Category Archives: Berks County History

How God Spoke to the Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravians Through the Media

12 Replies

Dedication
This blog post is dedicated to Corinne Earnest who left time on May 26, 2016. Without Corinne, Patricia, and Russell Earnest’s unflagging dedication to Fraktur, we would all still be trying to put together many of the pieces of the historical puzzle that they have researched, and solved. She was not zealous for her own purpose, but rather reached out and shared freely her great love and knowledge of Fraktur with everyone. We all shall miss Corinne.

Introduction
The Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravians produced their everyday tools and utensils from seven media: stone, wood, glass, metal, clay, textiles, and paper. Both decorative Fractur script and motifs, as well as everyday cursive calligraphy adorned this material culture, capturing both the spiritual and secular principles then prevalent. In this post we take a look at the scripts and motifs; the practical aspects of time and materials; and how God spoke to the Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravians through the media.

Adam & God
When Adam, father of all mankind, realized his memory wasn’t going to be good enough to remember all the names he had given to earthly living things, he thought he’d better have a talk with God. Now God didn’t want Adam to remember everything, so He said: “Adam, a man can’t keep everything in his head. There should be another way to remember, don’t you think?” Adam, being very relieved, agreed, and so God gave Adam a set of symbols that could be used to keep a record of things. Adam’s children carried on the tradition, and their children’s children, and over time others called these symbols letters or alphabets, and this way of remembering writing.

Writing School in Session
Today, the world over we find varying alphabets, and mankind is still using them to remember. So it was, too, in the eighteenth century when around 1760 people began to ask Johann Michael Schirmer, a writing master, mathematician, and school teacher in the free imperial city of Frankfurt am Main to put together a practical self-instructional handwriting book for the use of young people and adults. Schirmer had very little free time and was reluctant, but finally realized he was the only one who had the broad knowledge and skill necessary to inspire youth to take up the pen and learn to write German in Fraktur, Current, and, chancery scripts, and to notate their Latin, Italian and French in round lettering known as Literae Rotundae and square lettering or Romanae Quadratae. Schirmer’s title page indicates that Current, Canzleÿ, and Fractur are to be understood as German calligraphy, and Cursiva, Rotunda, and Quadrata as Latin calligraphy.

Current Script
Current, also known as German script, was so named, according to Schirmer, because it was “currently” in common use among the general public. He emphasized that his exercises were so designed to teach one to write in this cursive script with ease and clarity as if one letter grew out of the other.

Chancery Script
Canzleÿ or chancery script was created from Fractur quite by accident in the chanceries and scriptoria. As shortcuts were found to speed up the making of initial capital letters, first lines, and other applications in Fractur script, rules were altered. Eventually a whole new set of criteria was recognized under the name of chancery script. Schirmer advises the reader that there was no uniform agreement among writing masters concerning this.

Fractur Script
Initially German-speaking calligraphers preferred writing in Fractur, but found it required a great deal of time and skill to do so. This made it unsuitable for everyday situations, and, as already mentioned, encouraged simplification in the rules. So it is not surprising that scribes naturally developed a handwriting for daily use, and eventually designated Fractur exclusively for the ornamentation of initial letters, opening text, and important words in documents. Schirmer notes that only after the introduction of the printing press, [1] did people begin referring to the script as Fractur. Although there is no proof of this, one thing is certain: Fractur deriving from the Latin word Fractus, and meaning fractured or broken, certainly was used by those printing or handwriting these angular broken letters, and is still used today to describe its fonts and calligraphy.

Cursiva, Round Letters, Square Capitals
Schirmer categorizes Cursiva, Rotunda, and Quadrata as Latin calligraphy. Quadrata or Square Capitals were tedious to form because of their straight lines and angular configuration, making them more suitable for carving inscriptions on stone with a chisel than for writing a text on parchment or paper with a pen. Calligraphers, therefore, as with Fractur, in the course of time modified the shape of this script to a rounder lettered form that could be written with a flowing connected hand and speed for everyday use, calling it Cursiva. They reserved the Square Capitals for special headings and text on paper, and used them on readily conducive media such as stone or metal.

Intended for cursive handwriting, Schirmer includes large and small Round Letter (Literae Rotundae) alphabets in lower case (Gemeine), as well as decorative upper case (Versalien) examples,. He also introduces Literae Romanae Quadratae (Square Capitals) to be used as ornamental lettering.

Ornamented Letters in Latin and French
For those writing in Latin and French, Schirmer recommends twelve (12) examples in round capital letters to decorate introductory lines.

Ornamented Letters in German
When writing in German, he suggests using any of the following thirty-eight designs in lowercase Fractur to ornament initial text.

“Youth’s Lifelong Obligations”  Vorschrift by Johann Michael Schirmer, ca. 1760
Schirmer’s European writing samples are not only exercises to master the various scripts, but are also reminiscent of what we find in similar Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravian Vorschriften in America: a combination of design examples, practice formulas, and moral tips, taken mostly from the Bible, hymns, and religious poems, to keep young and old on the path to heaven. The following text from his “Youth’s Lifelong Obligaions” parallels what we find in American writing samples of the time period:

Focus on your Creator when young, and have Him ever before your eyes and in your heart.
With unfeigned love, childlike diffidence, and total confidence, dedicate the first fruits
of your endeavors to Him. Accustom your lips not to curse or swear, and never be afraid
to use them in prayer, praise, and thanks. Be diligent in learning the Word of God, and live
your life accordingly. Be humble towards everyone, and respect the elderly. Always be willing to oblige your friends and enemies. Avoid hateful words and foolish actions. Shun the temptations of youth, and remain chaste and virtuous. Be steadfast in your work, and eat your bread with dignity. Bann all falsehoods and lies. Harbor no evil thoughts nor associate with bad company. [2]

“Connoisseurs’ Writing Sample for Reading and Writing” by Wilhelmus Faber, 1812
A comparable American Vorschrift created by Wilhelmus Antonius Faber (active ca. 1790-1820) in 1812 for Johannes Klinger, a school boy living in Exeter Township in Berks County, Pennsylvania, demonstrates not only text similarities, but also mirrors a number of precepts found in Schirmer’s Writing School in Session or German, Latin, and French Writing Samples:

  • Firstly, Faber uses Fractur script for the initial lines as suggested by Schirmer, and chooses a double band decorative element similar to Illustration 7 of “How to Decorate Opening Lines Written in German,” (Copperplate No. 46 ) to ornament the opening religious text “Wohl dem den der Herr in…” Just as Schirmer demonstrates the use of calligraphic flourishes in “Youth’s lifelong Obligations,” (Copperplate No. 40), so too we find Faber embellishing not only the initial letter “W” with flourishes, but also, in similar fashion, all along the top of the line.
  • The religious text in Fractur script paraphrases the Psalmist David, and then in German script quotes verses 9-11 from Psalm 91, demonstrating the every day cursive handwriting the student is more likely to use throughout his life. The upper and lower case alphabets in Current script are included for practice purposes.
  • The final line Johannes Klinger’s Writing Sample, 28th November 1812 is important text identifying the owner, and, accordingly is also done in Fractur.

Connoisseurs’ Writing Sample for Reading and Writing, 1812
He whom the Savior blesses in his work and household shall prosper. For the Lord is your refuge, and the Most High your deliverance. No evil will befall you, and no plague come nigh unto your dwelling. For He has entrusted you to his angels that they may protect you wherever you may be [Psalm 91:9-11].
A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z A a | b c d e f fs g h j i k l ll m n o p q r s ss s t u v w x y z tz ch ß sch sl si tz
Johannes Klinger his Writing Sample, Exeter the 28th of November 1812 [3]

Faber was most likely a school teacher, and is best known for his decorative Scherenschnitte or cutwork that frequently encircles the text. However, he also made writing samples such as the FLP example. It has been suggested that he was Moravian since he reputedly once lived in Lititz, Pennsylvania, a Moravian community in northern Lancaster County. He was also, however, active in Berks, Bucks, Chester, Dauphin, Lebanon, Montgomery and Northampton Counties. Knowledgeable in German, Latin, and English, his calligraphy is remarkably fine, and that of a trained scrivener.

A New Definition of Fractur, 1897
In 1897 another meaning of Fractur was introduced that has redefined the way we think of Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravian material culture. In September of that year Henry Chapman Mercer gave a talk The Survival of the Mediaeval Art of Illuminative Writing Among Pennsylvania Germans to American Philosophical Society members in Philadelphia. He suggested that it would be much more convenient if all Pennsylvania German illuminated manuscripts be called Fractur. Since then objects with or without Fractur script can be called Fractur. For example, a bird or flower or geometric design on paper, textiles, clay, wood, glass, metal, or stone with or without any text can be referred to as Fractur. The material culture of both groups, therefore, is represented through visual, as well as written Fractur. Stone and textiles, per Ellen Gehret in This is the Way I Pass My Time, vie with works on paper for containing the most Fractur script, and hand towels are “more verbal than any other form of Pennsylvania German needlework with the exception of samplers.” [4]

“My God, Through the Blood of Christ” Sampler by Elisa Kulp, 1816
Elisa Kulp, a Mennonite living in the Franconia area of Montgomery County Pennsylvania, worked a most extraordinary sampler in 1816. An A B C sampler with square capital letters in the upper half, along with floral and geometric designs in the lower ensured that she would be able to number and mark her linens with her name or initials for inventory, as well as have a template of decorative motifs to embellish other textiles throughout her life. It is worthwhile pointing out that household textiles were highly valued, and an important part of one’s estate.

Elisa embroidered her name in full twice, and also added her initials so that there would be no doubt to whom this lovely piece belonged. She also embroidered two spiritual reminders, both in square capital letters:

  • MEIN GOTT ICH BITT | DURCH CHRISTI BLUT | MACHS DOCH MITT | MEINEM ENDE GUT or MY GOD I ASK YOU THROUGH THE BLOOD OF CHRIST TO ASSURE ME A PEACEFUL END.
  • O EDEL HERZ BEDENKE DEIN ENDE or O NOBEL HEART CONTEMPLATE YOUR END.

The origin or inspiration of these phrases can be traced to Ämilie Juliane, Imperial Countess of Schwartzburg-Rudolstadt (1637-1706), who was born in 1637 in Barby, a place which in the eighteenth century was to become strongly associated with the Moravians. Like Luther, this noble lady considered prayer and diligence key necessities to one’s life, meditating three times daily. She died in Rudolstadt in 1706. Ämilie Juliane is known to have written over 500 hymns, one of which Die Eile des Lebens or The Hurriedness of Life contains the phrase Elisa cross-stitched “Mein Gott ich bitt durch Christi Blut Machs doch mit meinem Ende gut.” This refrain comes at the end of each of twelve verses, “My God, my God, I ask you through the blood of Christ to assure me a peaceful end.” The beginning of the third verse “Lord, teach me always to contemplate my end,” or “Herr, lehr mich stets mein End gedenken’ may have inspired Elisa to encircle a flowering heart motif in the center of the bottom half of her sampler with the entire command “O Edel Herz Bedenke Dein Ende” or “O Noble Heart, Contemplate your End.” This was a saying near and dear to the Pennsylvania Dutch and appeared frequently on samplers and towels in the abbreviated form OEHBDDE.

“That Which You Want Others to Do” Susanna Steltz Plate by Georg Hübner, 1789
There are two kinds of Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravian redware: the greater majority falls under utilitarian in glazed, unglazed, or partly glazed ware; and a much smaller group of “fancy” glazed and decorated ware. Georg Hübner, a potter in Limerick Township, Montgomery PA made a slip decorated, sgrafitto dish thirteen inches in diameter for Susanna Steltz in 1789 that falls into the latter category. Slipware refers to glazed pieces that have had an element of design added such as a drawing, date, name, or saying. For sgraffito, from the Italian for “scratched,” the slip is painted on the surface and the design is scratched through the slip revealing the contrasting red clay beneath. Although such a piece showed off the potter’s skills, and was less likely to be used daily, there is evidence from marks of wear and tear on some that not all were presentation pieces. The Steltz piece, however, appears to have been rarely used, and does, indeed, demonstrate Hübner’s masterful work.

The potter inscribed the outer rim of the plate in Fractur script with a command Jesus gave to the multitude in his sermon on the Mount found in chapters 5-7 of St. Matthew, and chapter 6 of St. Luke—specifically Matthew 7:12, and Luke 6:31, as well as the date and name of the plate owner: “ March 5th 1789 the plate of Susanna Steltz. All that you would have others do unto you, do unto them.” [5] The inner portion is decorated with a double-headed eagle as per the Fractur script between the two heads: “Portrayed here is a double-headed eagle.” [5] Please note that this is not a Holy Roman Empire double-headed eagle bristling with authority and might, but rather a double-headed eagle of totally different temperament to whom Hübner gave a broad and flowering Pennsylvania Dutch heart.

“Dear People, Observe” Pennsylvania Stove Plate, 1753
Radiant-heat stoves existed in northern Europe as far back as the mid-sixteenth century. The tradition of casting them in iron with low relief decorative and textual elements, both secular and religious, also originated on the Continent. Some of the eighteenth-century German-speaking immigrants to Pennsylvania brought these cast iron stoves along with them to heat their homes, and when they needed to replace or repair damaged or worn plates, found iron masters who could replicate the traditional plates at local forges.

The Pennsylvania Dutch house in the mid- to late eighteenth century consisted of three rooms on the main floor: a Küche or kitchen on one side of a centrally-located chimney, and a family living space known as the Stube or “room,” as well as the Kammer or “sleeping chamber” on the other. The fireplace opened into the kitchen and, just as in Europe, the most economical way to heat the Stube was via the cast iron five-plate jamb stove, which when put together, formed an open box that could be put against an opening in the wall shared with and opening into the kitchen fireplace. Placing hot coals or burning wood from the fireplace side into the stove opening provided heat in the Stube without the annoyance of smoke.

These plates were made in the same way as in Europe, and typically were adorned with secular or religious inscriptions done in Romanae Quadratae or Capital Square Letters. Fractur visual motifs such as tulips, stars, medallions, wheat sheaves, and human figures often depicted a Biblical story with or without a saying, reminding the viewer of his temporal existence, and need to take stock of the eternal path he was forging.

One unusual stove plate, however, stands apart from all the others, and appears to be a political satire on an event taking place on September 14, 1753. As Henry Chapman Mercer noted in 1914 in his work The Bible in Iron, and as is still the case:

No event on September 14, 1753, either in Pennsylvania, where James Hamilton
(1748-54) was Governor, or in Germany or England, where Frederick the Great
and George the Third reigned, appears to explain this joke or satire (the only
caricature in the whole collection), upon some person, so publicly well known as
to strike the popular fancy and increase the sale of a stove at that time. [6]

This stove plate’s message was easily understood by the denizens of southeastern Pennsylvania in 1753, and although we don’t yet know the true significance of its imagery and text, we can at least contemplate both its visual, and verbal elements.

Two vaulted panels are divided by a vertical molding: At the top on the left in relief are the letters “17.” In the center a rider, in tricorn hat and long coat, clenches a sword in right hand, while holding aloft possibly a torch in his left hand. He conspicuously sits upon a goat. At the top on the right are the letters “53.” In the center a man on foot, wearing a headdress and long coat faces the rider, and with both hands holds a sword in horizontal position in front of him.

Underlined Romanae Quadratae or Square Capital Letters follow:

SEHET. ZU. IHR LIBEN.      DEAR PEOPLE, OBSERVE
LEUT. WIE. DER. HERR      HOW THE GENTLEMAN
AUFF . DIESEM PFRTE       RIDES UPON THIS HORSE.
REIT. D 14 SEPTEMBR      THE 14th OF SEPTEMBER

“Michael Weber Rests Here in God” Tombstone

“Well over one thousand examples of handcarved decorated gravemarkers exist in Pennsylvania German graveyards with German inscriptions and decorations not unlike those on Fraktur.” [7] The tombstone of Michael Weber, a Revolutionary War veteran, is one of these, and, although the tombstone cutter failed to include any Fractur visual motifs, he chose to inscribe Fractur script, a much more difficult task than if he had used the Square Capital Letters or Romanae Quadratae so suited to stone carving. This marker, unlike many that have been damaged by vandalism, acid rain, and neglect is well cared for and clearly legible: “Michael Weber rests here in God. He was born September 29, 1735 and died December 24, 1826 at age 88 years, 2 months, and 25 days.” [8] As so many others before him, who had used the tools of their trade upon stone, wood, glass, metal, clay, textiles, and paper, this tombstone carver consciously left a lasting warning and promise, one which reaches us even today as we read upon the gravemarker: “O wayfarer, consider your end, which can come all too quickly. Put on Christ Jesus, through whom you can be redeemed.” [8]

Endnotes
[1] Johannes Gutenberg introduced the first movable type printing press in Mainz ca. 1440.

[2] “Youth’s Obligations Towards Life,” a translation of Schirmer’s writing sample “Lebens Pflichten der Jugend,” in Geöfnete Schreib=Schule…Franckfurt am Maÿn: Selbstverlag, ca. 1760, copper plate No. 40. For original Fraktur script see Fig. 8. The following is a transcription thereof: Bedenke an deinen Schöpfer | in der Jugend, und habe denselben immer vor Augen | und im Herzen: widme ihm die Erstlinge deiner Kraft, in hertzlicher Lie= | be, kindlicher Furcht und vollkommenem Vertrauen. Bewohne | deinen Mund nicht zum Fluchen und Schwören, und schäme dich | nicht, denselben im Beten, Loben und danken aufzuthun. Lerne fleis= |sig das Wort Gottes, und führe dein Leben darnach [.] Sey demü= | thig gegen jedermann, und ehre die Alten. Befleissige dich der | Dienstfertigkeit gegen Freunde und Feinde. Schandbahre | Wort und Narrentheidung laß ferne von dir seyn. Fliehe die Lüs= | sten der Jugend, und halte dich keusch und züchtig. In deinem Be= | ruf sey fleissig, und esse dein Brod mit Ehren. Verbanne die | Falschheit und Lügen. Hege keine böse Gedanken, und meide | endlich alle böse Gesellschaft.

[3] “He Shall Prosper Whom the Savior Blesses,” a translation of Wilhelmus Faber’s 1812 Johannes Klinger Vorschrift. For original Fractur and German script, see Fig. 9. The following is a transcription thereof: Vorschrift der Liebhabern zum Lesen und Schreiben, 1812. Wohl dem, den der Herr in | seiner Arbe[i]t segnet, und seine Haushaltung beglücket. |[Luther Bibel, 1545; Psalm 91: 9-11] Denn der Herr ist Deine Zuversicht der Höchste ist Dein Zuflucht. Es wird Dir kein |übels [sic] begegnen, und keine Plage wird zu Deiner Hütte sich nahen. Denn er hat seinen [sic] | Engel befohlen über Dir, daß sie Dich behüten auf allen Deinen Wegen.
A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z A a | b c d e f fs g h j i k l ll m n o p q r s ss s t u v w x y z tz ch ß sch fl fi tz
Johannes Klinger seine Vorschrift, Exeter d 28ten November 1812

[4] Ellen Gehret, This is the Way I Pass My Time: A Book About Pennsylvania German Decorated Hand Towels (Birdsboro, PA: Pennsylvania German Society, 1985), 5.

[5] For original Fractur script, see fig.10. The following is a transcription of the plate rim: “Mertz.5ten 1789 Susanna Steltz, ihre schüssel, Alles was ihr wolt das euch die Leute Duhn sollen Das Duth ihr ihnen.“ Between the two eagle heads, the transcription reads: “Hir ist Abgebilt ein dobelter Adler.”

[6] Henry Chapman Mercer. The Bible in Iron (Doylestown, PA: Bucks County Historical Society, 1961), 59, No. 73, “The Man and the Goat.”

[7] Gehret, 5.

[8] For original Fractur script, see Fig. 12. The following is a transcription of the tombstone: “Hier | ruhet in Gott | Michael Weber | er war gebohren den 29 . | September 1738, und starb | den 24 . December 1826, | in dem Alter von 88 Jahre, | 2 Monate und 25 Tage. | O, Wanders Mann | Gedenk ans Ende. | Das leichtlich kommen kann; | Vielleicht auch gar behende, | Und ziehe Christum Jesum an, durch den man selig werden | kann.

SOURCES
Arthur Cecil Bining. Pennsylvania Iron Manufacture in the Eighteenth Century. Harrisburg: PA Historical Commission, 1938.

“Wilhelmus Antonius Faber” in Russell D. and Corinne P. Earnest, Papers for Birth Dayes: Guide to the Fraktur Artists and Scriveners. East Berlin, Pa.: Russell D. Earnest Associates, 1997, 2nd ed., vol. 1, 264-265.

Wilhelmus Faber’s Johannes Klinger 1812 Vorschift in Henry S. Borneman, Pennsylvania German Illuminated Manuscripts. Norristown, Pa.: Pennsylvania German Society, 1937, published as plate 3.

Ellen Gehret. This is the Way I Pass My Time: A Book About Pennsylvania German Decorated Hand Towels. Birdsboro, PA: Pennsylvania German Society, 1985.

Tandy and Charles Hersh. Samplers of the Pennsylvania Germans. Birdsboro, PA: Pennsylvania German Society, 1991.

Stacy C. Hollander et al., American Radiance: The Ralph Esmerian Gift to the American Folk Art Museum Catalog. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2001, 141-142, no. 104 [Georg Hübner].

 Catherine E. Hutchins., et al. Arts of the Pennsylvania Germans. New York, NY: Published for the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum by Norton: 1983.

Henry J. Kauffman and Quentin H. Bowers. Early American Andirons and Other Fireplace Accessories. Nashville, Tn: Nelson [1975].

Henry J. Kauffman. American Copper & Brass. [Camden, N.J.]: T. Nelson [1968].

_______________. Early American Ironware: Cast and Wrought. Rutland, Vt.: C.E. Tuttle Co., 1966.

_______________. Pennsylvania Dutch: American Folk Art, New York: Dover Publications, [1964], 94-95 [Georg Hübner].

Henry Chapman Mercer. The Survival of the Mediaeval Art of Illuminative Writing Among Pennsylvania Germans. [Doylestown, Pa: Bucks County Historical Society], [1897].

_______________. The Bible in Iron. Doylestown, PA: Bucks County Historical Society, 1914, 59, No. 73, The Man and the Goat. Google Books, Accessed 22 July 2016 https://books.google.com/books?id=kC9PAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

Lisa Minardi. A Colorful Folk: Pennsylvania Germans & the Art of Everyday Life. Winterthur, DE: Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc., 2015, fig. 20, 22 [Georg Hübner].

_______________. “A Colorful Folk: Pennsylvania Germans And The Art Of Everyday Life,” In Collect Interiors + Collections Online, Fig. 5. Photograph by Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library. Accessed 27 July 2016.   https://www.incollect.com/articles/a-colorful-folk-pennsylvania-germans-and-the-art-of-everyday-life

Betty Ring. Girlhood Embroidery: American Samplers and Pictorial Needlework,
1650-1850 . New York: A. A. Knopf, 1993.

Earl F. Robacker. “Pennsylvania Redware,” in Pennsylvania Folklife. Vol. 46, No. 3 (1997), 137-142. Pennsylvania Folklife Magazine. Book 150. Accessed 26 July 2016 http://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/pafolklifemag/150 [Georg Hübner].

Margaret B. Schiffer. Historical Needlework of Pennsylvania. New York: Scribener, 1968.

Johann Michael Schirmer. Geöfnete Schreib=Schule oder Deutsche, Lateinische, und Franzöische Vorschriften. Frankfurt am Maÿn: Selbst Verlag, ca. 1760.

Peter Steltz Sr., Last Will and Testament, with Codicil, 1832. Wills, Vol 6-7, 1821-1839. Proved and Letters Testamentary Granted to Valentin, Christian, and Peter Steltz Jr.; Author: Montgomery County (Pennsylvania). Register of Wills; Probate Place: Montgomery, Pennsylvania

John J. Stoudt. Pennsylvania German Folk Art: An Interpretation. Allentown, Pa.: Schlecters, 1966, 313 [Georg Hübner].

Stove Plate – Eighteenth Century. Pennsylvania. The State Museum of Pennsylvania. 33.107.3, accessed 9 July 2016 http://statemuseumpa.org/biblical-guidance-cast-iron/

Swan, Susan Burrows. A Winterthur Guide to American Needlework. Winterthur, Del.: Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 1976.

_______________. Plain & Fancy: American Women and Their Needlework, 1650–1850. Austin, Texas.: Curious Works Press, 1995.

Marjie Thompson, Kathleen L. Grant and Alan G. Keyser. Forgotten Pennsylvania Textiles of the 18th and 19th Centuries. Cumberland, ME: Linen Press, [2005?].

Daniel Berkeley Updike. Printing Types Their History, Forms, and Use: A Study in Survivals. Cambridge:Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1962, 2 vols.

Anna Maria Weber, m. n. Angelmayer (6/21/1749-4/3/1834), Friedensville Cemetery, Friedensville, Pa Accessed 10 July 2016 http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=80302681

Michael Weber (1738-1826), Friedensville Cemetery, Friedensville, Pa.Accessed 10 July 2016 http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=16462194&ref=acom

Winterthur Research Fellow, Moravian and Pennsylvania Dutch Material Culture, 2016
Every year Winterthur provides fellowships to a select group of scholars for research
in their chosen areas of study in social and cultural history, including material culture, architecture, decorative arts, design, consumer culture, garden and landscape studies, Shaker studies, travel and tourism,the Atlantic World, and objects in literature. ~ Winterthur Research Program

Thanks to a short-term research fellowship this summer at Winterthur I have been able to study rare books such as Johann Michael Schirmer’s ca. 1740 Geöfnete Schreibschule in the Winterthur Museum Library Collection of Printed Books and Periodicals; objects in the Winterthur Museum Collection; and manuscripts in the Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and Printed Ephemera.  All has contributed to my research for a book in progress Heavenly Fraktur: How Fraktur Influenced Pennsylvania German and Moravian Material Culture. This blog post is based on that research. My sincere thank you to all at Winterthur who have made this fellowship possible.

My thanks also to Donald Trump of the Friedensville Evangelical Lutheran Church; Joanne Kintner and Robert Wood of the Goschenhoppen Historians, Inc.; Patricia Herr, Author and Collector; Dorothy McCoach, Independent Textile Conservator; Janine Pollock and Joseph Shemtov of the Rare Book Department at the Free Library of Philadelphia.

How God Spoke to the Pennsylvania Dutch and Moravians Through the Media Blog Post including transcriptions; translations; and photo images, except for images of the Elisa Kulp 1816 Sampler; the Susanna Steltz Plate; and Sehet zu ihr liben Leut Stove Plate,
© 2016 Del-Louise Moyer.

Geburtsbriefe and Taufwünsche: European Phenomena

7 Replies

An Alpbrief [1] from the fourteenth century is the earliest extant record in a German-speaking area of Europe that requires a Geburtsbrief as proof of identity: Any nonnative who wished to join one of the three communities in and around Klosters in the Canton of Graubünden Switzerland had to “…present a Geburtsbrief, that is, a written proof of birth; land of origin; and that he [was] of legal lineage…” [2] Geburtsbrief is the earlier form for Geburtsschein, a term recognized today for eighteenth and nineteenth century Pennsylvania Dutch birth records/certificates containing principally the names of the parents, baby, date and place of birth.

Such documents have become collectors’ items, serving no functional purpose. It is important to remember, however, that there was a time when they were an integral part of people’s lives, and could be used in both Europe and America as proof of one’s origins when needed.

Translation [3]
A son was born into this world to this wedded pair, that is to Johannes Landes, and his legal spouse Elisabeth, m.n. Schott. His name is Samuel Landes, and he was born on the 17 January in the Year of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ 1801 in America, in the State of Pennsylvania, in Bucks County, in Rockhill Township; Written on the 13 March in the Year 1816.

The Taufbrief or baptismal letter, also known as a Taufwunsch or baptismal wish, Taufzedel, Taufzettel, Taufzeddul or baptismal note, and Göttelbrief or godparent letter was used differently than a Geburtsschein, or Taufschein, and bears witness to the relationship and responsibilities between godparents and the consecrated infant. This was to be a lasting memory to the child of its dedication to God on that day, and the desire of its sponsor(s) that it might continue to thrive in its relationship with its Creator as it grew to adulthood. It always contains the names of the sponsors, and often the child’s first name, and the date of baptism. It may or may not contain the church affiliation and place, child’s last name, and date of birth. It almost never contains the parents’ names. The earliest known Taufbrief dates back to 1593 in Saverne, Alsace for a Catholic baptismal service.[4]

That the Taufzettel was well established and flourishing at the beginning of the eighteenth century is attested to in an all important source describing the practical details of a woman’s life: Gottlieb Siegmund Corvinus’ (Pseudonym: Amaranthes) Nutzbares, galantes und curiöses Frauenzimmer-Lexicon of 1715 (A Useful, Noble, and Curious Lexicon for Women): [5]

Pathen-Zettul are those printed papers with copper etchings
or engravings intended for a baby boy or girl, and are decorated
with all kinds of rhyming congratulatory verses. The godparents
sign their names on the sheets; tuck their gifts or sponsor money
into them; and usually wind something around to make them secure. [6]

These then were the Patenbriefe that publishers offered and marketed through local bookstores, as well as itinerant book sellers who canvassed the countryside with their wares. Some of the better known were Reinholden Printers in Leipzig; J. Balzer and E. W. Buchheister in Breslau; J. H. Hierthes in Weissenburg; Johann Andreas Endter in Nürnberg; F. J. Oberthür in Straßburg; and Gottfried Hoffmann in Waldenburg, who printed baptismal greetings from 1756 on, and whose heirs continued to do so into the beginning of the nineteenth century. Among the older printed Taufzettel are some fine examples depicting symbols related to baptism and virtue; scenes from the life of Jesus; the four Evangelists; and often the entire baptismal sacrament itself.

Translation [7]
[Center]
Baptismal Note
Most precious child, may you so live on earth that you attain bliss.
I also want to ask of God that after this sojourn here, he might
take you into Salem’s dwelling,[8] into joyful eternity. Amen
I, your most faithful godmother, wish this for you. Elisabeth Käster
at Kästers house on the 22nd Day of December in the year 1811 you
were baptized in holy consecration at [Blank]

[Upper Left Corner]
May God give this child faith; cleanse it of all its sins; and give it an
upright spirit –

[Upper Right Corner]
to do as God the Father commands, according to His will while
living here on earth, and afterwards in eternal life.

[Lower Left Corner]
Take this penny from me. May God replace it with a better one.
Obey your father and mother—

[Lower Right Corner]
Be happy among pious people, and avoid the evil ones.
Then you’ll be able to enter heaven with God.

The hand-done Taufwunsch was represented first and foremost in the Alsace, and to a lesser extent in Silesia and Bohemia. Especially charming and artistically creative, their makers, whether teachers, ministers, or simple farmers, showed originality in their calligraphy and accompanying decorative elements, replicating on their baptismal greetings the tulips, forget-me-nots, roses, and carnations found in their gardens. The real world that surrounded them supplied the roosters, doves, swans, peacocks, and eagles. Architectural elements dating back to the Renaissance, and adorning town buildings, stone grave monuments, and the homes of the elite perhaps inspired the imaginative figures of unicorns, mermaids, mermen, and angels. The artist, who was more in tune with tradition than symbolism, added these to his design as well, and his love and joy in the artistic process more than made up for any drawing talent he may have lacked.

The following illuminated manuscript, attributed to the Tall-Soldiers Artist, is labeled Taufschein, but follows neither the European Taufbrief template nor the usual and customary formula of American Taufscheins as we understand them today. Rather, it is a baptismal or Tauf adaptation by the artist/scrivener in the form of a Schein or certificate, thus without a place to insert coin(s). More than likely the token gift of money accompanied the Taufschein.

Translation [9]
Michael Bossert was born into this world on 26 February in the year 1766 of Christian Lutheran parents. His Godfather Johann Michael Ritter has had this baptismal certificate made for him in celebration thereof. His Godmother was Margaretha Beck.

The Sussel-Washington Artist, active from 1760-1779, expressly created Taufwünsche that followed the European formula and so labeled them. He used a standard template of baptismal wishes in the center, flanked usually by the charmingly attired God or godmother on one side and the Peter, Pfeter, Pfetter or godfather on the other.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Fig. 6a Christlicher Tauff Wunsch for Samuel Staud, Pennsylvania, 2/28/1785, 39.164.1 (Courtesy of Reading Public Museum, Reading, Pa.; Photo Image © Del-Louise Moyer)

Translation: [10]
Christian Baptismal Wish: O dear child in Christ, you have been bought through Christ’s death, who, purchased you from Hell with His blood. After your baptism I wanted to send this to you as a remembrance and ever-present reminder. Grow up to honor God, to give joy to your parents, for the benefit of your neighbor, and for your salvation. Samuehl Staud was born Feburary 28, 1785, and baptized by Pastor Henrich Dehkert [Deckert]. Baptismal sponsors were Samuehl Marburger and his wife Maria, in Braunschweig Township, Berks County, in America.

Fig. 6b Christlicher Tauff Wunsch for Johan Heinrich, Pennsylvania, 3/1/1771.
1961.1118 A (Courtesy of Winterthur Museum, Wilmington, De)

Translation  [11]
Johannes Siberi Godfather Susanna Siberi Godmother
Christian Greetings spring forth from the heart’s bower in seven hours. Along with that I wish you luck, health, blessings and prosperity in your life here, and in time may you enter into the kingdom of eternal joy that no man’s tongue can describe; that no eye has seen; and no ear yet heard. Grow up to honor God, for the benefit of your neighbor, and for your salvation. Johan Heinrich was born March 1, 1771 in Warwick Township [Lancaster County].

Fig. 6c Christlicher Tauff Wunsch for Maria Gertraud, Pennsylvania, 9/25/1776, Visual Grace: Important American Folk Art from the Collection of Ralph O. Esmerian, Lot 617 (Courtesy of Sothebys, New York, NY)

Translation [12]
Godmother Maria Hemperling  Godfather Ludwig Hemperling
Christian Baptismal Wish: O dear child in Christ, you have been bought through Christ’s death, who, purchased you from Hell with His blood. After your baptism I wanted to send this to you as a remembrance and ever-present reminder. Grow up to honor God, to give joy to your parents, for the benefit of your neighbor, and for your salvation. Maria Gertraud was born September 24, 1776, in the sign of Aquarius in Paxton [Township] in Lancaster County [now Dauphin County] in Pennsylvania in America. May God grant His blessing.

Fig. 6d Christlicher Tauff Wunsch for Stovel Ehmrich, Pennsylvania, 1958.0120.015A (Courtesy of Winterthur Museum, Wilmington, De)

Translation [13]
Christian Baptismal Wish: O dear child in Christ, you have been bought through Christ’s death, Who purchased you from Hell with His blood. After your baptism I wanted to send this to you as a remembrance and ever-present reminder. Grow up to honor God, to give joy to your parents, for the benefit of your neighbor, and for your salvation. Stovel Ehmrich was born January 23, 1771, and baptized by Pastor Schultz. Godparents were Stovel Herrold and his wife Catharina in Bethel Township in Berks County in America in Pennsylvania. [Different hand not original to text as created ] The parents were Johannes Emrich and his wife Gertraut.

Superstitious beliefs also influenced what one might add to the Taufzettel as a gift, and different areas had their own peculiarities. This is especially true as to whether the baptismal letter was to be sealed or left open:

  • In some places, at the end of the consecration the godparents would put a certain sum of money into their Patenbrief, and place it into the godchild’s cradle.   The baptismal letter was left unsealed. This was true, especially if it was for a baby girl, in which case one would wind one strand of thread, and one strand of silk around it. The thread was to be used to sew the child’s first shirt. The silk, which was usually red in color, was to be used some time later to wrap around the baby’s hands. [The reason for the latter custom is unknown].
  • For a baby boy, one added nine kinds of seed to the baptismal letter so that when he grew up, the grains he planted would grow well.
  • Similarly for a baby girl, one added several grains of flax seeds and a threaded sewing needle so that one day her flax crops would flourish, and she would learn to sew well.
  • Including bread, cheese, wool, or flax meant the child would never want when it grew up.
  • In some regions it was believed that the Taufwunsch was to be left open so that the child’s mind would be open to understanding. Otherwise the child’s ability to learn would be impeded.
  • In the Canton of Bern, Switzerland there were to be three Godparents, each one presenting the baby with a separate Taufzedel. If, when the child grew up, it kept the letters on its person, neither witches nor ghosts could ever have power over it. [14]

In 1856 Pastor J. Baumgart described the then current ceremony in middle Silesia:

Before the godparents leave the church, they place a coin into a special fold in so-called Patentbriefe, which are decorated with printed vignettes and appropriate verses. Colorful ribbons are wound around the baptismal letter. The least the sponsors can give a baby girl is one Reichstaler three Pfennig, and the three copper pennies better not be missing. [15]

 It is a curious thing that in the early twentieth century it was sensed and lamented both in German-speaking areas of Europe as well as in America that an era was coming to an end, and the demise of once flourishing folk customs such as the Geburtsschein and Taufzettel were at hand. Prior to World War II feeble attempts were made to reawaken the desire to return to such traditions, but ultimately people were too far removed from the lifestyle that gave birth to these customs. Today Geburtsscheine and Taufwünsche similar in design and content can be found in both museums and libraries in Germany, Holland, Poland, Austria, parts of the former USSR and America leaving little doubt that both forms of identity, one for the temporal needs of this world, and the other for the spiritual were European phenomena that German-speaking immigrants brought with them as they settled southeastern Pennsylvania and other areas in the Americas in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Strong cultural ties to regional customs ensured that there would be no cookie cutter formula, neither in Europe nor in America, and that their usage would be adapted to the temporal and spiritual demands of the geographic areas where they would take root and flourish.

___________________

ENDNOTES
[1] Alpbrief was an agreement designating how residents of adjacent alpine areas were to distribute and care for the surrounding pastureland.

[2] Chur, Graubünden, Alpbrief des Hochgerichts Klosters Innern Schnitzes: Statutarrechte   von Graubünden im Brätigäu [14th century], VII, 3, 102ff.

[3] Transcription Fig. 1
Diese Beÿde Ehegaten | Als Johannes Landes Und | Seine eheliche
haus frau Elisabeth; eine | geborne Schottin Ist einen Sohn zur Welt
geboren | Namens; Samuel Landes | Ist geboren d[en] 17ten Jenner
im Jahr | Unsers Herren und Heilandes Jesu Christi | 1801 In america
Im Stat Pensÿlvanie[n] | Im bucks Cauntÿ Im Rockhill | Taunschp;
Ge=schrieben d[en] 13te[n] | Merz Im iahr 1816.

[4] Frederick W. Weiser. “Piety and Protocol in Folk Art: Pennsylvania German Fraktur Birth and Baptismal Certificates,” Winterthur Portfolio. 8: 1973, column 1, 22.

[5] Gottlieb Siegmund Covinus (Pseudonym: Amaranthes). Nutzbares, galantes und
curiöses Frauenzimmer-Lexicon. Leipzig: Johann Friedrich Gleditsch und Sohn, 1715.

[6] Ibid, 1447. Pathen=Zettul = heissen diejenigen in Kupffer | gestochenen oder radirten abge= | druckten Blätter | auf Knäblein oder Mägdlein eingerichtet, und | mit allerhand glückwünschenden | Reimlein gezieret, worein die Ge= |vattern das Geschenke oder Pa= | the= | Geld mit Unterschreibung | ihres Nahmens, einzuwickeln und | zu versiegeln pflegen.

[7] Transcription Fig. 4
[Center]
Tauf= Zedel
Werthes Kind, leb so auf Erden, | Daß Du mögest selig werden. |
Ich will Gott auch für dich bitten; | daß er dich nach dieser Zeit
Nehme auf in Salems Hütten, | In die frohe Ewigkeit. Amen. |
Des wünsche ich, dein allergetreuste Tauf= | Goten Elisabeth Käster |
zu Kästers Haus | Den 22 Tag Christmonat im Jahr 1811 |
bist du getauft worden bey der heiligen Tauf zu [Blank]
[Upper Left Corner]
Gott geb den Glauben diesem | Kind, Und wasch ihm ab all seine |
Sünd; und geb ihm seinen guten Geist –
[Upper Right Corner]
Zu thun was Gott der Vater | heißt. Nach seinem Willen hier |
zu leben; Nach dieser Zeit das ew’ge Leben.
[Lower Left Corner]
Den Pfenning nimm und hab von | mir, Einen bessern woll’ Gott
ge= | ben dir. Thu Vater und Mutter gehorsam seyn—
[Lower Right Corner]
Thu gern bey frommen Leuten | seyn. Der schlimmen Leuten nimm |
dich nicht an, So kannst mit Gott | in Himmel gan.

[8] Salems Hütte or Salems Dwelling refers to the new Jerusalem in Revelations 21, and God’s tent in Salem in Psalm 76: 2.

[9] Transcription Fig. 5
[Original hand] Michael Bossert | ist von christlichen Lu= | therischen Eltern auf dieße Wett [sic] 
ge = | bohren den [different hand] 26 Febrar ann[o]1766|[Original hand] Dießen Tauffschein hat ihme sein | Peter Johann Michael Ritter zu | einem Andencken machen lassen | seine God ist geweßen, Marga | retha Beckin.

[10] Transcription Fig. 6a
Christlicher Tauff wunsch | du bist O: liebes kind in Christ[i] | Tod gekaufft, der dich mitt seinem Blutt, hatt von der Hell erkaufft | deß zur erinnerung, und stettem | angedenck, hab ich nach deiner Tauff, dir dieses wollen sen | den, wachs auff zu gottes | ehr, und deiner eltern Freud | zu deinem nechsten nutz und | deiner seeligkeit. Samuehl Staud \ gebohren den 28ten February 1785 | getaufft von Pfahrer Henrich deh= | kert Tauffzeige Samuehl mar | burger und sein ehe frau maria | in Braunsweig Daunsip in Bergs \ Caunty in amerika

[11] Transcription Fig. 6b
Johannes Siberi Tauff Zeige |Susanna Siberi Tauff Zeige
Christlicher Wunsch kommt auß | dem herzen grund, in Sieben | Stund, winsch ich darbei, Glück | Heill, Seege und gedeien, in die = | sem leben allhier, Zu wandeln | und gehen ein, in die ewige | freud, die kein menschen Zung[e] | ausprechen kan, da kein auge | gesehen, und kein Ohr nie ge= | hoeret hat, wachs auff zu gottes | ehr; zum menschlichem nutz und | deiner Seeligkeit. Johan | Heinrich gebohren 1771. d| 1ten mertz warwick | Daunsip

[12] Transcription Fig. 6c
Tauf zeigin maria Hemperlinge Tauff Zeige Ludwig Hemperling
Christlicher Tauff Wunsch | du bist o liebes Kind in Christi | Tod getaufft der dich mit seinem blutt | hat von der Hell erkaufft, daß zur er = | rinnerung und stettem angedenck hab ich nach deiner Tauff, dir dießes wollen |senden, wachs auff zu gottes ehr | und deiner eltern Freud \ zu deinem nech = | sten nutz und deiner seeligkeit. Maria Gertraud gebohren | den 24ten September 1776 | im Zeichen Waßerman in | Becksten Caunty, Lenkester Caunty in Penselvani in | amerika Gott gebe seinen | seegen

[13] Transcription Fig. 6d
Christlicher Tauff wunsch, | du bist O: liebe kind, in Christi | Tod getaufft, der dich mit seinen |blutt, hat von der hell erkaufft | deß zur errinnerung, und stet = | tem angedenk, hab ich nach | deiner Tauff, dir dieses wol= | len sencken, wachs auff zu gottes | ehr, und deiner Eltern Freud zu | deinem nechsten nutz, und deiner | seeligkeit stovel ehmrich gebohren | den 23ten January 1771 getaufft | vom Phahrer Schultz Tauffzeige | stovel Herrold und sein ehe frau | Catarina in Bettel daunsip | Bergs Caunty in amerika in | Pensylvani [Different hand not original to text as created →] Die Eltern waren Johannes | Emrich und frau gertraut.

[14] Adolf Jacoby. “Taufbriefe,” in Monatsschrift für Gottesdienst und kirchliche Kunst. 13. Jahrgang, Heft I, Januar 1908. Göttingen Germany: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, herausgegeben [für] Dr. Friedrich Spitta and Dr. Julius Smend, 1908, 202-211.

15 Ibid, 204. Ehe die Paten die Kirche verlassen, werden dem Kinde noch die Patengeschenke eingebunden d. h. ins Bettchen gelegt und zwar Geld in besonders dazu gefertigten Couverts (sogenannte Patenbriefe mit Vignetten und bezüglichen Versen geziert) gewickelt und mit buntseidenen Bändern umschlungen. Die niedrigste Taxe für das Eingebind einer Magd beträgt 1 Rtlr. 3 Pf., der Kupferdreier darf nicht fehlen.

I’d like to thank Corinne & Russell Earnest of the Earnest Archives and Library; Bill Daley and Bod Wood of Goschenhoppen Historians, Inc.; Edwin Hild and Patrick Bell of Olde Hope Antiques; Jeanine Pollock and Joe Shemtov of the Free Library of Philadelphia; Scott Schweigert, and Ashley Hamilton Houston of the Reading Public Museum; Jean Solensky, Librarian for the Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and Printed Ephemera; Susan Ishler Newton, Photographic Services Coordinator; Julia R. Hofer, Registration Database Specialist; and Lea Lane, Elizabeth and Robert Owens Curatorial Fellow, all of Winterthur.

Geburtsbriefe and Taufwünsche: European Phenomena Blog Post including transcriptions; translations; and photo image for Christlicher Tauff Wunsch for Samuel Staud © 2016 Del-Louise Moyer.

 

 

 

 

 

Schwenkfelder Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century Textile Samplers and Writing Samples

8 Replies

Sampler motifs harken back to the Renaissance when all levels of society satisfied their love of ornamentation with decorative textiles. Professional embroiderers of clothing, bed hangings, and furniture coverings advertised their work and colors to prospective clients on linen cloths. From this came the custom-made samplers for individual use. These were the forerunners of the Pennsylvania Dutch textile samplers. Along with figurative examples, alphabets, one’s name, initials, and dates were added as personalized features. Most were worked in colored silk embroidery on a ground of plain weave bleached linen.  From about the 1520s to the end of the eighteenth century, pattern books played an important role in France, England, and Germany, recording pattern designs for use in embroidery, knitting, embroidery on knotted net, and lace making. Some of these designs were incorporated into the European-made samplers that the Pennsylvania Dutch brought with them when they immigrated, and were passed on from generation to generation within family groups, religious communities, and regional areas.

Tandy and Charles Hersh in their 1991 Samplers of the Pennsylvania Germans define a sampler as a “textile used to record and practice embroidery motifs, stitches and alphabets for future use.”[i]

Four periods of development are identified:

  1. Transition 1683-1776
  2. Refinement 1777-1809
  3. Continuity & Change 1810-1860
  4. Survival 1860-Present [ii]

During these four periods sampler makers positioned the motifs in four different ways:

  1. randomly without plan;
  2. in rows according to size;
  3. uniformly around a centrally aligned figure(s);
  4. and in mirror-images aligned along a horizontally or vertically positioned central line. [iii]

In southeastern Pennsylvania a teenage Pennsylvania Dutch girl traditionally learned how to make cross-stitch samplers at home using her mother’s, aunt’s, cousin’s, sister’s or other older family members’ sampler(s) as a template. Besides the cross-stitch, the Schwenkfelder [iv] sampler makers are known to have used other techniques as well: double back stitch, geometric satin stitch, and chain stitch. [v]

Maria Schultz (1785-1841) was a Schwenkfelder, and the sewn together two-piece sampler she made (ILL.1), one with smaller motifs in 1798-1799, and one with larger designs in 1801

was the very first purchase of the Goschenhoppen Folklife Museum, [vi] and the beginning of the present collection [at Green Lane, Pennsylvania]. Its prime importance, beyond its fineness as a piece of early Dutch folk art, is its importance as an evidence of the folk cultural process of acculturation, between traditional groups within the larger Pennsylvania Dutch folk culture.[vii]

A few of the motifs on Maria’s sampler can be traced back to a random sampler (ILL. 2) Maria’s great grandmother Anna Wagner (ACWW 1733) brought to America from Saxony when she immigrated to Worcester township, Montgomery county (then Philadelphia county) in 1737. Stitches she used include cross-stitch, back stitch, and geometric satin stitch.

In 1778 Christina Wagner, Maria’s aunt, and Anna’s granddaughter created a rowed sampler (ILL. 3) , copying six of the thirty-one motifs from her grandmother’s sampler. Maria and her two sisters Christina and Rosina, also residents of Worcester Township, used their aunt’s sampler as a guide. Maria was thirteen, and Christina sixteen when each made her first sampler in 1798-1799: Christina chose a row format (ILL. 4a)  like her aunt’s, whereas Maria placed her figures randomly on the canvas (ILL. 1, Top). However, both copied many of her motifs, including the small designs and letters in rows three to five and the bottom row with a cartouche enclosing their initials. Most notable of all is the corner decorative figure that can also be found on a Swiss or German sampler housed at the Textilmuseum in St. Gallen, Switzerland Inv. No. 20046, and scarcely changed in Christina Wagner’s nor subsequently in her nieces’ and other Schwenkfelder samplers (See illustrations in this post: Christina Wagner: ILL. 3; Maria Schultz: ILL. 1, upper sampler; Christina Schultz: ILL. 4a ).

Melchior and Salome (née Wagner) Schultz, Maria, Christina, and Rosina Schultz’s mother and father, took Regina Hübner into their home after her parents died. Her two younger cousins borrowed freely from the random sampler (ILL. 6) Regina had made in 1794 at age seventeen : three carnations; a crown with three diamonds; the seven flowers and vase; three tulips in a vase; five cross flowers; rooster, small corner flower, large corner flower, a chair, a table with two bowls, along with a creative addition of a cruet, and dog standing on the lower table shelf. Stitches they used include cross stitch, double back stitch and chain stitch (See illustrations in this post: Regina Hübner: ILL. 6; Maria Schultz: ILL. 1, lower sampler; Christina Schultz: ILL. 4b; Rosina Schultz: ILL. 7).

In 1809 Rosina, the youngest girl of the Schultz family, made a random sampler (ILL. 7) of over one-hundred motifs, many of which replicated her sisters’ designs, and which carried the sampler tradition into the next generation, serving as a template for her three daughters, Salome, Maria and Rosina Kriebel. Sara Schultz, daughter of Rev. Christopher and Susanna

Yeakle Schultz, a peer and cousin to the Kriebel girls, did not make her home in Worcester township, Montgomery county like most of her Schultz relatives, but rather lived in Berks county. Here she created a random sampler (ILL. 8) on paper at age seventeen in which she combined six of her mother’s sampler motifs with ones from her Aunt Christina Wagner. She also added designs from her other Schultz kin of Worcester Township, along with those in the northeast Berks Franconia Mennonite Area. [viii]   Such borrowed designs, also known as signature motifs, inspired other Schwenkfelder sampler makers, who repeatedly and faithfully borrowed the very same images, sometimes creating variants thereof, in cross-, back-, and chain stitches from ca. 1809 to 1875.

The Schwenkfelder tendency to borrow, replicate, and create alphabets and variant designs in their textile samplers is repeated in their illuminated manuscripts on paper as well, the ABCs and visual motifs being common to both mediums. Printed writing samples such as J. J. Brunner’s 1767 Vorschrift zu nützlicher Nachahmung…[ix] or A Useful Writing Sample for Copying… were available to the general public, and demonstrated several variants of the same Alphabet. Schoolmasters used such works as references when creating writing samples for their students. These same alphabet variants appear in textile samplers, and change according to regional cultural influences and time period. The Schwenkfelder samplers exclusively used the alphabet that appears on the sampler (ILL. 2) that Anna Wagner brought with her to Pennsylvania in 1737 right up to1875 when Regina Schultz used it in her first sampler. [x]

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

A school teacher before becoming a minister, David Kriebel (1787-1849), one of the best known of the Schwenkfelder frakturists, made a writing sampler or Vorschrift „Jerusalem Du Gottes Stadt or Jerusalem You City of God [xi] for Abraham Anders on February 24, 1805. Like Brunner, Kriebel intentionally demonstrated several ways to present the same letter(s) in Fraktur script for his pupil to imitate. Abraham would build upon this, and eventually use his quill, like the Schwenkfelder young ladies used their needles, to create a new design variant.

Susanna Hübner (1750-1818), another renowned Schwenkfelder frakturist, lived with her brother Abraham (also a frakturist) and his family on the old homestead after their father’s death, and made illuminated manuscripts for all of the children. She found David Kriebel’s illuminated initial “J” of “Jerusalem” from the Anders Vorschrift so appealing that she devised a near replica of it as the initial letter “J” for her nephew Jacob’s Christian name in an illuminated manuscript Jacob Aber Zog Seinen Weg or Jacob Went His Own Way (Genesis 32: 1-2) that she created for him on April 2, 1808.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

We find the same tendency in Schwenkfelder frakturist families as we do among the Schwenkfelder textile sampler maker families. Close proximity encouraged relatives to borrow each others’ designs and ideas, but in a creative manner. Susanna Hübner made her niece Maria an illuminated manuscript to the text Maria Hat Das Gute Theil Erwählet. Das soll nicht von ihr genommen werden… or Maria Has Made the Right Choice. That Should Not Be Taken From Her… (St. Luke 10:42) on December 4, 1808.

Maria faithfully copied a portion of her Aunt Susanna’s gift Maria Hat Das Gute Theil Erwählet. Das soll nicht..,.using the same color scheme for the text, and the same vase of tulips. However, in the process she respositioned both, and added a bird perched on a very original elongated flowering tree, thus creating an entirely new variant based on her Aunt’s original.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

On December 16, 1804 David Kriebel made special gift for Susanna Kriebel surrounding the text Gott hat in meinen Tagen mich väterlich getragen or During my Life God Has Supported Me in a Fatherly Way [xii] with floral designs reminiscent, in the opinion of some, of central and eastern Europe. Dennis K. Moyer in Fraktur Writings and Folk Art Drawings of the Schwenkfelder Library Collection found that “the color and motifs that he chose seem to imitate a quality and style similar to the art and textiles of the Near East. Perhaps the ideas for the design and color were drawn from printed or woven textiles.” [xiii]

The similarities between the vertically-oriented drawing (bookplate?) Susanna Hübner made for her niece Susanna and the rectangularly conceived religious text framed in a dense floral border that David Kriebel created for Susanna Kriebel are obvious. Hübner borrows profusely from Kriebel, but lightens up the density of his flower-patterned periphery by adding mustard yellow to the darker blue and red colors, as well as by interspersing feather-like leaves among the floral foliage. Her multi-rayed star is more vibrant and takes on a three-dimensional energy because of the circular background rays. A brilliant addition is the potted floral bouquet that Aunt Susanna places in the center of the picture above her niece’s name. It is so geometrically conceived that it could easily be included in a textile sampler.

 In 1818, Maria Hübner rethought the drawing her Aunt Susanna had made for her sister, deleting the name, but keeping the motifs almost exactly intact. She chose a more subdued
pastel palette of colors , and added two flowering vine plants, one above the other on the right-side margin of the leaf. The drawing is a tribute to her Schwenkfelder heritage, a reconceived amalgam of friends’ and family’s designs in a color scheme of her generation.

Whether the medium was textile or paper, the Schwenkfelder artists, with needle and quill, were imitating and transforming designs and alphabets from what they had available in their time and place. By recycling these visual motifs and texts, they extended the cultural life of their community for generations to come. In the eighteenth century one expected to find the Pennsylvania Dutch girl’s sampler in her sewing basket, ever ready with the designs she could choose for her sewing and embroidery needs. As time progressed, the purpose of the sampler changed, and became more ornamental than practical. What used to be tucked away, was now framed and hung on the wall. The same is true of illuminated manuscripts that originally were kept away from view taped to the lid of one’s dower chest, and/or safely put away in a drawer or folio Bible. Labeling them folk art, and promoting their commercial potential as decorative wall accents has replaced their cultural value as the Pennsylvania Dutchman’s private expression of his love of God articulated through art.

ENDNOTES

[i] Tandy and Charles Hersh,. Samplers of the Pennsylvania Germans. Birdsboro, PA: Pennsylvania German Society, vol. XXV, 1991, 14.

[ii] Ibid, 47.

[iii] Ibid, 14.

[iv] The Schwenkfelders, followers of Kaspar Schwenkfeld von Ossig (1490-1561), were severely persecuted for their non-orthodox beliefs. Fleeing in 1726 from oppression in Silesia , they were first welcomed by Count Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf on his estate at Berthelsdorf and Herrnhut in Saxony. This proved to be a temporary home.   From 1731 to 1737 small bands emigrated to Pennsylvania where they settled in the Goschenhoppen, and Skippack areas among the Mennonites, Lutherans, and Reformed who had also settled in this part of Montgomery county (then Philadelphia county) around the same time. All of these settlers transferred a bit of their cultural heritage to southeastern Pennsylvania, some of which can be said to be common to all, and some of which can be recognized as unique to one group or the other.

[v] Dorothy D. McCoach. n. d. Conservation Report for Maria Schultz Sampler 1798, 1799, 1801 (Project #: 01.103.A), n.p., pp. 1,2.

[vi] The Goschenhoppen Historians, Inc., presently celebrating the 50th anniversary of their incorporation, continue to identify, preserve, and disseminate the Pennsylvania German folk culture and history of the Goschenhoppen region.

[vii] Isaac Clarence Kulp, Jr., ed., “The Cover Picture,” The Goschenhoppen Region vol. 1, no. 1 ( Peterkett/St. Peter in Chains Day August 1, 1968): 2.

[viii] Hersh, 145.

[ix] Johann Jacob Brunner. Vorschrift zu nützlicher Nachahmung und einer fleissigen Übung zu Gutem vorgestellt und geschrieben durch Joh. Jacob Brunner älter von Basel. Gegraben in Bern von Carl Gottlieb Guttenberger aus Nürnberg. Bern, Switzerland: n.p., ca. 1766.

[x] Hersh, 67.

[xi] Jerusalem Du Gottes Stadt gedenke jener Plagen….in Das kleine Davidische Psalterspiel. Germantown: Christoph Sauer, 1744, p. 216, Hymn 221, verse 1.

[xii] Gott hat in meinen Tagen mich väterlich getragen….is part of the opening line of a seven-verse religious poem by Jakob Friedrich Feddersen (1736-1788).

[xiii] Dennis K. Moyer. Fraktur Writings and Folk Art Drawings of the Schwenkfelder Library Collection. King of Prussia, PA: Pennsylvania German Society, vol. XXXI, 1997, 115.

My thanks to Bob Wood, and Linda Szapacs of the Goschenhoppen Historians; Dorothy McCoach, Independent Conservator; Dave Luz, Hunt Schenkel and Candace Perry of the Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center.

Schwenkfelder Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century Textile Samplers and Writing Samples Blog Post including transcriptions; translations; and photo images excepting illustrations in Tandy and Charles Hersh’s Samplers of the Pennsylvania Germans © 2016 Del-Louise Moyer

Friendship, Fraktur, and Signature Quilts

12 Replies

Every experience deeply felt in life needs to be passed along. Whether it be through word or music, chiseled in stone, painted with a brush, or sewn with a needle, it is a way of reaching for immortality.  ~  Thomas Jefferson

One enters a sphere of timelessness when looking at a Pennsylvania Dutch quilt for there are many memories sewn into each one. Yet it was the hand-woven coverlets and not the quilts that were their first top bed coverings. By the mid-eighteen hundreds, however, both industrialization and acculturation brought about a transition from coverlets to quilts fashioned from inexpensive printed cotton left-over from making dresses, and other articles of clothing. Once quilting caught on, the Pennsylvania Germans never looked back, and used their ingenuity and resourcefulness to create stunning, yet practical quilts to stay warm; to demonstrate their sewing and designing skills; and to memorialize family and friends on fabric. This post will focus on the latter quilts known as friendship or signature quilts.

The popularity of friendship quilts coincides with the American Civil War, and as Lynn Zacek Bassett observes In War Time: A Study of Civil War Era Quilts 1850-1865:

Concerns over separation encouraged another genre of quilts in the period
prior to the war: friendship quilts, in which family members, friends, neighbors, and associates signed pieced calico blocks, often in order to present the finished quilt as a gift to someone who was leaving the community, whether to go west, to go to another parish, or to follow her husband to a new home…At home, women expressed their beliefs, fears, strengths, and struggles in their quilts before, during, and after the war (p.6).

In 1983, and again from 1990-1992, some of the quilts the Goschenhoppen Historians documented in their quilt surveys of the Goschenhoppen area—roughly the upper Perkiomen watershed—were friendship quilts with names inscribed in Fraktur that had been made in the mid- to late nineteenth century by young Pennsylvania Dutch women living in eastern Berks, southern Lehigh, southern Bucks and northern Montgomery County.

One example from the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center, and three from the Goschenhoppen Historians’ Textile collection are representative of these quilts:

The Hannah Derolf Fraktur quilt (1868) from the Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center Textile collection: SLHC Quilt 2012.23.01 features a pattern known as Rolling Stone. Dimenstons are 99″ L x 75″ W; colors: red, yellow, orange, blue, brown, black; place of origin: Bucks County; number of blocks: 30. One finds the following Fraktur script inscribed on the central ownership block:

Hannah Derolf | ihr Teppich | 1868 | W. Grosz
[Hannah Derolf | her quilt         | 1868 | W. Grosz]

 Hannah Derolf (1847-1923) was born December 6, 1847 in Pike Township, Berks County Pennsylvania to Jacob and Maria Derolf. Per the 1850 U.S. Federal Census, her relatives George Derolf  and his wife Elizabeth, née Fronheiser lived in the neighborhood with their five children, and the Jacob Fronheisers and Daniel Fronheisers also lived nearby. Jacob was a laborer. At age twelve she was living with the Joel Miller Family in Spinnersville, Milford Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania as a domestic servant.

In 1868 at age 21 Hannah married Daniel L. Miller, and had two children by him: Amanda L Miller in 1870, and Hannah Miller in 1882. During her married years she lived in Milford Township, Bucks County, PA, and died there on May 28, 1923 at the age of seventy-five. The informant on the death certificate was her son-in-law Franklin W. Gerhart of East Greenville, PA, who listed her father as Jno Dierolf, and mother as Sarah Fronheiser. This conflicts with information on the 1850 U. S. Census for Hannah Derolf’s parents. She is buried at St. Paul’s Lutheran Cemetery in Red Hill, PA.

Hannah made her friendship quilt in 1868, the year she was married, and we can identify some of the names we find on her quilt: Jacob Derolf (father); Elizabeth Derolf–possibly Aunt Elizabeth, born ca. 1812 or Cousin Elizabeth, born 1849; Daniel Miller (husband); Joel Miller (employer); Rebecca Miller (Joel Miller’s wife); Sarah Miller (Joel Miller’s daughter) James Miller (Joel Miller’s father).

William Gross (Grosz, Groß), a very active scrivener who infilled—usually with a crimson-colored ink—an enormous number of Taufscheins in Berks, Bucks, Lebanon, Lehigh, Montgomery, and Northampton Counties from 1860-1886, inscribed the names on the quilt in Fraktur script. If we take a look below at a birth and baptismal certificate printed by Saeger and Leisenring in 1864, recording Harvey Jacob Wieand’s birth in 1860  (ILLs. 2a, 2b), we can see an excellent example of Gross’ talent as a Fraktur calligrapher, as well as that he was signing his name in German script, not Fraktur. However his signature “W. Grosz“ for John Franklin Kern’s Taufschein ca. 1867 (ILL. 3) is in Fraktur script, just as it is for Hannah’s Fraktur quilt. Groß never added baskets of flowers to the birth and baptismal certificates he infilled, but he did so for all the quilts he inscribed, an example of which is found on Hannah’s owner block. Light orange floral cotton print is used for the signature blocks, but it should be noted that usually they were made of white muslin, and the ink used for the inscriptions was black. There is no listing of the inscribed signatures available online.  However, the  Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center will be happy to supply a complete list upon request.

The Angelina Ritter Fraktur quilt (1852) from the Goschenhoppen Historians Textile collection : GH Quilt 2003.05.01 also features the Rolling Stone pattern. Dimensions are 94″ L x 98″ W; colors: red, yellow, blue, white; place of origin: Lehigh County; number of blocks: 25.  The Goschenhoppen Historians purchased the quilt from Victoria Hoffman in 2003.  Inscribed on the central ownership block in Fraktur script we find:

 Angelina | Ritter | ihr Teppich. | 1852
[Angelina |   Ritter | her quilt         | 1852]

Angelina (Engaline, Enschulina, Anjuline, Annjulina) Ritter (1834-1900) was born March 14, 1834 in Salisbury Township, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania to Michael Ritter and Elowissa (Allevesa, Eloisa, Ellen Louisa) née Miller. In 1852, when she made her quilt, Angelina was seventeen and single. Her father was a well-to-do farmer whose property (real and personal) was valued at $7000. She too married a farmer Addison S. Mohry (1836-1897) on December 12, 1856 in Salisbury Township, Lehigh County, PA. During her married years the family lived in Emmaus, PA. There were three children: John born 1859; Laura born 1865; and Jennie born 1872. Angelina Mory died July 19, 1900.

A full list will soon be available online of the names Angelina commemorated on her bedcover. However, a few of the names appearing on the quilt are: Dianna Diehl; Susanna Kemmerer (possibly a second cousin); Ellewisa Ritter (mother); Benjamin Franklin Ritter (brother). The signatures are in Fraktur script inscribed by an anonymous scrivener, who used two leafy boughs to encircle Angelina’s name, identification of ownership, and date on her owner block. It has been suggested by Russell and Corinne Earnest that it could be the “Footed Letter Scrivener,” a scrivener who used either scarlet or reddish brown ink when he infilled Taufscheins. He is known to have been active in Berks, Bucks, Carbon, Lehigh, Montgomery, Northampton, and Schuylkill Counties from ca. 1843-1860. The sobriquet “Footed Letter Scrivener” is used to describe this artist because of the way the serifs at the bottom of his capital letters ‘M,’ ‘N,’ and ‘K’ turn outwards like a foot. Nancy Roan finds Jonathan Kemmerer to be an excellent candidate as the scrivener of the names on this quilt, and others, referencing Jonathan’s block on his sister Susanna Kemmerer’s Fraktur friendship quilt of 1852, as well as several Taufschein examples at the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center. Unlike William Groß, who includes his signature in the quilt owner’s block, Jonathan Kemmerer does not. He uses his signature block to advertise that he is a daguerrotypist. Hopefully, someday we will find a signed piece by this scrivener. The encircling leafy boughs decorative element has only been found on the Fraktur quilts, but not on any Taufscheins known to be inscribed by either the “Footed Letter Scrivener,” or those attributed to Jonathan Kemmerer.

The Anna Maria Desch Fraktur quilt (1853) from the Goschenhoppen Historians Textile collection : GH Quilt 1994.02.01 features the Flying Crow pattern, deviating from the usual Rolling Stone pattern that was used for almost all other known Fraktur quilts. Dimensions are 84″ L x 100″W; colors: red, yellow, pink, blue, green, white; place of origin: Lehigh County; number of blocks: 30.  The Goschenhoppen Historians purchased the quilt ca. 1994 from Judy Hurdle, an antiques dealer, who had bought it from Horst Auction in Ephrata, PA.   Inscribed on the central ownership block in Fraktur script is:

Anna Maria | Desch | ihr Teppich. | 1853
Anna Maria   | Desch | her quilt         | 1853

Anna Maria Desch (1834-19020) was born April 1, 1834 in Lower Macungie Township, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania to Daniel Desch and his wife Elizabeth, née Ruth, and was baptized at Zion Lehigh Lutheran Church on May 11, 1834. Her maternal grandparents Philip and Maria Ruth were her Godparents. In 1850 Anna Maria’s father’s property (personal and real) was valued at $3000. This was a large family with a total of eight children. Her father Daniel died in 1853, the year she made her quilt. Anna Maria never married, as was the case for two of her younger brothers William and Daniel. All three lived at home with their mother Elizabeth until her death in 1886, and per the United States Federal Census were still living together on a farm in 1900. In this same census record all are listed as being able to read and write, but unable to speak English. She died October 18, 1902 and is buried in Solomon’s U. C. C. Church Cemetery in Macungie, PA.

The Goschenhoppen Historians Online Finding Aid includes all the names appearing on the quilt. Some of those are: William Desch (brother); Anna Maria Ruth (grandmother?); Anna Carolina Desch (sister); Peter Desch (brother); Stephanus Reimeyer; Hannah Baer; Sarah Anna Desch (sister) ; Eliza Ruth (mother?); Elweina Butz. Their names are inscribed in Fraktur script by the same anonymous frakturist who inscribed Angelina Ritter’s.

The Emma Schaffer Fraktur quilt (1871) from the Goschenhoppen Historians Textile collection : GH Quilt 2004.06.01 uses the representative Rolling Stone pattern. The dimensions are : 87″ L x 82″ W; colors: red, yellow, green, blue, white; place of origin: Bucks County; No. of Blocks: 36. The Goschenhoppen Historians purchased the quilt from Dennis Moyer  in 2004.  Inscribed on the central ownership block in Fraktur script we find:

Emma Schaffer | 1871 | William Gross

A full list will soon be available online for all of the men and women whose names are written on Emma’s quilt, and the picture, of course, may change as we gather  more definitive data.  Nonetheless,  some of the names such as Tilghman Kline, Rebecca Kline, Emma Schaffer (on 2 signature blocks and the owner block), Erwin Dietz, Mary Erney, and Elizabeth Schaffer, can presently be partially accounted for.  Mary Erney was born June 6,1852 to Jonas Erney and Hannah, née Marsteller in Coopersburg, Lower Milford Township, Lehigh County, PA. In the 1870 U. S. Federal Census Jonas listed his estate value (real and personal) as $4000, that of a prosperous farmer. Ca. 1873 Mary married Erwin S. Dietz, also a farmer from Coopersburg, Lower Milford Township, Lehigh County, PA. According to the United States Federal Census Tilghman P. Kline, a farmer, and his wife Rebecca Kline were living in Emmaus, Salisbury Township, Lehigh County, PA in 1870 with their family and Emma Schaffer, an eighteen-year-old domestic servant. This Emma [C.] Schaffer  was born November 1852 in the Bridgeton area of Bucks County, PA to William S. Schaffer, and Elizabeth, née Lambert . There were five children in her family, and her father was a farm laborer with a value of $50 for his personal estate. She married William Pursell, a canal boatman, in 1871, the same year she made her quilt. Emma had seven children between 1873 and 1893, and spent her entire adult life in Bridgeton, Bucks County, PA. She died March 27, 1931 in Milford, Hunterdon County, NJ in the home of her daughter Mrs. Samuel Shaffer, at the age of 78 and is buried at the Upper Tinicum Cemetery in Upper Black Eddy, Bucks County, PA. Her obituary was published in the Hunterdon County Democrat on April 2, 1931.

William Gross is the professional scrivener of this quilt as well, and inscribes all the names in Fraktur script.   As in Hanna Derolf’s owner block, he identifies himself with a hand drawn basket of languid flowers, but in this case changes his signature on the base to his full name.   His Fraktur script style in Emma’s is far less ornamental than in Hannah’s.

Who paid for these Fraktur signatures, the maker, owner or the persons whose names appear on the quilt? During their 1983, 1990-1992 quilt surveys Nancy Roan, Ellen Gehret, and Alan G. Keyser gathered information on quilt traditions from knowledgeable Pennsylvania Dutch informants such as Wilson H. Green of Green Lane, PA who shared that these signature quilts of the mid-nineteenth century were known as Beddelmann Teppiche or Begger Quilts because “the maker ‘begged’ family members and close friends for a sum before putting their names on the quilt” (Lest I Shall Be Forgotten, p. 17). Lucinda Cawley in her article “Ihr Teppich: Quilts and Fraktur” in the American Quilt Study Group’s Coverings (p. 14) states that “there is no contemporary evidence that money was solicited in connection with putting names on the quilts. They are more accurately described as fraktur inscribed quilts.”

Webster’s Dictionary (webster.com/dictionary/tradition) defines tradition as “the handing down of information, beliefs, and customs by word of mouth or by example from one generation to another without written instruction.” So, expert quilters such as Sadie Krauss Kriebel, whose mother Annie Hoffman Krauss was born in 1879, and grandmother Elizabeth Kriebel Krauss in 1859, could easily reach back to the time period in question, i.e. mid-nineteenth century, through living references capable of verbally relating Pennsylvania Dutch folk customs as experienced during their lifetimes.  It is interesting to note that written evidence often comes from outside the culture, not within, as in travel diaries kept by people who find a tradition peculiar to their own worth noting.  That no contemporary written evidence has yet been found does not mean that it doesn’t exist. Sadie, a living continuance of quilt traditions, could immediately identify a Beddelmann quilt shown to her by Nancy Roan during the quilt surveys: “This quilt [261-83] was made in 1862, probably by Mrs. Christina Kriebel who died in 1906…Everybody whose name is on [it] gave a dime” (Lest I Shall Be Forgotten, p. 17).

Friendship quilts were and are made by the Pennsylvania Dutch to also celebrate special occasions for important anniversaries, birthdays, or other special days, and the well-wishers’ names were and are not only hand written in Fraktur script, but also embroidered, and with the progression of time have been inscribed in Roman script, as well as printed, and/or stamped.

Also, churches and other non-profit organizations used and continue to use friendship quilts to raise money: Chances are often sold to win a signature on one of the blocks. Once all signature blocks are taken, a seamstress embroiders or a scrivener hand inscribes each name onto the block. The entire quilt can then be raffled off or sold at auction (Earl F. Robaker “Stitching for Pretty,” Pennsylvania Folklife, p. 9).

St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, better known as the Blue Church, celebrated its 250th Anniversary in 1989. To commemorate this special occasion one of the parishioners designed a blue and white quilt that was quilted by the Blue Church quilters.  Each quilter’s name was embroidered onto the quilt.

The Nancy Hasson Roan friendship quilt (1995), now part of the Mennonite Heritage Center (MHEP) Textile collection: 1995.29.01 was made to benefit MHEP. It uses the representative Rolling Stone pattern. The dimensions are 97.5″L x 83″W; colors red, yellow, blue, black, white; place of origin: Montgomery County; Number of Blocks: 30. Each block is made up of four to six names handwritten in black ink in Roman script.

Nancy Roan designed and pieced the quilt. It was then quilted by members of the Variable Star Quilting group, as well as MHEP volunteers. Supporters of the Mennonite Heritage Center paid to have their names inscribed on the quilt. Auctioned at the yearly Apple Butter Frolic, it was then donated back to the MHEP museum.

Karen Dever and Didi Salvatierra of Moorestown, NJ are members of the American Quilt Study Group (AQSG, Lincoln, Nebraska) and the Eastern Shore Quilt Study Group headed by Lucinda Cawley. In 2014 AQSG, to commemorate the Civil War Sesquicentennial, issued a “Civil War Quilts” challenge.

The Challenge required participants to identify an inspiration quilt dating from 1850 to 1865. The quilt could be reproduced in whole or in part, or it could be used as the basis for a new meaningful design (In War Time: A Study of Civil War Era Quilts 1850-1865, pp. 7, 77).

While attending the Penn Dry Goods Market at the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center in Pennsburg, PA—a yearly springtime combination of lectures, and exhibits focused on fancy stitchery and the history of textiles, as well as on-site antique dealers specializing in antique textiles, and related objects—Karen Dever found the perfect inspiration. Attending a quilt lecture by Nancy Ronk on Fraktur quilts, Karen heard about the Aveline S. A. Stern Fraktur quilt that had inspired Lucinda Cawley to research and write her 2004 “Ihr Teppich: Quilts and Fraktur” article in the AQSG periodical Uncoverings, and discovered that the Stern quilt is now part of the International Quilt Study Center in Lincoln, Nebraska. Noting that Aveline’s husband Joseph had served in the Union army, Karen and Didi were thrilled to be able to create a sixteen-signature-block quilt based on the Avelina S. A. Stern Fraktur quilt to honor all the presidents of the AQSG who have served since its inception in 1980, and especially to pay tribute to Mrs. Cawley.

All of the above friendship quilts were made more for sentimental than practical reasons. It is the women’s and men’s names on these very special show pieces that are important as most all of the design elements of the quilts are simple and similar to each other. Also, the quilting is utilitarian rather than ornamental; the piecing of the blocks uncomplicated. Using Fraktur script to pen the names was representative of and unique to the Pennsylvania Dutch culture and time period. As time progressed, the names continued to be handwritten, but the calligraphy changed to stay in step with acculturation, and some were also printed or stamped. The owner of the quilt, who more than likely also made it, was, as evidenced by the above examples, remembering family and friends. Whether 1852, 1853, 1868, 1871, or 1989, 1995, 2015, the names embody the stories of a time period and community of people, and frequently are or may become the only surviving evidence that these women and men ever lived.

Sources:

Allentown Art Museum. 1974. Pennsylvania Folk Art: [exhibition], October 20 through December 1, 1974, Allentown Art Museum. Allentown, Pa: The Museum.

Bassett, Lynne. In War Time: A Study of Civil War Era Quilts 1850 – 1865. Lincoln, Nebraska: American Quilt Study Group, 2015.

Cawley, Lucinda R. “Ihr Teppich: Quilts and Fraktur.” Uncoverings 2004 vol.25,
11- 40, Appendix II, Appendix III.

Certificate of Death. Pennsylvania (State). Death certificates, 1906–1963. Series 11.90 (1,905 cartons), Records of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Record Group 11. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Certificate Nr. 62068 for Hannah [Dierolf] Miller; Certificate Nr. 110628 for Mary [Erney] Dietz.

Earnest, Russell D. and Corinne P. Papers for Birth Dayes: Guide to the Fraktur Artists and Scriveners, East Berlin, Pa.: Russell D. Earnest Associates, 1997. 2nd ed., vol. 1, pp. 287-290; 335-338.

Eaton, Linda. Quilts in a Material World: Selections from the Winterthur Collection, exh. cat. New York: Abrams in association with the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 2007, 68-69.

 Ewing, Gretchen. Quilts. Allentown: Call Chronicle, 1983.

Hollenbach, Raymond E. for Anna Maria Desch in Zion Lehigh Evangelical Lutheran Church Records: Births and Baptisms, 1750-1896 Alburtis, Lower Macungie Township, Lehigh County, PA., Ms., p. 118, Entry Nr. 8.

Garvan, Beatrice B. and Charles F. Hummel. The Pennsylvania Germans: A Celebration of their Arts, 1683-1850, an exhibition October 17, 1982-January 9, 1983. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1982.

Holstein, Jonathan. Made To Remember. HF Johnson Museum, Cornell. Ithaca: H.F. Johnson Museum-Cornell, 1991, 36.

Nicoll, Jessica F. Quilted for Friends. Winterthur, DE: The Henry Francis dupont Winterthur Museum, 1986, 7.

Roan, Donald and Nancy. Lest I Shall Be Forgotten: Anecdotes and Traditions of Quilts Green Lane, PA: Goschenhoppen Historians, 1993.

Roan, Nancy and Ellen Gehret. ‘Just A Quilt’ or Juscht en Deppich. Green Lane, PA: Goschenhoppen Historians, n.d.

Robacker, Earl F. “Stitching for Pretty,” in Pennsylvania Folklife, Spring 1966, vol. 15, No. 3, 9.

Rogers, Susan. Crazy Like a Quilt. New York: New York Post, 1971, 46.

Shaw, Robert. American Quilts: The Democratic Art, 1780-2007. New York: Sterling Publishing, 2009, 44-45.

Stopp, Klaus. The Printed Birth and Baptismal Certificates of the German Americans, vol.1 of 6. Mainz, Germany and East Berlin, Pa: privately published, 1997-1999.

United States 1850 Federal Census for Hannah Derolf: Year: 1850; Census Place: Pike, Berks, Pennsylvania; Roll: M432_754; Page: 457A; Image: 561; for Angelina Ritter: Year: 1850; Census Place: Salsburg, Lehigh, Pennsylvania; Roll: M433_792; Page: 12A; Image:29; for Anna Maria Desch: Year: 1850; Census Place: Lower Macungie, Lehigh, Pennsylvania; Roll: M432_792; Page: 156A;

United States 1860 Federal Census for Joel Miller: Year: 1860; Census Place: Milford, Bucks, Pennsylvania; Roll: M653_1082; Page: 308; Image: 313; for Emma Schaffer: Year: 1860; Census Place: Bridgeton, Bucks, Pennsylvania; Roll: M653_1082; Page: 72; Image: 77.

United States 1870 Federal Census for Tilghman P. and Rebecca Kline, as well as Emma Schaeffer: Year: 1870; Census Place: Salisbury, Lehigh, Pennsylvania; Roll: M593_1363; Page: 477A; Image: 182.

United States 1900 Federal Census for Daniel L. Miller: Year: 1900; Census Place: Reoder, Bucks, Pennsylvania; Roll: 1385; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 0026; FHL microfilm: 1241385; for Anna Maria Desch: Year: 1900; Census Place: Lower Macungie, Lehigh, Pennsylvania; Roll: T623_31077_4115120; Page: 4B; Enumeration District: 0038; FHL microfilm: 1241429.

Merriam-Websters Online Dictionary http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tradition . accessed 3 January 2016.

My thanks to Lynne Zacek Bassett; Lucinda Cawley; Russell and Corinne Earnest; Linda Moyer; Sophia Bakis of the Allentown Art Museum; the Rev. James Hammond, and Kathy Exner of St. Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran “Blue Church” of Coopersburg, Pa.; Bob Wood, Nancy Roan, Linda Szapacs, and Alan Keyser of the Goschenhoppen Historians;  Sarah Heffner, Forrest Moyer and Joel Alderfer of the Mennonite Heritage Center; Dave Luz, Hunt Schenkel and Candace Perry of the Schwenkfelder Heritage Center; Linda Eaton, Jeanne Solensky, Lauri Perkins of Winterthur.

Friendship, Fraktur, and Signature Quilts Blog Post including transcriptions; translations; and photo images © 2016 Del-Louise Moyer

John Daniel Eisenbrown: Fraktur Artist and Grave Monument Engraver

7 Replies

Monroe Fabian in his 1974 Pennsylvania Folklife article “John Daniel Eisenbrown, Frakturist,” introduced a totally unknown artist-scrivener. Fabian enthusiastically hoped that more Fraktur examples would one day come to light, but the years have passed, and, if there is a cache of his illuminated manuscripts, they have remained well hidden among family members. Fortunately, one more can now be added. In May of this year an anonymous donor gifted a New Testament containing a bookplate and birth record to the Goschenhoppen Historians Fraktur collection. Eisenbrown made it in 1824 for his student Joseph Weber of Upper Saucon Township, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania.

Fig. 1a Weber New Testament Title Page Germantaun: Michael Billmeyer, 1822. Courtesy of (1) Goschenhoppen HIstorians

Fig. 1a Weber New Testament Title Page Germantaun: Michael Billmeyer, 1822. Courtesy of Goschenhoppen Historians

Fig. 1b Book Plate and Birth Record, Weber New Testament. By John D. Eisenbrown, 4/10/1824. Courtesy of Goschenhoppen Historians

Fig. 1b Book Plate and Birth Record, Weber New Testament. By John D. Eisenbrown, 4/10/1824. Courtesy of Goschenhoppen Historians

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is signed and dated in the lower corners of the bookplate: [LL corner] “Upper Saucon Township April 10, 1824,” [LR corner] “made by John D. Eisenbrown as a memento for his student.” The main body in the center reads: “This New Testament belongs to Joseph Weber who was born June 27, 1815.”

Joseph Weber has left no footprint, and although John D. Eisenbrown remains obscure as a Frakturist, represented by only four Fraktur pieces done during his early career as a school teacher, he is remembered for his calligraphic skills as a carver of tombstone memorials.

Even today the reputation built by John Daniel, and later his son Penrose Frederick lives on in the P. F. Eisenbrown Memorials Co. in Reading Pennsylvania. Although no longer owned by the Eisenbrown family, the present owner of this marble and granite business continues to retain the P. F. Eisenbrown brand name for the trustworthiness, honesty, and prestige the Eisenbrown family achieved in its principled business transactions. That is a legacy well worth remembering!

Johan Daniel Eisenbraun was born on December 2, 1795 in Adelberg near Stuttgart in the Duchy of Baden-Württemberg. There is no documentation to support Morton L. Montgomery’s statement in his Historical and Biographical Annals of Berks County Pennsylvania that Eisenbrown landed in Philadelphia from Germany at age sixteen. However, we know from a birthday Fraktur he made for his future wife Charlotta Wolf (1798-1832) of Egypt, PA—the only Pennsylvania Dutch birthday Fraktur example presently known—that he was in America by the spring of 1817 for Eisenbrown dated and signed his greetings “April 16, 1817, Johan Daniel Eisenbraun.”

Sometime after November 4, 1818, the date Johan Heinrich Wind purchased a family Bible in Philadelphia, Eisenbrown was engaged to create a double-leaf bookplate for the Bible.

Fig. 4a Leaf 1 of 2. Wind Bible bookplate by John Danial Eisenbraun sometime after 11/04/1818. Courtesy of (3) The Library Company of Philadelphia

Fig. 4a Leaf 1 of 2. Wind Bible bookplate by John Danial Eisenbraun sometime after 11/04/1818. Courtesy of  The Library Company of Philadelphia

Fig. 4b Leaf 2 of 2 Wind Bible bookplate by John Danial Eisenbraun sometime after 11/04/1818. Courtesy of (3) The Library Company of Philadelphia

Fig. 4b Leaf 2 of 2 Wind Bible bookplate by John Danial Eisenbraun sometime after 11/04/1818. Courtesy of  The Library Company of Philadelphia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first leaf reads: “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it.  [St. Luke 11:28]; purchased on November 4, 1818 in Philadelphia; made (written) by the former schoolmaster in Upper Saucon, John Daniel Eisenbrown.” The second leaf reads: “Bible for John Henry Wind.”  Johann Heinrich Wind (1779-1842) was active in the Friedens Lutheran Church, and is buried in the old churchyard cemetery at Friedensville, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. From this Fraktur we know that Eisenbrown was a teacher in Upper Saucon Township, Lehigh County, PA. by 1818. His association with Wind, as suggested by Monroe Fabian, could indicate that Eisenbrown was the schoolmaster for the congregation at Friedensville.

A family Bible register, kept by John Daniel Eisenbrown to note the births and baptisms of his children, records Charlotta’s and his life from 1821-1832.

The following nine children were born to John Daniel and Charlotta Barbara:

  1. Maria Franziska: born 10/15/1821; Upper Saucon Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: grandparents J. George and Anna Maria Wolf; baptized by Rev. Conrad Yeager
  2. + Constantin Edward: born 9/8/1822; Upper Saucon Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: parents; baptized by Rev. Conrad Yeager.
  3. Charlotte Mathilda: born 8/6/1824; North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: parents; baptized by Rev. [Frederick William] Mendsen.
  4. Anna Maria: born 11/12/1825; North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: grandparents J. George and Anna Maria Wolf; baptized by Rev. [Frederick William] Mendsen.
  5. Carolina Lowina: born 1/25/1827; North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: Daniel Rösler and his wife; died in the year 1828.
  6. Charlotta: born 3/24/1828; North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County; sponsors: parents; baptized by Rev. [Frederick William] Mendsen.
  7. Wilhelmina: born 6/11/1829; Kutztown, Berks County; sponsors: parents [and] Johann Knoske, Lutheran minister, and his wife; baptized by Rev. [H.] Knoske.
  8. Friderich Penrose: 4/3/1831; Kutztown, Berks County; sponsors: Friderich Wolf and Elisabeth Knoske, unmarried; baptized by Rev. H. Knoske.
  9. William Jonas: 10/12/1832; North Whitehall Township, Lehigh County; the mother died from this childbirth; sponsors: Jonas and Sara Troxel took the baby and adopted it.

Charlotta died from complications in childbirth on October 18, 1832, six days after giving birth to William Jonas, who was adopted and raised by his godparents Jonas and Sara Troxel.

John Daniel’s second wife was Mary Troxel with whom he produced an additional eight children, two of whom died in infancy. During this time period, he successfully transferred the tombstone-cutting business he had begun in Minersville, PA in 1844 to Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1855, and located it on the northwest corner of 9th and Hamilton Streets—the later site of the famous Hess’s Department Store!  Penrose took up the same business as his father establishing himself first in Minersville, and then Pottsville, and finally in 1874 in Reading. Father and son built up the mutual respect of their customers, were known for prompt service and reasonable prices, and, as already noted, were very successful businessmen. Per St. Pauls Lutheran Church Records in Allentown Pennsylvania John Daniel Eisenbraun died March 16, 1874, aged 73 years, 3 months, and 14 days.

When Monroe Fabian wrote his 1974 article, Paul Eisenbrown, John Daniel’s great grandson, enthusiastically collaborated with the author, and located the birthday Fraktur, a cabinet photo by Hafer Studio, Reading, Pennsylvania reproducing a now lost daguerreotype of John Daniel Eisenbrown ca. 1850, as well as the J. D. Eisenbrown Family Bible Register among his relatives. If anyone knows the present whereabouts of any of these items, I would be very grateful for an email reply to this blog post.

Illustration Links

(1)      Find a Grave Photos

(2)       Find a Grave

Sources

“Charlotta Eisenbrown, Where Buried,” in Find a Grave. Accessed 4 September 2015. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=62209197&ref=acom

“John Daniel Eisenbraun. Death Entry by Rev. Minnig in St. Pauls Lutheran Church Records, Allentown Pennsylvania,” in Historical Society of Pennsylvania’s Historic Pennsylvania Church and Town Record collections, Philadelphia, PA, Reel: 545, 373 of 558.

“John Daniel Eisenbrown,” in Russell D. and Corinne P. Earnest’s Papers for Birth Dayes, Guide to the Fraktur Artists and Scriveners. York, PA: 2nd ed., 1997, vol. 1, 229.

“John Daniel Eisenbrown, Where Buried,” in Find a Grave. Accessed 4 September 2015.
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76230372&ref=acom

P. F. Eisenbrown Memorials of Reading, PA. Accessed 3 September 2015 http://eisenbrownmemorials.com/about-us/3647772

“Penrose F. Eisenbrown” in Morton L. Montgomery’s Historical and Biographical Annals of Berks County Pennsylvania (Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co., 1909), vol. 1, part 1, p. 82 of 227. Accessed 3 September 2015. http://www.ebooksread.com/authors-eng/morton-l-morton-luther-montgomery/historical-and-biographical-annals-of-berks-county-pennsylvania-embracing-a-co-003/page-82-historical-and-biographical-annals-of-berks-county-pennsylvania-embracing-a-co-003.shtml

Monroe Fabian’s “John Daniel Eisenbrown, Frakturist,” in Pennsylvania Folklife,
Winter 1974-1975 vol. XXIV, No. 2, pp. 31-35.

“Johann Heinrich Wind, Where Buried,” in Find a Grave. Accessed 3 September 2015
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=Wind&GSfn=Johann&GSmn=Heinrich&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=79963152&df=all&

© Del-Louise Moyer 2015

Elisabet Mertz’s Birth Record: Freeing the Spirit in the Fraktur

9 Replies

Every time I hold a Pennsylvania Dutch illuminated manuscript in my hands, the text begins to pulsate with life. A bit of history has long been waiting to escape the confines of the paper, and it’s so much fun to bring the words to life.  First I have to transcribe the Fraktur and/or German script; assess the information; and finally research names, dates, places, and possibly quotes with the hope that I’ll find enough material to free the spirit in the Fraktur and resurrect a person, or a cultural moment in time that would otherwise not see the light of day.

Ill. 1 Elisabet Mertz Fraktur B

Ill. 1 Elisabet Mertz Fraktur, Courtesy of Goschenhoppen Historians

Such is the case with one very exciting birth record recently gifted to the Goschenhoppen Historians Fraktur, Manuscript and Rare Books collection by an anonymous donor. The Fraktur was made for Elisabet Mertz (1777-1848), born to Johan Jacob Mertz (1741-1811) and his wife Catarina (1747-1826), née Schelkopf, on July 11, 1777. The manuscript measures 8 x 13 inches; is hand-drawn, hand-colored, hand-lettered with ink and watercolor on laid paper. Water damage, and traces of scotch tape used to repair a major central horizontal tear are evident. Subsequently someone attempted to rectify this tear by mounting the piece on pressed board. The work is a candidate for conservation, and it is hoped that this can be undertaken in the near future.

Prominent decorative elements include tulip vines with red, green, and yellow blooms.  On each side a vine rises vertically out of a double-handled brown and yellow pot to frame a quintet of birds. Three are perched on an undulating banderole that runs horizontally across the upper middle portion of the work and is supported at either end by two vertical green stems: The central bird is red and green, faces left, and is flanked by two much larger inward facing brown and orange singing birds. There is a Fraktur text that has been penned in red ink within the banderole. At the bottom two more singing birds face inwards, flanking a heart from which yellow and red blooming tulip vines flow symmetrically to the left and right. Centered between the upper text banderole and the lower bird scene is the birth record in black Fraktur script:

[Original]
Elisabet wurd geboren den 11 July 1777 seine | Eltern waren der ehrbare Johan Jacob Mertz und Seine Hauß frau | Catarina p Tauf zeigen war die Ehrbare Friedricke Schelkobin

[Translation]
Elisabet was born on July 11, 1777. Her parents were the honorable Johan Jacob Mertz and his housewife Catarina, etc. Baptismal sponsor was the honorable Friedricke Schelkob [Schellkopf].

A sawtooth border in yellow, green and brown (damaged around outer edges) encloses this imaginative and picturesque work. Unusually vibrant and fresh colors indicate that care has been taken to keep it out of sunlight. The last owner purchased the illuminated manuscript at the Pennypacker Auction Center, Reading PA in May 1971. Oh, that more were known about its provenance!

Elisabet’s birth record is unusual in a number of ways.  Firstly, most all texts found on illuminated manuscripts are taken either from the Bible or religious poetry.  The text that appears in this Fraktur, however, was chosen intentionally from a morally-oriented secular text [1] to inspire others to live righteously on earth.  The banderole phrase is taken from a very popular book of manners for young people written by Johann Leonhard Rost (1688-1727), an astronomer and poet who spent most of his life in Nuremberg, Germany.  When not writing treatises on astronomy, Rost amused himself by writing romance novels about the nobility and improving the manners of gentile off-spring under the

[Original]
Wer sich läst Welt und wolust freuen den wirts dort ewig reuen Peter Scheurer

[Translation]
He who delights in temporal pleasures here, will eternally regret them there. Peter Scheurer

pseudonym Meletaon.  One would not expect a quote from his Well Considered and Newly Conceived Book of Manners [… ] for the Pleasure and Instruction of Young People, [2] published in Nuremberg in 1739, to appear on a Fraktur birth record produced in or around rural Ruscombmanor Township in Berks County Pennsylvania in 1777.  Please note that original church records situate the church in Ruscombmanor Township.[3]  Elsewhere one finds references to its location in Rockland Township.  The Book of Manners was illustrated with copper engravings, and it is on the second engraving that we find the referred to passage warning children of impending doom if they enjoy too much of the world’s pleasures.

Engraving from J L Rost’s Book of Manners: In Hell; In Paradise

Ill. 2 Engraving from J L Rost’s Book of Manners: In Hell; In Paradise

The same hand that wrote Rost’s quote on the banderole also signed Peter Scheurer at its end.  Although he is not known to have been a Fraktur  artist/scrivener, Peter Scheurer and Johann Jacob Mertz, along with their families worshiped together at the Mertz Church.  The many Scheurers who were members of this church were most likely friends of the Mertz family.  Peter also appears in the church records as a sponsor for baptisms during the same time period as the Fraktur was created. It is quite possible, therefore, that Peter Scheurer was signing the document as its artist/scrivener.

Elisabet Mertz was an important addition to a very special family. Her grandparents were Johann Heinrich Merz (1708-1788) and Anna Maria, née Rosmann, who are known to have emigrated from Württemberg to Pennsylvania in 1733, and to have donated the land on which Christ Church was built. The church itself was organized in 1747 by Rev. Tobias Wagner, who began the Evangelical Lutheran Church Records with the first five births and baptisms of this couple’s children. The initial three children were Johann Philipp, Johann Wilhelm, and Johann Jacob, the latter of whom was born 18 August and baptized on 30 August 1741. It is interesting to note that one of the sponsors at his baptism was Anna Magdalena Scheur. Johann Jacob married Catarina Schelkopf, and is known to have served in the American Revolution in Captain Crouse’s Company from 1777-1778 (Second Battalion). Unlike his siblings he never strayed from his place of birth. Both his wife and he are buried in the Mertz Church Cemetery
(Row 1, graves 35, 36).

Tombstone of Catarina (née Schelkopf) Mertz

Ill. 3a Tombstone of Catarina (née Schelkopf) Mertz

Catarina’s maiden name, as is clearly discernable on the tombstone that appears online at the Find a Grave website,[4] was Schelkopfin,[5] not Schaller. It is not known when this image was posted on Find a Grave, but in the interim acid rain has erased the gravestone lettering. The face of the stone as of June 2015 is almost completely blank.

Ill. 3b Christina Mertz's tombstone with acid rain damage and Johann Jacob Mertz's replaced gravemarker d

Ill. 3b Christina Mertz’s tombstone with acid rain damage and Johann Jacob Mertz’s replaced grave marker

Knowing Catarina’s surname before marriage helps to solve another curious peculiarity of Elisabet’s Fraktur. The name of her baptismal sponsor appearing on the illuminated manuscript is Friedricke Schelkobin, but in the church records Friederica Emertin.  An entry in the church birth and

Ill. 4 Birth & Baptismal Entry in Mertz Evangelical Lutheran Church Records

Ill. 4 Elisabetha Mertz Birth & Baptismal Entry in Mertz Evangelical Lutheran Church Records

baptismal records confirms that Friederica Emert must have been very pregnant when she stood for Elisabet on 10 August 1777, for she gave birth to a baby girl Maria three days later on 13 August 1777. The father and mother are listed as the deceased Emert; wife Friederica. Catarina Mertz’s and Friederica Emert’s surname before marriage was Schelkopf (Schelkob; Schellkopp), and were more than likely sisters.

Ill. 5 Maria Ebert Birth & Baptismal Entry in Mertz Evangelical Lutheran Church Records

Ill. 5 Maria Ebert Birth & Baptismal Entry in Mertz Evangelical Lutheran Church Records

At present very little is known about Elisabet except that she grew up attending Mertz Church, stayed in the same vicinity, and married perhaps a cousin whose name was also, like her father’s, Jacob Mertz (1774-1845). Both are buried in the New Jerusalem Union Cemetery in Fleetwood, Berks County, Pennsylvania.

Endnotes
[1] For another example see Del-Louise Moyer, “Amyntas, The Story of Christina Schneider’s 1777 Vorschrift,” Der Reggeboge: The Journal of the Pennsylvania German Society (Kutztown, Pennsylvania, 2012), Vol. 46, no. 1, pp. 53-67.
[2] Johann Leonhard Rost, Die wohlangerichtete, neuerfundene Tugendschule, in welcher 24 anmuthige Historien zu erlaubter Gemüths-Ergöztung der Jugend auf eine erbaulich Art vorgetragen und mit nützlichen Anmerkungen und Lehren begleitet werden (Nürnberg 1739/ Nürnberg: Bieling, 1800 ), second copper engraving.
[3] See:  Evangelisch Lutherische kirchen buch von die Gemeinde in Ruscombmanner und die umligende nachbarschaft, Ms. at Christ Mertz Church, Dryville, Pennsylvania.
[4] Find a Grave: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=53657558&PIpi=29550788 (accessed 1 June 2015).
[5] An –in at the end of the surname in German signifies female gender, but is not included in the English translation.

Many thanks to Sandra Highouse and Bob Wood of the Goschenhoppen Historians, as well as Eleanor Dreibelbis, Pastor Cheryl Meinschein, and Stef Boyer of Mertz Evangelical Lutheran Church at Dryville, PA.

© Del-Louise Moyer  2015