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by Hans
Kopp
Foreword
The old cliché, “one picture
is worth a thousand words,”
holds especially true for
the Donauschwaben since the
time photography was
developed toward the end of
the 19th Century. We
have to be grateful to this
technology which was used to
the full extent by our
ancestors during the time of
the late 19th century up to
the time of the end of World
War II in 1945. Especially
grateful we have to be to
the individuals who took the
pictures showing the variety
of life during the last 50
years our culture existed in
the settlement regions of
Hungary or after WWI in
Romania and Yugoslavia.
We are forever grateful, not only to
the people who took the pictures, but also
to those who were able to save and preserve
them at the end of the war and make them
available in the many books of individual
Donauschwaben villages, towns and cities.
These book projects were spearheaded by
small groups of men and women from these
villages, towns and cities of the so-called
“Heimatortsgemeinschaft groups,” who have
devoted and volunteered their valuable time
to document our history in word and pictures.
Many of those volunteers became the
members of the donauschwäbische
Kulturstiftung with Hans Sonnleitner as
their “Vorsitzeder” chairman. We find such
names as Hans Diplich, the designer of the
Coat of Arms, such scholars as Josef Beer,
Dr. Georg Wildmann, Dr. Valentin Oberkersch,
Dr. Ingomar Senz or Hermann Rakusch with the
illustrations and maps created by Magdalena
Kopp-Krumes. We also find a Friedrich Binder, Karl
Schumm, Anton Scherer, Oskar Feldtänzer,
Leopold Barwich, Fritz Hoffmann, Friederich
Kühbauch, Ernst Lung, Josef Pertschi, Martin
Reinprecht, Georg Tscherny and Dr Roland
Vetter. Then there are the many personalities such
as Stefan Nuber, who documented the death
camp of Gakowa or an Ernst Jäger, Hans
Gassmann, and Andreas Pfuhl, to mention only
a few of the many authors whose works,
collections of documents, articles and
pictures are priceless and provide the basis
for our complete history today.
Since all those books were written in
the German language, I was asked by Franz
Awender, the Vice
President of our Donauschwaben Society of
North America in 1995, to write a book about
the Donauschwaben, for the Donauschwaben, in
the English language with a picture
presentation which has been
acquired by
many various contributors for publication.
That our ancestors did not live in the
comfort of today we all enjoy and understand
very well; their lives consisted of hard
work coupled with simple pleasures we
treasure today as their customs and social
mores.
They did not have running water; electricity
became only available in the 20’s and 30’s
of the 20th Century. Water had to be heaved
up from the Schwenkelbrunnen for men and
beast. Water for washing the laundry was
collected in underground reservoirs and heat
was supplied by a wooden stove or Kachelofen.
Their lives centered on the church. The
Sunday was holy for them and during the
summer months their Sunday afternoon where
often spent with friends gossiping and
talking about the latest news. By 4:00 pm
the farmers’
Sunday was over. The farmers had to go
about their routine work of feeding the
animals and milking the cows. During the
winter months one visited relatives and
prepared for the biggest holiday,
Christmas.
The chores during the summer months
were tending the fields and in fall the
farmers had to bring in the harvest. During
the winter months the farmer had to load
manure on his wagon and take it to the
fields to spread so the new plants would
grow strong and bring in another harvest to
sustain the lives of their families. In the
evenings the farmer had to work repairing
and making new bridles for his horses, fix a
broken wagon and other equipment.
In
this section we are pleased to present a
collection of pictures with captions,
depicting the lives of our Donauschwaben
ancestors. The pictures were selected on
the basis of their availability and
quality, but also how they talked to us and
what they tell us. We made an effort
whenever possible to select pictures from as
many villages as possible.
Excerpts from the book
“The
Last Generation Forgotten and left to
Die” - "The History of the
Danube Swabians” by Hans Kopp, with
additions for the study of the history
of the Donauschwaben, their heritage,
customs and social mores. [Hans
Kopp Files]
All Rights
reserved.
ISBN No. 0-9701109-0-1.
Copyright 1999 and 2006
Reproduction of this material for resale
is prohibited by law.
Special
permission is granted to the
“Donauschwaben Village Helping Hands
Project"
to republished “An Illustrated History
of the Donauschwaben”
[Published at www.dvhh.org, 14
Nov 2006] |
