Why they left Europe

Every weekday morning, I get an e-mail from Delancyplace.com. It's a daily excerpt from a book or article about something interesting.This morning, there was an explaination of WHY so many people left Europe after 1840 (exactly when our Heschs left):

"Beginning in 1840, the largest human migration in history brought over 30 million immigrants to America, and by the time this migration was interrupted in 1914 by World War I, America stood as the most prosperous nation on earth. The reasons for the largest human migration in history had been long in coming.

One of the main factors was the enormous increase in the European population that took place in less than a century - from 140 million people in 1750 to 250 million in the 1840s. As the numbers increased, peasant families were constricted into increasingly smaller plots of land by powerful landlords who were anxious to reap profits by creating larger farms to feed the growing cities.

Soon alarming numbers of peasants found themselves unable to subsist. They were joined in their plight by legions of artisans whose special skills - passed on from father to son and mother to daughter for generations - had earned them both a livelihood and a respected place in society.

Now, however, scores of the goods they had so expertly handcrafted were being produced by the machinery of the Industrial Revolution. Thousands of' these artisans found themselves out of work, forced to move to the cities and work in factories, where low wages, drudgery, and the loss of their personal independence resulted in a sadly diminished quality of life.

Devastating as they were, none of these problems compared to the series of famines that, beginning in the 1840s, descended upon various European nations. No where was the situation more desperate than in Ireland where, in 1845, a fungus destroyed the potato crop, the single food staple upon which the poorer classes of the country depended for survival. By the time the disease began to abate in 1849, more than a million Irishmen, women, and children had starved to death. ...

It was not only in Ireland that famine struck. ... A quote from the archives of the Iowa State Historical Society by a Polish youngster put it more personally: 'We lived through a famine,' he explained, '[so] we came to America. Mother said she wanted to see a loaf of bread on the table and then she was ready to die.'

There were other important reasons for the mass exodus as well. Despite the notions of liberty and equality that both the American and French revolutions had spawned, oppressive governments in countries such as Russia, Germany and Turkey had denied freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or other rights and had brutally put down rebellions aimed at bringing about reform. In Russia and Poland, massacres called pogroms erupted. Designed to eliminate minority groups who lived within their borders - particularly Jews -some of these pogroms were carried out by the governments of these two countries; others were unofficially endorsed by them....

They came in waves...more than five million of them arrived between 1840 and 1880, an influx slightly greater than the entire population of the United States in 1790.

Most emigrated from northern and western Europe - Scandinavians who settled in the American Midwest; Germans who established enclaves in New York, Baltimore,Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Milwaukee; and British and Irish who poured into Boston, New York, and other northeastern communities.

Beginning in 1880 a great shift occurred when an even larger flood of newcomers came from eastern, central, and southern Europe - Russians, Poles, Austro-Hungarians, Greeks, Ukrainians, and Italians. In 1880 less than twenty percent of the 250,000 Jews living in New York had come from Eastern Europe. In the next forty years the number grew to 1,400,000. That was one-fourth of the city's entire population.

In the first quarter of the 1900s, more than two million Italians arrived. By the time the human tide was interrupted in 1914 by World War I, some thirty-three million people had fled their native lands, risking all to start life anew across the ocean".

Martin W. Sandler, Atlantic Ocean, Sterling, Copyright 2008 by Martin W. Sandler, pp. 356-364.

More History

Well now. We seem to be slacking off on HESCH discoveries lately, hm?
"What?" You ask, "Is Hesch History done? Are there no other connections to be made?"

Don't worry, fair reader--there are, and they'll be posted here as we uncover them, but for right now, Larry and I have turned our attention to my other grandparents, and a blog called JANSON .
Blogging about family, to me, seems like a great way to share our research and pictures in a relatively permanent format: right now, if you google "Hesch", you'll find this blog, and you'll be able to see if it's about "your" Heschs. And, if it isn't, you might be able to figure out how we connect.
Pictures posted online, too, are so cool: if you want a copy of any of them posted here, just right click the picture and "save as"....and now, it's in your personal file, too.
See ya soon!

The Hesch Store from the outside

Sue sent this photo today--its the rear side view of the John and Ket Hesch house and store. Immediately to the left of the pic would have been Joe and Rose Brandl's house, and on the other side, the Schmolke house.
Here's how the buildings were situated then:
LOL...I really think this is COOL!

An "Update" from 1947

My other grandpa (Anton Janson) wrote and self-published a book he called "Pioneer Life as I Saw It". He included short biographies of a few friends and neighbors in Buckman, including Math Hesch, and J. H. Docken. If you've followed Hesch History so far, you'll recognize a number of 'characters' here:
We wondered about the sheriff, John P Sand, and whether he was one of "ours". Evidently, he was...lol
And John Docken lived west of town, was NOT Catholic, but participated in governing anyway. That surprises me.

Searching Cemeteries

If you're looking for where a relative is buried, there's something online called FIND A GRAVE where family members or volunteers post pics of monuments. It's honestly fun to figure out where someone is buried, and go take a photo of it for someone who can't.

We went to the Stearns History Museum yesterday and got maps of two cemeteries in St Cloud, Minnesota: Calvary (public) and Assumption (Catholic) Cemeteries.
I'm posting them because you can look-up a Minnesota grave on DALBY DATABASE and find the section that person is buried in. IF they're in Calvary or Assumption, you've just scored!

The CALVARY CEMETERY MAP is in three parts: (Click to enlarge)

And ASSUMPTION CEMETERY is all on one messy page:

The German pages from Math's Diary

Funny, a straight translation of these pages makes no sense; they're evidently the words to an old German song only it's messed with, and there's other handwriting besides Math's.

But imagine if you were young and trying to seem cosmopolitan in a foreign city. What if you found yourself doing something that would NOT be permitted at home (girls in your rooms at night with no chaperone), while being a little in love with one of those girls...who starts singing...? It's a song about injustice, written by a student who was executed in 1820. We think they played at translating the song literally, with Math saying, "I've gotta write that down!" and Lena, reading what he wrote, saying, "No, that's not right!" Much laughter and suggestive looks...
I sent the pages to Michael Hortsch, who graciously translated them (see below).

++++++++++++++++++++

May 24/14 from Lena Wisiak
Zu spät kommt
oft die Reue ein
Herz vor Gramm
vergeht das kleine
Word verzeihe kommt
leider oft zu spät
Regret often comes too late
Sorrow breaks a heart
The little word "sorry" often comes too late

Zu spät kommt oft die Reue, ein Herz vor Gram vergeht.
Das kleine Wort "verzeihe" kommt leider oft zu spät.
http://wollmeise.blogspot.com/

"The following "poem" in Math’s diary is partially based on the poem attributed to Sand. However, there is no punctuation and the line breaks make little sense. After a few lines Lena’s poem deviates more and more from the original".

Ich verfolge dich noch
als Leiche wenn du meiner
je vergisst und im Toden
kleide schleiche ich beständig
wo Du bist. Hast Du mein Eid
mir vergeben Fluch sei mag
dir kein Gl¸ck Pein und
Selichkeit verloren wenn ich je
Vergesse dein. In Liebe lernt
lernten wir uns kˆnnen (Should read "kennen") ach
es war nur ein kurzes
Gl¸ck. Wie oft hast du
aus falscher Liebe einen
Ku_ auf meinen Mund
gedr¸ckt wenn du hinter
dustre ("d¸strer=dunkel") Mauer oft mit eine
andere geht so bedenke du
mit Trauer das du deiner
Leichen Herzens brichst!
Nun so ? und las
und scheiden ohne Kus(s)
und Druck der Hand
dem ich glaube von uns
beiden hat die Liebe sich
gewandt!
Helene Wiciak
Wenn ich mu_ gestorben
??? geh zu meinem Grabe
hin schreibe leise in den
Sand diese hast du geliebt
Und gekannt
Helene Wiciak
Berlin dort?? ??49
den 24 Mai 1914

[Translated:

I follow you still as my body

when you ever forget and deaths

I slip resistant dress where you are.

Do you have my oath forgive me is like a curse

Gl ¸ ck you no pain and

Selich lost if I ever Forget you.

In love, learn we got may submit (Should read "know")

ach It was only a short Gl ¸ ck.

How often have you from false love

a Ku_ on my mouth

Something Gedr ¸ if you get

behind dustre ( "d ¸ strer = dark"),

often with a wall others go

so you think with sadness that you your

Corpses heart breaking! Well, then?

reading and excrete without Kus (s)

and pressure of the hand

I think we two, the love is turning!

Helene Wiciak

If I died mu_ ?? go to my grave

write down softly in the Sand these loved you

And known

Helene Wiciak

Berlin there? ? 49 the May 24, 1914]

"This is the original version of the poem:"

DER SCHWUR
Als sie naht, die Abschiedsstunde,
Die uns hier so schmerzlich trennt,
Noch einen Ku_ von deinem Munde,
Der auf meinen Lippen brennt.
Treue hab ich dir geschworen:
Fluch treff mich und ewige Pein,
Heil und Seligkeit verloren,
Wenn ich je vergesse dein!
Sollst du je meineidig werden,
So treff dich des Rächers Fluch,
Dich verfolgt mein Dolch im Leben
Und mein Geist im Leichentuch.
Dich verfolg ich noch als Leiche,
Wenn du meiner je vergi_t,
Und im Totenhemde schleiche
Ich dir nach, auch wo du bist.
Nimm zum Liebesunterpfande
Dies, mein dunkel Lockenhaar
Mit dem schwarzrotgoldnen Bande,
Das an meinem Busen war.
Nimm sie hin, die dunkle Locke,
Ewig, ewig lieb ich dich!
Horch, wie tˆnt so dumpf die Glocke,
Lebe wohl und denk an mich.

(Deutscher Liederhort II Nr. 760 (ohne Melodie);

Handschriftliches Liederbuch eines Soldaten;

Arnstadt, 1848 geschrieben.

"Attributed to Karl Ludwig Sand, who murdered August von Kotzebue. Supposedly written to his lover before his execution in 1820.
Karl Ludwig Sand (Wunsiedel, then in Prussia, 5 October 1795 - Mannheim, 20 May 1820) was a German university student and member of a liberal Burschenschaft (student association). He was executed in 1820 for the murder of the conservative dramatist August von Kotzebue the previous year in Mannheim. As a result of his execution, Sand became a martyr in the eyes of many German nationalists seeking the creation of a united German national state. The events of Sand's life are narrated in the story Karl Ludwig Sand, part of Celebrated Crimes by Alexandre Dumas.
The imagery in the poem is typical German romantic period. After the liberation from the Napoleonic rule a strong nationalistic and democratic movement developed among German intellectuals, leading to the revolution of 1848/49. The lock of hair in the poem is bound together by a black/red/gold ribbon, which represents the colors of today’s German national flag. These colors were originally the uniform colors of the "L¸tzowsches Freikorp", a Prussian military unit fighting in the liberation war against the French 1813-1815".

See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%BCtzow_Free_Corps

++++++++++++++++++++++

If you compare the script in the diary with Michael's translation, you can discern who wrote what...but they were just being silly and euphoric that night, I think.

What did they do for fun?

Larry found this ad in the entertainment section of one of the newspapers in Winona, Mn. He wondered if Hesch-Weaver was a band, playing for a wedding dance? And, had I ever heard of Hannon's Pavilion?
But woohoo--This was Edna Hesch** and Theo Weaver's wedding dance in 1937! With a little research online, we discovered a whole LOT:
--Hannon's Pavalion was a very popular place between Arcadia and Waumandee, Wisconsin, in the 1920s and '30s. There are some 280 ads in the local Winona papers during those years! Many were for the big 4th of July celebrations, or for when the Carnival set up at the pavilion, but lots of those ads were announcing regular or wedding dances.

--Some of the wedding dances charged admission, but that helped the newlyweds because they got part of the proceeds.

--A FREE wedding dance was multi-purpose. Some people brought gifts, there were more people AT the dance, it was a good and fairly safe place to meet girls, and having a wedding dance at all prevented a Shiveree--remember those?

--The way it worked at a dance hall like Hannon's was the hall hired the band and promoted it, people came and paid admission (which paid the band), and the concession stand did big business if people had a really good time...lol

--We found an Arcadia Area History Tour brochure online, and one of the stops was at the Hannon's Pavilion site. A few pages from the brochure:

(Written by 88 year old Alice Hannon about her fond memories of the place).
This particular ad included a description of where the place was. Sounds like a lotta fun to me!

** Edna was the daughter of Mathias' son Valentine Hesch. Val stayed in Waumandee when his parents moved to Pierz, Mn in 1911. Edna's husband died in the early 40s leaving her with two sons, Roger and Francis Weaver.

Updates

Sue emailed this week to say that she'd gone to visit a Suess uncle of hers. He said, among other things, that Ket (Mueller) Hesch was the midwife in Buckman back then. If I'd ever thought about it, I just assumed the doc delivered babies...

He also said that Ket "spoke High German while Andrew spoke Austrian German. Katherine could speak both but when she got visiting with her sister(s) Andrew would just scoff that he could not understand a word of it…." lol

And, talking with Uncle Tony yesterday, I mentioned the Kulig family and how 'married-in' to the Hesch family they were. He explained that when Irene Hesch (Math and Holka's daughter) married Gene Kulig, Leo Karash became her Uncle, since his sister Margaret was Gene's mom.

In other words, think common ancestor here:

Michael Karasch was the father of Leo and Margaret, ok? And Paul Hesch was the grandfather of Irene and Fronie Hesch, who were cousins. Fronie married Leo, and Irene Married Gene.

No, that doesn't make it clearer, but it's the best I can do...lol
Irene Hesch and Eugene Kulig wedding...abt 1950?

Morrison Moonshiners 'R' Us....

If you've kept up with HH so far, you'd think Great Uncle Math was the only Hesch with a still in the woods...but you'd be wrong. I just heard the BEST stories during a phone conversation with Uncle Tony.

(The call was originally with Aunt Marlene about her family and cool stuff Larry'd found lately, but they use the speaker phone, and pretty soon, Uncle Tony jumped it...lol)

He said that for awhile, grandma and grandpa rented the Sand place (where grandma'd grown up) and that grandpa had a still across the road in a brush grove. A neighbor, Hubert Kelzenberg, could never find the still in that grove, and so, "for fun" set the grove on fire.

Grandpa put the fire out, but he moved the still anyway. Later, Grandpa borrowed a boar hog from Hubert (for the usual purposes...lol) and when Mr Kelzenberg came to pick the hog up, it was sleeping. He nudged its' behind with his foot (kicked it), and it woke, and tried to get up. Nope. The hog tipped over on its' side. Tried again, on its' front feet--tipped over onto its' side, and went back to sleep.

Hubert laughed and said he'd come back for it when the hog had sobered up.

I said I'd heard from dad that grandma sold the stuff at the farm, and UT laughed and told this story:

Grandpa was coming home from town one day and saw a strange car leave his own yard. Since he didn't recognize it, he decided to follow it, out of curiousity. The car sped up and grandpa followed. It sped up again. Grandpa did too. Pretty soon, without slowing, the door opened and a gallon of moonshine was tossed out. Turns out the driver was a judge from Little Falls. LOL

And, oh, yes--my other grandpa was cooking, too--only foolishly, his still was in the basement of the farm house. UT said the thing wasn't working right--there were fumes--and little grandpa went outside for something to fix it. When he came back and opened the basement door, cold air rushed in and the fumes exploded. The house lifted up (OMG!) and resettled an inch or two off the foundation. I don't know if that was before or after the explosion in the attic that burned the floor and blew a window out...whew.
From talking with relatives, it sounds like almost everyone had a still hidden on their farms around Buckman. Adeline said they all knew about the others, but nobody ratted. The 'revenue men' were the adversary, not the neighbors.

Added years later ☺:

I'm reading a book called "The German Americans- an Ethnic Experience" from the Max Kade German-American Center in Indianapolis.  Chapter 8, "Ethnic Politics: German-Americans as Voters and Office Seekers" explains something about the mindset of our ancestors during Prohibition.  It wasn't only rural folk trying to get by while trying to avoid the Feds.  It had to do with our folks being ethnic Germans.  This was after the First World War, a time when being of German ancestry was suspect and could get a person in deep trouble just because of the accent, or being heard to speak German.  I imagine our folks felt they'd just barely made it thru that time unscathed.  Did they hold a grudge?  Oh, yes...

"The violent reaction of many German-Americans to the Temperance Movement becomes comprehensible and more justifiable if we acknowledge that it was in reality a defense mechanism in which the validity of equal rights and self-respect were reasserted.  German-Americans considered legal limitations on the sale and consumption of alcohol, as well as mandatory rest on the puritanical Sunday, as nothing less than discriminatory over-regulation of their personal affairs and their leisure activities."

Math & Theo and the Rembrandt Theater

Remember when great uncles Math and Theo did the grand tour in 1914? (Click DIARY on the side bar). Math mentioned that they were given tickets to a show when they were in Amsterdam--"best seats in the house", too. And, he had the managers' address in the back of the diary: "R. Underberg, Rembrandt Theater, Amsterdam".
Well, today, Larry found a postcard on this site of the original building:
Just think: 95 years ago, two Minnesota farm boys went thru those doors to see a pretty good show they "couldn't understand a word of!".
According to the link up there, the theater was built in 1902, became a moving picture house in 1919 and was torn down in 1937.
THANKS to LARRY!
For extra credit when quiz time rolls around: Rembrandts' middle name was Harmenszoon!

Ah-HA moments

A while ago, Larry asked what my top "Ah-HA!" moments were since we started researching the Hesch family...and wow, there are so many, I don't know where to start.

A biggie was finding Johann Hesch in the on-line church books in Oberschlagles, Horni Pena, Bohemia, and the amazing coincidence that they were being digitized JUST when we needed them. I think we waited 8 months for the H parishes, but by then we were pretty good at figuring out Suetterlin script, and we "knew our way around Bohemia" too...lol

Another was realizing that Paul Hesch had brothers. When we started looking, I knew only his name, but then, a trip to the Minnesota History Museum in St Paul got us the info that Paul died of a broken back in August of 1900, and that his father was John. Woohoo! This was the beginning of realizing how redundant given names were in German families.

Oh! Discovering my grandfathers' siblings' families was a thrill. Of 11 kids born to Paul and Mary, 5 had died before I was born, and two of them had families.

LOL...darn! To be continued--this 'working' thing cuts into my HH time something awful!

Hoffman's Chow Mein Parlor

Sometimes, looking for family names online brings us to sites with many other interesting bits of info, and even some totally irrelevant stuff that's STILL cool.
Aren't you thrilled we can share it with YOU?

Uncle Tony's wife (Marlene) is looking for information on her grandmother, so she called me. She knew her name and that she'd died 3-4 years before Marlene was born. I asked about where they'd settled, and all the names involved--who did she marry, where's she buried, was she Catholic, what country was her family from, etc.

Evidently, the family settled in Cottonwood and Watonwan counties in southern Minnesota, so Larry started searching for the name Meine, cuz that was Marlene's mom's name (you start with what you know, and discover what you don't know...)

To us, "southern Minnesota" means "try the Winona papers", cuz they're online and very searchable, and they covered a wide area.

Problem is, we get off on tangents so EASILY...LOL

Larry said wow, he'd found a stunning example of cultural assimilation: a man named Hoffman who lived in Winona in the 1930s and owned a place to eat....Hoffman's Chow Mein Parlor....where he sold Hot Tamales, too.


Looking at the address, at 119 1/2 Center Street, we realized the Parlor was upstairs. Hm.

In fact, it was above the Telegraph office, in Winona's "Chinatown"...? Who knew? But Hoffman was a true entrepreneur, he knew his clientele, and we were appreciating his sense of humor:

As Larry observed, since when is it a lot more work to strain the meat out of the broth? LOL

Oh-oh, some local politics here: evidently, the city used the steps to deny Hoffman a liquor license, but he used that too!

He knew eye-catching ads worked:

Do you think he played on the notion that nobody in Winona really knew what a tamale was, let alone "real" chow mein?

Hoffman wasn't above playing on words either--and the fact that he also sold menswear*:

We had a few good laughs over those ads, and they sent Larry looking for Hoffman's obit. Here it is, from 1936...it makes his ads even MORE fun when you realize how he *combined businesses.
Thinking about it, Winona was a 'port city' on the Mississippi, with a good mix of ethnic groups. Does anyone know if it ever had a Chinatown area? Is the building still there?