Our German-Speaking Heritage

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A speech given by Karen Romick at the April 2002 meeting of the

Monroe County Chapter of the Ohio Genealogical Society

Around 1906 Reverend Theodore Rudin was appointed pastor of the German Methodist Episcopal Churches in the Hannibal and Clarington areas. In one of the first entries he made in the journal he kept during his time here, he noted his surprise at hearing his native German language spoken so frequently and fluently in this area. He made special mention of Captain John Muhleman whom he said spoke the language as though he were a native when in fact he had never lived anywhere but Monroe County.

At that time in history Captain Muhleman would not have been considered a rarity. There were a number of German-speaking communities and families throughout the county.

For Monroe County, it began in April of 1819 when twelve families left their home in Switzerland and traveled to the United States. Upon their arrival in New Jersey, half of the families elected to stay there but the other half continued overland to Wheeling (West Virginia) where they boarded a flatboat and descended the Ohio River. Among these families were the Fankhausers, Nisperlys, Tishers, Martins and Tschappats.

Their first stop was at Captina, which is now Powhatan Point. There they were met by two German-speaking settlers, George Goetz (Gates) and Henry Schweppy, who encouraged them to purchase the government land that was available. Some of the colony decided to do that and they made the first Swiss settlement in Monroe County, settling about four miles south of Powhatan in what was then Salem Township.

The rest of the group continued downriver about fifteen miles until they landed at Bare s Landing. There the owner of the land, Jacob Bare, who was a German-speaking settler from Maryland, met them. He also encouraged them to make this area their home and that is where their long journey from Switzerland ended, in the hills around present-day Hannibal.

The following spring Jacob Nisperly returned to Switzerland and encouraged others to join the little colony in their new home in America. This began the influx of German-speaking immigrants to Monroe County which would continue throughout most of the nineteenth century.

There were three major settlements of German-speaking people in Monroe County. The first was the group that settled in what was then Salem Township. In 1826, Salem Township officials attempted to collect fines from people who had not served in the militia. The Swiss farmers in this section of Salem Township refused to pay the fines because they were not naturalized citizens. This created quite a ruckus and to solve the problem, this portion of Salem Township was reorganized as Switzerland Township.

The second settlement was the Swiss settlement in the Ohio Township area near Hannibal. Although it began as largely Swiss immigrants, many German families later joined them.

The third settlement occurred later in Malaga and Miltonsburg and it was largely a German population.

Although these three areas were the major settlements, the German-speaking people were by no means isolated within those areas. Early census information reveals that people of German and Swiss ancestry scattered throughout the county. There were German tradesmen that lived in Woodsfield, Trail Run had two German-speaking churches, and Brownsville has a German cemetery. In Jackson Township there is a small burial ground with German-inscribed stones for the Moszer family.

It s always been a legend that the first Swiss settlers chose Monroe County because it reminded them of their homeland. Researchers who have visited both the homelands and Monroe County say there are similarities with the hills, river and many waterways. Undoubtedly it was comforting to be in a somewhat familiar surrounding. However, there are two other factors that were as important if not more important, in their decision to make Monroe County their home. Both of these factors are evident in the meeting of the original Swiss settlers and Jacob Bare and George Geotz.

Both men greeted them in their native tongue and shared information of land available for sale. For people who had lived in a culture where they could not own land either because of financial means or rights, owning land would have been a great enticement. Especially this land because it was cheaper than other land because it wasn t considered to be prime agricultural land. The soil was poor and the rugged hilly terrain made farming a backbreaking job. This was especially true in the days before there were modern machinery and conveniences.

Neither the hills nor the poor soil deterred the hearty pioneers from turning their farms into profitable ventures. They did this by creating a new industry in Monroe County; one that stills exists today dairy farming. They grew enough crops to feed their families and livestock and to perhaps sell, but it was dairy farming which helped many of these farmers to support their families.

But there was a problem with dairy farming in the early days. There was no refrigeration so it made it difficult to keep the large quantities of milk they were producing. They had springhouses that kept milk for a while, but there was no way to ship it. This created yet another business cheese making.

It began in the homes with individual families making the cheese, but later farmers joined together to create cooperative dairies. One such dairy was in Lee Township. In fact, the place is still know as Dairy.

Each dairy had a professional cheesemaker. The cheesemaker would make the cheese during the season, which usually ran between May and October. The cheese was then sold and shipped by river to places such as Marietta, Wheeling and Parkersburg.

Dairies were eventually replaced by creameries, which performed the same function only on a larger scale. My maternal grandfather, Fred Jones, drove a creamery truck. He would pick up cream from the different farms and take it to Sardis where there was a small creamery. They would sell the cream and also make butter and cheese. There were also larger creameries in the county such as United Dairy and the Hannibal Creamery.

Gradually the creameries closed but individuals kept cheese making alive. My paternal grandparents made cheese to utilize all of their milk products, feed their family and also as a supplement to their farming income. Homemade cheese was delicious and a taste that can t be matched by professionally made cheese.

The second factor that contributed to the immigrants decision to stay here was the familiarity of the culture. Both Jacob Bare and George Geotz greeted them in their own tongue. Imagine moving to a new land where you had either no knowledge or perhaps just a limited one of the language. It would have been reassuring to meet someone who could converse with you. As more immigrants arrived, the community of German-speaking people grew.

As we know, people rarely traveled alone. They usually immigrated with family and friends. Basically they transplanted a community from their homeland to America. That was the case here also.

When these immigrants arrived in Monroe County, they found a culture like the one they left in their homeland. These communities had the same customs, traditions, language and even sometimes the same people from their home village.

They spoke German in their homes, schools and churches. My grandmother s mother, Mary Winkler Niemann, was born in Switzerland and came here with her family when she was about 7 years old. Grandma s dad, Henry Niemann, was born shortly after his family arrived from Germany. Although both of them grew up in Monroe County, they couldn t read English. They carried German Bibles to church because that was the only language they could read. German had been taught to them in all areas of their life.

By necessity, these people were bilingual. Although they spoke German in their communities, they had to associate with the world around them, especially for business purposes. The late Charles Merriner wrote an article in our Monroe County, Ohio Families book about growing up in Sardis in the 1902s. Charles wrote about market day when people brought their goods to be shipped on the river. He mentioned hearing the German conversations of the farmers who had come down from the hills to sell their products. Even by this late date, German was still the language for many families in Monroe County.

But the end was nearing for the German language in Monroe County. In his journal which he kept from about 1906 to 1911, Reverend Rudin wrote about two issues that troubled him and both of these issues had an impact on the German-Swiss culture of Monroe County.

The first issue was what Reverend Rudin described as young people turning away from their heritage. In Hannibal, there was a German Methodist church and an English Methodist church on the same street. They had different pastors and different congregations but occasionally they would share services. He wrote about young people appearing to be more willing to attend the English church than their German one. As the generations were becoming more removed from their ancestral home, the younger generation was identifying more with the American ways.

The second issue that Reverend Rudin wrote about was the growing tension in Europe. Although at the time he wrote this in his journal, the European situation seemed far removed from Monroe County, it would have the greatest impact on the German-speaking culture in the county. A few short years later, it would erupt into World War I. In 1916, the United States was drawn into the war and everything German became suspect. That included German-speaking churches.

Since these churches were still conducting services in German, the government wanted to ascertain that nothing was being said against the American government or in support of Germany. At each service a government agent was sent to monitor the service. He would stand behind a curtain and listen to the entire service.

Although German wasn t immediately dropped from the churches, the war was a strong motivation in bringing about the end of this language and the adoption of English as the primary language. In 1933, the English Methodist church in Hannibal burned and that congregation united with the German church. In 1935 the English and German Methodist denominations merged and the German church ceased to exist.

Even though the language was erased from the churches and schools, it continued to linger in communities. My dad was a pre-teen when World War II began. He remembers that there was occasionally tension among neighbors because of some s refusal to speak against Germany. While they didn t outwardly support Germany, they also wouldn t fault them. This upset families who sent sons to war and especially those, like my dad s family, who lost a son in the war.

The heritage of the Swiss and German people continued to linger and still does today. I remember the friends and neighbors of my grandparents who spoke with thick German accents. They had never lived anywhere but Monroe County and neither had their parents, but you could easily have mistaken them for natives of Germany or Switzerland. Even in the voices of their children who are now senior citizens, you can hear the traces of that heritage.

As you travel around Monroe County you can see the remnants of that heritage. If you drive along State Route 255 in Lee and Ohio Townships, you will be driving toward Sardis and the roads that branch off to Hannibal. You will see farmhouses and barns that appear to be clinging to the sides of hills. It is readily apparent how difficult it was to make a living in farming on these hills. These structures also speak of an influence from the early immigrants: the half bank barn. These barns were built on banks. In the upper part of the barn, hay and machinery was kept. The lower portion was where the cattle were kept as the cattle could enter under the barn. There are many such barns in the county and they represent a form of Swiss- German architecture. They are just one of the remnants of the German-speaking heritage of this county.

Cheese making at Home

My father recounted how his parents made cheese.

1. In the morning after the milking, Grandma would strain milk through a cheesecloth and a strainer.

2. She would put the milk in a large boiler which was about 18 high, 12 wide and 2 feet long.

3. She then would cook it to boiling over a woodfire, stirring it for the hour and half it usually took to finish.

4. When the milk began to separate or look like cottage cheese, Grandma would put cheesecloth in the cheese box, then scoop the mixture into the box. She would usually do this with her hands and squeeze it to get as much juice as she could out of it.

5. When the box was full, she would fold the cloth over it and put the lid on it.

6. Next she would put a weight, like an old iron, on it. That would continue to squeeze the juice out of it and it would run out of the sides. Sometimes they would catch the juice and use it to feed the hogs.

7. After a few hours, she would take the lid off and take the cheese out without taking it out of the cloth, and turn it over. She would again put the lid and the weight back on top.

8. By evening, the cheese was ready to be removed from the box. She would put the cheese in a large box in the cellar where she stored the other cheeses.

9. Grandpap would clean the cheese everyday and scrape any juices off them.

In about three weeks the cheeses were ready to be sold or eaten.

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