From: Krasna, Bessarabia
20 March 1914
First of all, I want to let the editorship know that I received the Lahrer Calendar. Thank you very much.
Since the middle of February we have been having beautiful weather and by the beginning of March the farmers were already finished with the seeding. The weather is still nice and the winter wheat is showing splendidly. On March 11 and 12, we had thunderstorms, so that there were complaints about flooding here and there. Our farmers are in good spirits and hope for a blessed harvest.
On March 4, the backyards at Joseph Volk and Phillip Hintz were on fire. All the straw and building materials became prey of the flames. Luckily the wind blew away from the village otherwise the fire would have caused much larger harm, since most of the men weren’t home, but away in the fields seeding. Certainly the women would have been able to do little if nothing to stop the spreading of the flames.
In Edition #33 of the paper, I read a report signed by E. Sch. in Mariental. Evidently the writer is Emanuel Schnell. (*Editor: Indeed – That’s the way it is.) He reported that I am his wife’s (Margaretha, nee Bachmeier) godmother. That is very true but since he did not indicate his state, I certainly don’t know where he lives. (*Editor: But the state was noted, namely Saskatchewan in Canada. Address is as follows: Emanuel Schnell, Mariental, Sask. Canada.) Now then, I was very happy to hear from him and his wife. The Staats-Anzeiger is indeed a wonderful paper since through its many reports and worldwide distribution, it connects people who have not seen or heard from one another in twenty or more years. People who one thought of as dead often show up this way in the Staats-Anzeiger. (*Editor: The story of the Swabian who had eaten the liver appeared just recently in the paper.)
My friends in the New World, especially Peter and Karl Schäfer, Thomas Ihli, Phil Seifert including their wives are being greeted cordially. My newspaper subscription will expire on 29 June 1914, and I am asking friends to again order it for me. Which one of them will do it? I hope to read about it soon in the Staats-Anzeiger, since I don’t want my name to be crossed off the list.
A greeting is also sent to all other acquaintances and all readers of this paper in the Old and New World.
Valentin Herrschaft
From: Brisbane, Morton County, ND
3 May 1914
We farmers are fully occupied with planting. If it turns out as it did with Phillip Zacher, then the seeding will rapidly come to an end. In the fall of 1913, Mr. Zacher bought a mechanized plough from Peter Bord on a two-year loan and gave him two horses as collateral.
On 2 May, however, Mr. Bord, along with an agent and the sheriff came to Mr. Zacher and demanded that he give Mr. Bord a quarter of his land as additional collateral, or else they would take the plough and the two horses. When Zacher refused to comply, Bord told the sheriff to unhitch the horses from the sowing machine and take them along. The sheriff grabbed the horses by the reins. Zacher jumped to the nearby standing wagon, pulled the neck yoke from the shaft and ordered the sheriff to let go of the horses or else he would beat him to the ground. Under such circumstances the sheriff let loose of the horses, but leaped to the buggy that was parked near by and fetched a revolver.
In the meantime, however, Zacher jumped onto the planting machine and hurriedly drove off to the farmyard and put the horses in the stable.
After a while three gentlemen also arrived and the matter was amicably settled in that Mr. Zacher gave Mr. Bord additional collateral. The sheriff gave Zacher’s children some money for candy and the situation was arbitrated. – What can you say about stories like this? Isn’t it a shame to transact a business deal for a two-year term and then demand the money before that time? That certainly is an injustice.
Mr. Romuald Dirk recently asked me in the newspaper how I liked it in the new homeland. Well, so far I like it really well here. But should you arrive here without any money (I only had an asset of just $2) and end up without a harvest, and then of course it is bad. But it is for certain, that here you can get ahead better than in Russia, even if you have to work for a day’s wages. A good farmhand gets paid up to $350 per year. Should a farmhand be married and have children that can assist him, then he can soon gain prosperity. Now I believe that Mr. Dirk also has the America fever. Well, Mr. Dirk, you have sons-in-law, Ignatz Gross and Eduard Richter, here who are well off. They should be able to help you out some so that you could come to America. I know both gentlemen really well since they live nearby.
Father and mother are healthy. Mother was sick for five months, but now is well again.
Joseph Hinz is a well-off farmer and does not want to hear anything anymore about Russia.
I send a greeting to my Uncle Michael Winter, also to Martin Müller (son of Martin), and to the entire reader’s circle of this dear newspaper.
Maximilian Winter,
Son of Mathias