Sister letters 1930

Gnadenfeld, 18 Mar 1930

Dear Family Members!

I will simply have to bestir myself and answer your letter, which we already received about two weeks ago. We are always delighted when one arrives, but answering I find ever more difficult. I do not want to write about that which is most important to us, and to me such a letter then seems to be so untrue. In your letters there is a tone as from another world, where one can breathe freely and are developing. 

Jasch’s foot has healed well, and is far less sensitive than before. Oh, we still have enough grounds to be thankful to our Heavenly father! In recent times, I have longed most especially for all of you there in America.

So, are you taking piano lessons? Do your husband and Paul also play the piano? I have already forgotten everything. A while ago at the Rempels, I tried to play, and just think, I was not even sure of the notes!

Here, the seeding time is beginning. Still, I do not know where I will get vegetable seeds as last year the caterpillars took almost everything and I was hardly able to collect any seed. We had a very mild winter and now the spring is early. We still do not know whether we will remain here or not. This uncertainty is so torturing and tiring.

About a month ago, we received a letter from Neta. In such a friendly way, she invited us to come so that we could also be near them. Alas, that would just be too wonderful. But I fear nothing will come of it. Well, God must rule, and lead everything well. If it is his will, then we will also come over and, if not, then that too must be what serves us best.

Two weeks ago, we had a wedding at our church. Our niece Lieschen Franz and Hermann Dirks, Franz’s school friend, the short one, do you remember? I am so disappointed that I will not even be able to see you as a bride in pictures, since as you wrote, the pictures did not turn out. Have you had later pictures taken?

We have not had a letter from Dietz for a long time. Is he still in New York? And what is he doing there? Have Hermann and Franz visited you yet? Sometimes, I fear that we will become quite strange to each other if we ever meet again. The brothers have all become such highly-gifted gentlemen, and still I am the “dumb old Greta”. Jasch is now discontinuing clock repairs. Now he is repairing plows for the cooperative.

Gnadenfeld, 26 May, 1930 (an open postcard)

Dear Sister and Brother-in-law

When you receive this card, you will already be very busy preparing for your trip to Canada. Alas, how much I would also like to be there at that time! Here it has rained a great deal of late. Everything is growing well, including the weeds and tomorrow we want to work hard on that. 

In your next letter, please write the name of Dietz’s fiance, as well as how it is pronounced. Also please write to me with what your husband is occupied with. I was not quite able to understand it from the letter. Where did you come to know each other? Also greet D. Klassens when you get there and write us a shared letter from there.

Gnadenfeld, 22 JJuly, 1930

Dear Relatives Klassens and Duecks!

I assume that this letter will still reach you all together. How beautiful it must now be there! As we, unfortunately, cannot be there we are at least sending our pictures with this letter. Hopefully, you will receive them. We are sending three: one for Klassens, one for Dycks and one for Dietz, whose address we do not have. Will you please be so good as to send it to him? The pictures turned out a little too light. Liesel is hard to see, but you can still get an impression of our children. They are standing according to age next to me. Artur, and next to him, Kolja, Wally is sitting on a little bench and the chubby one in her beloved little wagon, in which she escorts me wherever I go. She does this when we go on a visit, but also whenever I go beyond the woodlot to our vegetable garden to get potatoes or whatever. Otherwise, I would have to leave her alone in the house, since Jasch is working elsewhere the whole day long and only comes home to eat. He is repairing mowing machines for the harvest. The grain is already starting to ripen. It has rained a great deal here and the grain looks good. We have already begun to eat fresh potatoes. Unfortunately, our potatoes and also those of many others have a disease. Only a few plants are healthy and under them there are beautiful big potatoes, but the others are turning yellow even before blooming and there are only very small ones under them. So, potatoes will probably not last us as long as we would like. 

Today, I was at church with the children. Wally is now sitting properly with the boys. Liesel was also very well behaved and only fell asleep during the last hymn. When I got home, I warmed up the borscht and after we had eaten we lay down and slept until 2:30. Then we all went to Franz Loewens, but did not find them home. Then we returned home along the woodland path. We had not been home long when they arrived at our house. They had been at Peter Loewens and did not find them home and then they came to us. Mrs. Poppenberger also was here with her two children, and one fellow after another came to see Jasch. So today we had many guests. Shortly before supper there still came Hans Braun’s Rempel’s Mika to see me for a while. Now the children are sleeping. Jasch is sitting at the radio with Franz Voth. During the week, he is always too sleepy for that, because the afternoon nap is then only very short.

We are getting along relatively well. Jasch’s foot has been quite well since the autumn and he no longer has such pain when he is walking. I do not have Oksana anymore and by eveningI am quite tired, especially on Saturday. When all the rooms are clean and tidy and when we have all been in the bath, one after another, then the clock says 10 or 10:30   , one goes to bed and one also sleeps beautifully. Artur and Kolja now always go to the kindergarten in the morning as well as in the afternoon. This is held where the Reimers used to live, and they have to go quite far. Next Sunday, they will have a little celebration at which there will be various recitations and singing. The parents are also invited to it. They must, however, not disclose anything and everything is very secretive.

Neta and David, your children must already be going to school, at least Elly and Paul? Franz Voth just left and Jasch came to sit with me at the table and together we did away with the last May cherries that I had picked today after I drove the cows out. They tasted splendid, only it is sad that they were the last ones. Jasch says that we will save the pits and later plant them where you are. Alas, pious wishes, aren’t they? 

Independent farming is no longer done here. Rather, everyone works together in the cooperative. Then, in the autumn, each receives his pay according to the contribution he has made. A while ago, we bought a three-week-old pig for 37 rubles. Isn’t that good? It is thriving. We have 75 chicks and two hens are still brooding. While the pig remains too small to slaughter, we must at least make sure we have chickens to fry. Meat is very expensive and is almost never to be had. We have sold one of our horses, and the other one is in the cooperative. Yes, that is the way it is here!!! 

I would also like to write to Dietz in far away Philadelphia, but as I said, I do not know his address. Perhaps you could include this letter when you write to him.

Gnadenfeld, 11 December, 1930

Dear Lina, Dietrich and Paul!

How great was the joy again when we received your long, beautiful letter this afternoon, and I decided to answer it right away this evening. Then perhaps we will get another one that much earlier? I was especially delighted that you too, dear brother-in-law, have written. The beautiful verse of which you remind us, we will take to heart as our guide.

My dear Jasch recovered quickly after his operation and feels far better than before. Thanks be to the dear God for that! After all the many days of fasting at the hospital he brought home a very healthy appetite. Now he looks fuller in the face and also has a healthier color. I am very happy that he decided on the operation. Now the appendix can no longer bother him. Occasionally, he still has pain at the internal scar, but that may always be so. Brother-in-law David should do it also. Jasch says that it is not such an awful operation. Only his foot does not want to heal. Actually the wound has become quite small, but yesterday his heel began to hurt again and he was afraid it would get worse. How it looks today I do not know since he left for Tokmak this morning to have some oil pressed.

I am already very happy to get the oil because we have been without a drop of fat for quite a while. At first the cow produced a little, but now she is dry and meal preparation is nearly impossible. Everything has to be boiled and one can’t fry anything. Actually, there will now be much oil. We had harvested enough from our vegetable plot beyond the tree plantation, but here one is permitted to keep only 14 pounds of sunflower seed per consumer for the entire year. The remainder one must forfeit. For us that will amount to about 20 pounds of oil. That means save. Actually we have a pig to slaughter. So far it is still far too lean. If by that time it is not forbidden to slaughter, and we must then forfeit some of it, that would really disappoint us. Bread and potatoes will hopefully last us if we try hard to save. Everywhere it calls for saving, but one must be happy that one still has that much, as for many,  things go much worse than for us. For example, the Abram Brauns. They had provided for everything for the winter and brought it in. Then, all of a sudden, such a large levy was put on them that it was impossible for them to pay it. Because they were unable to pay, all they had, other than beds, clothing and dishes, was sold. No other choice remained for them but to move as far as possible away from here, where, without money, they must live on just what they can earn. This happened about two months ago. So far, they have found no earnings, although they are hoping that Abram Braun will be able to earn a little by making wooden slippers, that Suse may perhaps earn something by sewing, and Greta by writing. Hans had just returned from the service when all this happened. On account of all these upheavals, Mika, his wife, went into confinement two months early. She recovered soon, and the child lived and is thriving. Their first girl, Veronika, is a lively, delicate thing. This one is named Liese-Lotte. They are only 101/2 months apart. The Hans Brauns are now living with J. Rempels. Uncle Hans and Aunt Varja are now supposed to move into Abram Braun’s house, and also another teacher who is to board with them. They have assigned the house to them because it was standing empty. We often fear that what happened to Brauns could also befall us. There is also much interest in branding us as specialists, and that designation then leads to such consequences. For the time being, however, we have been taken off this list.

The 26th of December, 1930. I intended to answer your letter right away, but at the time I was so rudely disturbed that the mood to continue writing left me., and later I never got to it again. It was 11 o’clock in the evening and Jasch was not home. All at once, the night watchman for the cooperative began to whistle loudly on the street and to shout “robbers”. I quickly doused the light and listened in suspense. For a while, all remained quiet and I calmed down. Suddenly, two shots were fired not far from our bedroom and soon thereafter still more. Then some men with a lantern hastily crossed the yard. You can well imagine that I was very agitated and my whole body trembled. A little later, Uncle Hans knocked on the window and said that I should not get excited about the shots. He and Vadim had done that in response to the shouting. RReally there was nothing. But the watchman’s son was substituting for his father during this night because he too had gone to Tokmak with Jasch. The new watchman had seen two men walk through the yard, and when they did not answer his “Who’s there?”, he became afraid that they might be burglars and began to shout.

Today, it is the 26th of December. The beautiful Christmas feast will soon be over. It was actually forbidden to arrange a gift distribution and a Christmas tree in the church. At least the grown-ups could not do it. The children were really sad about this, as well as the adults. So, the school children among each other discussed taking care of this themselves. With baskets, they went the rounds to collect cookies and apples and money for a Christmas tree. They prepared sacks of treats, and even memorized poems, just as was customary. Only that they had to do it all without assistance. On Christmas Eve, the weather was beautiful, a light frost, a wonderfully clear sky, everything covered with frost and snow. Added to that was the moonlight. I went with Liesel and the boys. Jasch stayed home to watch the house. When we returned and had eaten our supper (fruit soup and cold chicken meat), the children went to bed. They were already very tired from joy and running about. Then I sat down next to Jasch at the radio and we heard Christmas Eve celebrated in Germany, and also a beautiful sermon and Chrstmas carols, all familiar ones, with organ accompaniment. Then I went to assemble the little tree and to decorate it. It was only a branch from the arborvitae, but still better than nothing. Then I drew four tiny candles from a piece of an old stearin candle, filled the plates with home-baked cookies and apples and placed the modest presents beside them. I had dressed Liesel’s doll in fresh clothes, Wally received a little wagon, Artur and Kolja each a colorful ball made out of wool, and together a box of colored pencils and each one a sheet of paper. Just before Christmas, we did not have any money because we had to make such large payments recently. Jasch had to set aside his clock repair activities, since such individually employed artisans are very highly taxed. So we were unable to make anything for the children and Jasch had no time to make anything himself. But the children were still very happy and emyite;y satisfied. 

After breakfast, I went to church. After lunch we went to Grandfather’s and for the evening our neighbor Willy Braun came over to listen to the radio. Instead of nuts we are cracking pumpkin seeds and eating cookies in between. Aunt Marichen was here for a visit today. For tomorrow, she invited us over to their house. A month ago, Uncle Hermann was very ill with inflammation of the lungs. We were already afraid that he would die, but now he has recovered to such an extent that he would venture out sometimes. Aunt Lina had come from Paulsheim to Gnadenfeld to care for him, since it was too hard for Aunt Marichen. Shae had taken excellent care of him, and next to God has enabled him to get through it. She too asks us to greet you heartily. 

On Sunday evening, the Pausheim singing choir is to present an oratorio here, but that is to be kept a secret until Sunday so that it will not suddenly be forbidden. That would be very sad. 

Now, enough of us. We still have not had pictures made of our family, so that we can also send Hermann and Dietz each one. Hopefully, you are not angry at us about that. We would be much overjoyed to again receive a letter from them and from Franz. We received the last letters from them a year ago on Christmas.