Journal, Vol. 01, No. 1 – Spring 1978

Cover: Children of Russian German colony near Eureka, SD, in 1896, is the focus of this issue’s Folklore Forum on “Childbirth and Childhood Customs of the Germans From Russia.”

Content:
Exploring his family background and the Ostrog Mennonite settlement in Russia (daily life, religious activities, weddings, funerals, and emigration), Jacob B. Janz provides more insight into the “Mennonite Life in Volhynia, 1800-1874,” translated by Agnes Janz Hubert with notes by John B. Toews.
The Journal continues with Part II of Lew Malinowski’s articles on German colonization of Russia in his “They Did Not Come From Warsaw,” translated by Sally S. Arbuckle, and with Adam Giesinger’s series of translations of Volga settlers’ memoirs, “Reminiscences of August Stahlbaum.”
Dr. Giesinger also has translated the official account of the repatriation of certain Germans to the Reich from 1939-1940 in “The Trek of the Ethnic Germans From Volhynia, Galicia, and the Narew River Region.”
An interesting counterpoint to this official version, the personal recollections of Maria Mahlsam, is presented in “At Home Once More,” translated by Nancy B. Holland.
Lawrence A. Weigel adds to his music series with a story on the song, Die Vertriebenen.
Adam Giesinger deals with the earliest Crimean German villages Rosental, Neusatz, and Zuerichtal in his village series.
Other special features include Emma S. Haynes’s translation of a letter written by Emilie and Eugen Schwan of Stuttgart in “White Paper on Human Rights of Germans in Eastern Europe”; a report on the 1978 AHSGR tour to South America, “New Friendships in South America,” by Barbara Amen; and a chart with accompanying map of the present-day names of the German colonies in Bessarabia, provided by Karl Stumpp.
In “A Voice From the Past: Remembering Eighty Years,” Andrew Kehrer tells the story of his family from their life in Russia near the Black Sea to their resettlement in Washington.
Emma S. Haynes gives a “Progress Report on the Coming of Volga German Protestants to the United States” with accompanying “Passenger Lists,” and a genealogy section includes a “Surname Exchange” and “Queries.”
Completing the issue are book reviews of The Volga German Gemeindeschaft and Political Autonomy Amidst Domestic Turmoil, 1914-1922 by Aleksander Mrdjenovic, The Logan County Ledger, and Hans Brandenburg’s The Meek and the Mighty: The Emergence of the Evangelical Movement in Russia.