50 - Diary Entry - 26 June 1936

Click here to read story from beginning.

Story so far: Grandma Cecile had reached her relatives back in her home village of Nieder-Mohrau, Czechoslovakia, after a trip across the continental USA and the Atlantic Ocean.Grandma had written letters back home and others had written to her as well as letters that were going back and forth at home. Her third oldest son was about to get married and was waiting for proof of his baptism so he could wed in the church.

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Grandma had been in Europe for almost 2 weeks already. She must have been busy, because in that time she had only written in her diary once while there, to describe her arrival. On June 26, 1936, she made her next entry:

It’s JUNE 26. This morning Mina’s Hedwig [Grandma's niece] and I went to Romerstadt, I thought I would get my glasses, But they were not there. 

When we started it was warm. We had some shopping to do. I got 2 kilogram meat from Schaffer's daughter. It was 20 Kronen, one dozen [illegible word], 2 1/2 Kronen, my how terrible high [expensive] everything is in this mountain corner. 

At noon we walked fast, we seen a thundershower in the west and we didn’t want to get wet. We could have taken the bus, but I wanted to see how I could stand the walk. It is farther than to Stayton from our place [about 3 miles]. 

People were making hay and on Frau Feith’s place, the Festenhof, they had oxen hitched to the hay rakes. I asked a lady from Harachsdorf, to whom the Festenhof belongs and she told me it belongs to Frau Feith and that Mr. was dead and the only son was studying somewhere. There we were by a nice Hotel. She said that belongs to her too. Just
imagine, a big nice hotel by the woods in Harachsdorf, that Lady said they are doing a wonderful business. 

My, we passed some fields again, according to how everything stands, food should be more reasonable [less expensive]. I went to a confectionary [dry goods store]. That lady said if it wouldn’t be for the factories, they wouldn’t do such good business. 

When we came to Mina’s house it was quarter after 12:00. She had cauliflower soup and barley biscuits, filled with quark [curd, cottage cheese?] and boughten cherries. I stayed there, about 4:00 arriving here [back at Gustie's house]. (I have a key to the front door.) They were all in the field. The hired girl works, too, from four in the morning till about half past seven in the evening. It is 20 to six now. Wonder how long I’ll be alone. 

 I’ll get me some sourbrunn [mineral water - see Post 51 for more information] now, maybe after that if nobody comes I’ll walk to Johanna Schiebel, which is an old Lady, but who is a cousin of us and who knows all the history of this village, please do not think she is mean, she just remembers things so good.

I heard something rattle on the front door, going to the window a young fellow was there with a bicycle, he said he wanted to invite Herr Weihs, which is my brother-in-law [Gustie's husband], to the cino [theater] to Klein-Mohrau and he wanted to buy eggs from Gustie.

When people see me they always want me to come to their houses, but I’ll not do anything like that. I have to answer so many questions. I get tired of it. I guess I’ll have to invite them to come to America.

Grandma Cecile seems to be enjoying herself now. She's walking around - miles, in fact. Having grown up in the era of the automobile, it is hard for me to imagine someone walking from the farm to Stayton, we always drove. She does make it sound like she only walked this time just to see if she could still do it like she did when she was young.

 If you are wondering what the illegible word in the second paragraph was, take a look and see if you can figure it out. 

the word - after 1 Dz. - ??? Kncies ???

Grandma's handwriting was  sometimes a little hard to read, and her spelling not perfect. It looks like "Kncies" or "Rncies" or "Kucies", or ??? I have no idea.

Grandma must have used her notebook not just as a diary, but for taking notes. In the middle of this diary entry, at the top of a page, there is an entry written in German, in someone else's handwriting. It appears in the middle of a sentence that ends on the previous page and picks up after the insert.  In this case, she must have handed the notebook to someone else to write down as answer to her question while the page was blank. Her sentence would have been written around this insert later. Here is the page:

Page 11 of the diary, address note at the top

For the translation, I turned to my friend Al Haunold for his help. This is his translation:

Moravian Ostrawa:  Polish Consulate
A visa for repeated border-crossings regarding [visits to ??]  relatives is enclosed
In Teschen   call the business location of Polzer Josef

Someone must have been answering Grandma's question of where and how to obtain a visa to cross into Poland to visit her brother Josef Schiebel.

The other puzzle in this entry for me is just what is sourbrunn? According to Wikipedia, Brunn refers to a stream or a source of water. Perhaps this was some sort of mineral water that they drank? Or it could be something to eat, since she was waiting for the others to come home from the fields.  [11/25/2021 the answer to this question can be found in the next post "#51 - "What was Grandma Eating?"]

For a closer view of any of the images, simply click on one of them.
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Story to be continued......  

To read Post -  "51 - What Was Grandma Eating?" - Click here 

49 - Letter From Weisers to Grandpa - 24 June 1936

Click here to read story from beginning.

Story so far: Grandma Cecile had reached her relatives back in her home village of Nieder-Mohrau, Czechoslovakia, after a trip across the continental USA and the Atlantic Ocean. All the while that she visited with her old friends and siblings, back at home the date of her third son's wedding was drawing ever closer.

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One of the letters in Grandma's bag of mementos was one from the Weisers of Nebraska addressed to Grandpa. Dan Weiser was married to Grandpa Alois's oldest sister, Berta.

The letter was long, written in German, except for the last, short page. Sadly, the postage stamps were removed by "tiny stamp collectors", so I do not know how much an "Air Mail" letter cost in 1936. The question as to why people who wrote on scraps of paper to save money would send a letter via Air Mail was explained by page 5. Consider this - the postmark of the letter is June 25. The date of Gus and Ann's wedding was June 30 - only five days away! Page five was needed to fulfill requirements for the wedding to proceed!

Here is the letter:

the envelope - note the "Via Air Mail" stamp

page 1 of the letter

page 2

page 3

page4

page 5 - in English, except for Berta's signature

My friend Al Haunold provided the translation:

Creston, Nebraska,  June 24, 1936

Dear brother and family,
    We received your letter and saw from it that the priest is not satisfied;  Anna and Adam [Keimig] were at Florens’ [Florence Beitel's baptism] but not at August’s since Alois and Humphrey went to the priest and then they went to Pornelie (Vorlenelie ?) to Joe and Cecilia Partsch [cousins].  Emma was there two weeks earlier when Zielie [Cecile] was in bed and Zielie Pasch [Partsch] was with her and washed her knee,  she said I and Papa were godparents  and otherwise  nobody knew it. We had almost forgotten;  she dressed the child for baptism  and it will be good …. 

second page 

and we are also satisfied with that.  Dear brother, you know that I am not so young anymore  and I gave mother her (?? illegible) and that I give her all as I do and it is the same situation with Papa. I thought today a lot about that and the thought crossed my mind when we were the godparents and we drove  that afternoon to the baptism and thus we are the godparents.  Dear brother, when I received the letter from Zilie I was sick  and I was in bed and could not go to Colubus [Columbus] and yesterday I received a letter from her  saying that she did not go to Columbus when I ….

third page 

would have been in your place I would not have let her go or I would have gone with her, nobody would have prevented me if I would have gone by myself,  I was the second one in the church and we had to see the priest and he asked whether I knew a person by the name Josef Alois Beitel  and I said no. And then he re-read the letter from the priest  and then he said it was August Josef and he wanted to get married and the baptismal certificate at the priest’s was so old and (illegible, probably “damaged”)  and quickly something could happen and now for August we wish good luck and blessing in his state of matrimony and Zielie  and…

fourth page 

they should stay there. When their first son got married and she wrote about it  and that is nice and that she feels good.  I felt I should write to her but I feel bad about my posture and my knees can’t carry me anymore and I can hardly get up from the chair when I cannot hold onto something and I also cannot sleep well,  Papa is in much better shape what that concerns, he sleeps thought the whole night without waking up ,  we have accepted that and then they had to get out of the Poster ?? (Pester ??)  and for the sheep.  When it does not rain in a week or so we have to sell the young life-stock,
Best greetings to all of you,  Berta

fifth page

We as sponsors to August Joseph Beitel send our signature that he was baptized at St. Marys Catholic church near Humphrey.

Mr. Dan Weiser

Mrs. Berta Weiser 

 

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What a letter! Al had a hard time with it and I can see why. It was written, all but the 5th page, by Berta Beitel Weiser, Grandpa's oldest sister. Her handwriting is poor and so is her grammar and spelling. She seems to write in a stream of consciousness, jumping from one thought to another, addressing thoughts without much detail. It would have been a little easier if we had the letter that Grandpa must have written to her.

I can make an educated guess as to more of what it meant to convey:

 Grandpa Alois had written that the priest needed more evidence that Gus had been baptized as a Catholic and qualified to be married in the church. Anna, one of Berta & Dan's daughters, was married to Adam Keimig before either Gus or Florence were born, so they would have been old enough to be a baptismal sponsor for either.   Emma Weiser, another daughter of Berta's, must have been with Grandma Cecile before she gave birth. Not sure about what the statement "washed her knee" is about. Something must have been lost in the translation. Emma must have helped dress Gus for Baptism and reminded Berta that she and Dan were the godparents/sponsors. The other names mentioned were similar to those of cousins in Nebraska.

 On page two, Berta is talking about her poor health - she is 70 already, but as she rambles, she remembers Dan driving with her to the baptism and that they were the godparents for certain and he was most definitely baptized. She remembers being sick when Grandma Cecile's letter said she wanted to meet her in Columbus on her train trip. (Grandma mentioned this near the end of her first diary entry, it turned out the train went nowhere near Columbus.) 

 On page three, she sympathizes with Grandpa - he should have either gone with her to Europe or told her she could not go. Then she switches subjects back to the wedding and how the priest in Nebraska asked if she knew the person getting married - he had the name confused at first.  

 Page four is more discussion of their aches and pains. The last sentence about needing "to sell the young livestock" if it doesn't rain is notable, since Nebraska, along with the central region of the United States of America was suffering from a terrible drought known as the Dust Bowl at that time.

Page five is the signatures needed for the priest. Obviously they did not need to leave it with him, as it was still with the letter - no scanners or copy machines back then. Maybe the letter was late and they went ahead without it, we don't know. A couple of interesting notes - Dan signs his name in English script, Berta signs in German script. Also, they attest that Gus was baptized at St Mary near Humphrey, which is where several of the young Beitels were baptized. However, family history stories say that Gus was baptized at St Bonaventure in Columbus because the family lived in Columbus after returning from a move to Salem, Oregon. When I was in Nebraska in 1996 on a family trip, we did not search for his baptismal record with the St Mary records because we were not expecting it to  be there.

It would have been interesting to know when this letter arrived and how close it came to holding up the wedding, waiting for documentation! I recently asked my cousin Robert, the oldest son of Gus and Ann, but he had never heard of this before.

To see any of the letters up close, click on the image and you will be able to scroll through all of them. 

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Story to be continued......

To read Post -  "50 - Diary Entry - 26 June 1936" - Click here