the hill, Papa joining us for a swim in the water. The ‘race’ to the dam was as much fun as the swim, even to Papa, who always won! Hard work had made my father a very strong man. When he swam, he used a powerful sidestroke, which we all tried to imitate. We girls would be wearing our knee-length one-piece Eaton catalog swimsuits, while the boys wore their woolen swim trunks. If Mama came, she wore hand-sewn attire that covered her from neck to ankles.

One summer day my three-year-old brother Wilfred fell into the dam, only to be rescued by my sister Martha. I, too, managed to fall through the ice one cold winter day. My screaming got the attention of Uncle Jakob’s maid, thus causing my mother to rush in to save my life in an act of bravery that almost cost her her own. Thankfully she recovered from the ensuing pneumonia.

In those days farm life left little time for anything but chores. We were always planting, milking, cooking, harvesting, preserving, or schooling, i.e., always doing something that filled up our days. But in winter we had a little more free time, especially for something like our skating parties at the dam. Those parties brought our many cousins to our farm for all-day events.

One would think that because our cousins lived so near to us that traveling to our farm would have been easy. After all, Uncle John lived just across the dam, Uncle Frank Frombach was nearby and Uncle Karl Mang was about two miles from us. But in those days nothing was easy. In winter, with bitter cold below zero temperatures and snow-covered roads, our cousins had to come to our home by horse-drawn sleighs, dressed in heavy clothing. For additional warmth on their sleigh ride, they would be covered up to their neck under their cow-skin blankets. There was barely room in the sleigh for their skates!

Once at their destination the boys would clear off the dam’s surface, then crack the ice so that its water would flow out, filling in all unwanted cracks. After the dam had quickly refrozen, we had a nice smooth skating rink, where all family members would gather and skate. We curled, played hockey and other sports or partner skated until dark. Then, with faces as red as furnaces, we proceeded to pile into our house to eat. In an effort to dry out our mufflers and mittens, we would stuff them under the self-feeder stove.

Mother and my sisters would don their long white flour sack aprons, and they would prepare a nice meal for us served on the world’s longest table. It was the sheer happiness and especially the camaraderie of our cousins that I best remember about those cherished days.

Most marvelous in memory is the abundance of food. A cellar full of preserved meats, fruits, vegetables, jellies and a kitchen full of homemade Kuchen  (cake) resulted in a quickly-served meal. White porcelain pitchers of steaming hot cocoa filled the table. Festivities began when Papa bowed his head so that his chin rested on his beard. And in a deep melodious voice he would softly intone, Grosser Gott im Himmel, wir danken dir für dieses Mahl, dass du uns gegeben, im Gottes Name, Amen (Almighty God in heaven, we thank you for this meal, which you have given us, in the name of God, Amen).

After our meal we would often retire to the parlor, where we played games like ”Fruit Basket Upset,” or we would gather around the organ and sing. “Fruit Basket” was a form of musical chairs and a much-favored game. Since our chairs were on wheels, our games tended to get a little rowdy. The cousin without a chair would take charge of the victrola, which had a large red horn trimmed on the inside with pink flowers. A round black phonographic cylinder provided the music. One would insert the cylinder, wind up the machine, and let it play. One Christmas the game caused my father a little grief.

We got so carried away, crashing into each other, vying for the unoccupied chair, all of us gleefully laughing, that we wound up knocking all the wheels off all the new chairs and managed to smash a few phonograph cylinders as well! Hearing this commotion, Papa came into the room looking very serious and said, “Das ist jetzt genug! (that’s enough now!). Everyone stopped misbehaving and laughing. Today, as I write this memory and picture it in my mind, I can still hear the popping noise of flying wheels: pop! pop! pop!, cousins ducking and laughing, cylinders smashing and Papa’s angry red face as he surveyed the damage. But I must tell you that if the house would have fallen down upon me, I would still have been laughing!

So, dear children and all of my offspring, if you suffer from a streak of irreverence, you know from where you got it: from Ruth Frombach Schmahl. 

BUKOVINA INSTITUTE PLANS PROGRAMS

Between January and July of 2002 the Bukovina Institute (Augsburg) has scheduled ten cultural events including seminars, exhibits, lectures, and introductory as well as advanced-level language courses in Czech, Hungarian, Polish, Romanian, Russian and Ukrainian. A non-partisan organization dedicated to the pursuit of scholarly research and study of Bukovina with emphasis on its multi-ethnic and multi-confessional character, the Institute focuses on documenting the history and culture of Bukovina with international and interdisciplinary collaboration of historians, linguists, folklorists, sociologists, political scientists as well as theologians of all denominations.

In January Marie-Luise Kotzian gave a slide presentation on her trip to Brazil in July 2001 entitled: “Bukovinians, German-Bohemians and Other Germans in Brazil.” This was followed in February by three programs including a concert and two seminars, “An East Jewish Life” by Michael Martens and “European Union—Member Country of Cyprus” by Professor Rudolf Grulich and the Consul General of Cyprus in Germany. In March Peter Krier, chairperson of the Banat Swabians, opened an exhibit with a lecture entitled “Fifty Years since the Baragan Deportation” followed one week later by a seminar led by Luzian Geier of the Bukovina Institute on the topic of  “Forcible Resettlement in the Steppes and Puszta.” 

April’s cultural event will be a seminar with M. A. Lambert Klinke and the Consul General of Estonia in Germany devoted to the topic of “European Union: Member Country of Estonia.” An exhibit entitled “Bukovina Pictures” under the director of the museum in Suceava, Bukovina, is May’s event, to be followed in June by a film and book presentation by Günter Czernetzky, the producer and co-author of Germans in the Gulag. Dr. Stephane Pesnel of Paris, speaking on the topic “Joseph Roth as Reporter in Europe’s East,” will be the featured speaker in the July.

Anyone interested in learning more about the Bukovina Institute and its activities or attending one or more of its programs may contact: Dr. Ortfried Kotzian, Director, Bukovina Institute, at Alter Postweg 97a, 86159 Augsburg, Germany or e-mail the Institute at bukinst@t-online.de

WITH THE LANDSMANNSCHAFT  IN BUKOVINA
By Doug Reckmann

This past June the Landsmannschaft der Buchenlanddeutschen  (Bukovina-German Association) scheduled its fiftieth annual convention in Suceava, Bukovina, holding this cultural event in “the old homeland” for the first time since World War II.  Representatives from the German federal states of Swabia and Bavaria as well as from France, Poland, Ukraine and Romania joined to commemorate the contributions of the German population which had formerly inhabited this province and to discuss various partnership programs to facilitate Romania’s re-entry into the European market. To these ends the Landsmannschaft organized bus trips for those wishing to travel from Germany to Suceava. It was my privilege to be among them.

Alfred Wenzel, representing the Landsmannschaft from Salzgitter-Lebenstedt, arranged for two buses to travel to Romania. Our bus departed Salzgitter at 5:00 A. M. and traveled south through Kassel and Würzburg, meeting the other bus in Regensburg.  The seven Americans boarded the second bus, since our accommodations had been made for Suceava, while the others headed for Vatra Dorna. From Regensburg we traveled along the Autobahn through Passau, Linz, Vienna, Budapest, eventually arriving in Szolnok, Hungary shortly after midnight. Early the next morning (June 12) we resumed our journey, which took us through Oradea, Cluj, Bistritz, Vatra Dorna and finally to Suceava, which we reached at about 10:00 A.M.

At least half the travelers used June 13 as a free day to catch up on sleep and explore Suceava while the others were able to fulfill the real goal of the trip: a visit to Schwarzthal (Black Valley). Wenzel generously volunteered the bus for this purpose. Besides myself, the American Schwarzthalers included Jean (von Allmen) Dixon (my mother’s sister), Marilyn Jung Cameron and Paula Jung Everist (my mother’s cousins), Louise Garbe and her daughter Jode (Tauscher descendants and practically cousins!). The Schwarzthalers from Germany were Walter Klein, Arthur Seemann and his wife Ursula, Adolphine Seemann Patzschke, Siegfried Weber, Ewald Pilsel, Hermann Stadler, Roland Jeremias, Alfred Wudi with his son Bernd and nephew Franz-Heinrich.

We retraced our route to Gura Humorului and from there drove south through Stulpikany to Negrileasa, finally arriving in Schwarzthal. Many in the German contingent had been born here and had returned more than once. For others it was a first-time experience since the transfer of Bukovina’s German population to Germany in 1940. This was an opportunity for my aunt and several of the travelers from Germany to visit the birthplace of their parents and for the American “cousins” to tour the ancestral village of their grandparents. A chance of a lifetime and to be there with so many relatives!

Schwarzthal, now called Vadul Negrilesei, is a small village founded by Germans from the Bohemian Forest in 1841. It is no coincidence that this village is located so close to Bori, settled in 1835, since the colonists all haled from the same region in Bohemia. Almost everyone in Schwarzthal was related either by blood or marriage to everyone else in the village as well as to the inhabitants of Bori.

Schwarzthal, with houses along both sides of the road at the bottom of the valley, runs parallel to a small river. Ostra lies over the hill to the west while Gainesti is located to the east. In the Austrian era the extreme south end of the village abutted the border with Romania. According to my great grandmother, Clara (Seemann) Jung, a flourishing black market economy (fruit, vegetables, eggs, poultry, tobacco, and small livestock) existed between Schwarzthal and the Romanian villages of Gainesti, Iesle, and Valeni Stanisoara before World War I. Although random crossing of the border into Romania had not been permitted, the villagers did so nonetheless. What difference did it make if you followed the road or simply walked over the hill!

Our first stop in Schwarzthal was to find Stefanie Hoffmann Jung, the sole surviving pre-1940 inhabitant of Schwarzthal.  Stephanie, my great grandmother’s niece, is related to ten members in our party; her husband Josef Jung was my great grandfather’s nephew. After fixing us an impromptu lunch, she escorted us through the village, pointing out each house or lot and telling us who had lived there in 1940. At age eighty-six Stefanie could out-hike most of us. We visited the church and what is left of the old cemetery, crossing the bridge at the south end of the village, which was the Romanian border until 1918. My aunt and I were struck by the similarities of the houses and gardens in Schwarzthal with my great-grandmother’s house and garden: fruit trees with their white-painted trunks, picket fences around the gardens, houses with rugs covering the floors, religious icons and paintings on the walls, smocked pillows on the sofas. It was like reliving our childhood. After an exhilarating day we returned to Suceava.

On June 13 we traveled to Radautz where the townspeople were celebrating the Feast of Corpus Christi. The church could not accommodate all the participants. The ceremony, with a procession led by children dressed in white garments and strewing flower petals, followed by the bishop of Radautz and hundreds of worshipers, included prayers at the Stations of the Cross amidst musical renditions by a military band. During church services all streets were blocked to traffic.

After lunch we enjoyed a short reception at the German Forum, an institution established for the benefit of the German ethnic population still living in Bukovina. Then we returned to Suceava for an exhibit depicting the 1940 relocation of the Bukovina Germans followed by a buffet of food and beverages.

Friday, June 15, was the day on which the Landsmannschaften held their general meeting. Various folk groups performed in the main square all day, and again, food and beverages were provided for the participants. Lectures and seminars continued throughout the day, culminating in an enchanting evening program with Bukovinian musical ensembles from Germany as well as Suceava’s well-known  Ciprian Porumbescu. The folk music provided by this immensely popular local musicians was among the most beautiful that I have ever heard. And when the folk dancers performed, I was not the only member of the audience with tears in his eyes. It was a spectacular event.

On Saturday, June 16, we visited three of Bukovina’s exquisite cloisters and monasteries: those of Putna, SuceaviÛa, and MoldoviÛa. Despite the devastation sustained during World War II and its aftermath, these historic monuments, designated as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO, have remained remarkably well preserved. These buildings, with huge overhanging eaves, have frescoes painted on their outside walls. During Romania’s bleakest years the religious community, tolerated by the government, became a symbol of strength and hope for the future. The potential of these monasteries for the tourist trade, as well as the beautiful countryside, is just now starting to be tapped. 

The next day our group again split up, with the “non-Schwarzthalers” proceeding by bus first to Gura Humorului to visit the cloister of VoroneÛ and then continuing on to Jakobeny and the spa of Vatra Dorna. The “Schwarzthalers” rented a small bus and ventured back to their ancestral village. Many of us now packed the extra clothing and supplies we had brought for distribution among the villagers. The tourists from Germany had a goodly supply of chocolates for the children.

On our visit earlier in the week we had learned that the church needed funds to replace the roof, repair the walls, and the restore the frescoes. By the time of our second visit we had collected $250 and 400 DM for these purposes, which we presented to the church officials. In appreciation we received typical Romanian weavings used to cover frescoes and icons and which can also serve as table runners. Since $1.00 will buy about $10.00 worth of goods, this was a chance to make a difference.

Monday, June 18, was a final day of shopping and touring in Suceava. Many of us found a local source for Afinata, the local huckleberry schnapps. At the music store around the corner we bought out all the Romanian ethnic CDs. It was hard to believe our visit was rapidly winding down.

At 1:00 A.M. (yes, A.M.!) the following morning we boarded our bus for the return trip. In Bruck an der Leitha in Austria Louise and Jode took the train to Vienna and in Regensburg Paula, Marilyn and I bade adieu to our other fellow travelers. I shall never forget this trip and the opportunity it afforded me to visit the ancestral homeland of my maternal forebears.

My visit to Bukovina has motivated me to pursue two goals related to Schwarzthal: (1) to contribute to the restoration of its Roman Catholic Church, which so faithfully served our forebears; and (2) to develop a village monograph not unlike what Sophie Welisch did for Bori. In both of these endeavors I am reaching out to Schwarzthalers and any other interested benefactors for contributions for the church and for genealogical data on former Schwarzthal families. These include: Anger, Baumgartner, Bayerl, Beer, Berdich, Bernhauser, Binder, Bisyak, Böna, Brandl, Fleissner, Frisch, Fuchs, Gross, Gumina, Hasenöhrl, Hehn, Hoffmann, Ilck, Jeremias, Jung, Klostermann, Knaus, Krassel, Kübeck, Mayer, Pilsel, Schaffhauser, Seemann, Tauschek, Tauscher, Weber, Winter and Wudi.

Should anyone wish to contact me, I can be reached by mail at 3850 SE 40^th, Portland OR 97202-1713, by phone at 503-777-6560, or by e-mail at reckmann@ bukovinasociety.org

LAST CORRESPONDENCE OF ADAM LOY:
GERMAN POW IN THE USSR (1945-1947)
(DIED DECEMBER 17, 1947 IN ULYANOVSK ON THE VOLGA, USSR)

 Introduction and translation by Dr. Sophie A. Welisch

[Additional documents, not published in the original paper version of this newsletter, may be found at ..\Adam-Loy-POW.html ]

Among the papers of my aunt Cäcilie Loy I found the correspondence of her husband, Adam Loy, a German POW in the GULAG from 1945 until his death two years later. Adam Loy was born in Paltinossa, Bukovina, immigrated with his parents and sister Maria to the United States after World War I and returned to Bukovina with his family in the late 1920s.  In 1934 he married his third cousin, Cäcilie (also surnamed Loy), born in Paltinossa in 1916.

As did some 90,000 other Bukovina-Germans, Adam and Cäcilie Loy, with their then three children (Angela, Leon and Marie) opted for transfer to Germany in 1940. After a short stay in Austria they were resettled in Wola Gzymalina, District of Kleztow in Warthegau (German-occupied Poland). In 1942 Adam Loy was inducted into the German army. His fourth child, Hermann, born in 1944, died several months later without his father ever having seen him.

In the bitterly cold winter of January 1945, with Christmas tree still standing, Cäcilie Loy and her three children abandoned hearth and home, joining a trek organized by the civilian population to flee the advancing Soviet armies. En route for six weeks, they finally reached Seehausen in Saxony, a village in what would later become the German Democratic Republic. It was at this address that Adam Loy, now a prisoner in the GULAG, found his wife and children.

Adam’s post cards reflect hope for the future, a deep bond with his family, and a concern about their well being. When his cards failed to arrive, his wife suspected the worst, which Franz Hieronymi, a fellow prisoner in Ulyanovsk, later confirmed. In order to notify as many families as possible about the demise of their loved ones, Franz Hieronymi placed their names and addresses between the soles of his shoes before his release from the GULAG.  He wished to spare others the grief experienced by his mother, who never ceased awaiting the return of his father, declared missing in action in World War I .

In 1955 Cäcilie Loy and her two youngest children immigrated to the United States. Her oldest daughter, Angela, had married by then and remained in Germany. Cäcilie now has seven grandchildren and three great grandchildren. The privation and hardships of a half-century ago have faded from memory, especially for the younger generation, which now enjoys an era of peace and tranquility.

[Additional documents, not published in the original paper version of this newsletter, may be found at ..\Adam-Loy-POW.html ]

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