The Rose Garden, Chapter 3 – History Lessons

1910 Map of Hungary (ethnicities indicated), Author Ascended Dreamer,
(CC BY-SA 4.0 International)

“Then the children of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides children.  A mixed multitude went up with them also, and flocks and herds — a great deal of livestock” (Ex. 12: 37-38).

The year before my father died, my sister decided he should write down his life story.  She was adamant that both our parents do this, in fact.

So, in two lined, spiral notebooks, Ma and Pop wrote out the family history in longhand.  This was especially difficult for my mother who had earlier suffered a stroke and was nearly illiterate, in any case.

I have the notebooks.  It took me four years to read through them.  Not because of their length, but because of the emotion their contents evoked in me.

Hungary

My parents’ story begins in Hungary.  Then as now, Hungary (Magyarország) was a small, landlocked country in Central Europe.

Since earliest times, Hungary has been a crossroads with a mix of peoples.   Celts, Romans, and Huns; Slavs, Franks, and Bulgars; Magyars and Mongols; Ottomans and Austrians; Serbs, Croatians, Romanians and Czechs; finally Germans and Russians were among those who occupied the territory —  all, in their turn, migrating, invading, vying for power, uniting, dividing, and intermingling.

As I search the narratives for clues to my father’s character and his choices, I find the related history — family and national — immensely moving.

Not only is this my heritage, I see my life mirrored in these events.  Like Hungary, itself, I have been enriched by many sources.  Like Hungary, the territory that is my life has been embattled.

The Great Swabian Trek

Some 150,000 Germans were relocated to Hungary by the Austrian Hapsburgs during the 18th Century.  Their migration came to be known as the “Great Swabian Trek.”

Although from a variety of regions (with many dialects), German settlers were disparagingly called “Swabians” by the Hungarians.  The name came to mean all Germans who settled the Danube valley, an unwanted ethnic group.

Despite hardship, German immigrants to Hungary greatly increased the economic prosperity of that country.  The Banat region where they settled later became known as the “breadbasket of Europe.”

My parents’, grandparents’, and great-grandparents’ lives played out against this background.  This work ethic shaped my life.

A Thatched Cottage and Thirteen Children

My father grew up in a village called Mosonszentjános, near the Austrian border.  He was raised on a hardscrabble farm, in a dilapidated cottage with a thatched roof and dirt floor.  Petroleum lamps provided light, since there was no electricity.  A potbelly stove provided heat.  The house had no plumbing.

Ten of the children shared a single room, sleeping on straw beds.

In the summer months, they were barefoot.  Shoes were always worth more than the person.  Lice and fleas were a plague.  In the winter months, the children were fortunate if each received a shirt, a jacket, a pair of pants, long socks, and a pair of shoes.  Always hand-me-downs, as might be expected.

Any season of the year, grueling physical labor was the rule.

A veteran of World War I, my paternal grandfather was evidently a hard man, cold and uncommunicative.  Though my father was not close to his own father, he was close to most of his siblings.  The molestation could not, therefore, have resulted from an inability on his part to form attachments.

“Kids,” my father wrote in his notebook, “I love you very dearly.  Thank God I did not see you growing up that way.”

The statement suggests that my father loved his children.  He believed he did, at any rate.  What warped an otherwise natural instinct?  Surely, it could not have been deprivation alone.

Still, I find it wrenching to read of the impoverished circumstances my father experienced as a boy.

A Small Farm and Never-Ending Work

My mother grew up on a small farm in a village called Magyarpolány (“Polány”), some 60 miles away over rutted country roads.  Though her family was slightly better off, the work there was never-ending, as well.

Swabians were known for their carefully maintained houses and gardens.  Each tidy plot of land was surrounded by a fence.   Streets, too, were kept clean.  Cattle were led to a common pasture in the area surrounding the village.

Orchards and vegetable patches brimmed with apricots, pears, peaches, plums, peppers, potatoes, onions, carrots, and tomatoes.  Grapevines were separately cultivated.

Blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, and gooseberries grew wild in the woods.  My grandfather used a portion of this family bounty to brew homemade wine and brandy.

Each village had its own distinctive type of dress and hairstyle.  As a girl, my mother wore her hair coiled around her head in braids.  I have old black and white photographs in which she and my grandparents are posed stiffly, in their Sunday finery.

Schools were built in close proximity to the church.  Classes were generally taught in German.  Social customs in these villages centered around church activities.  Baptisms and weddings were cause for celebration, family and neighbors joining in a street procession or special meal.

Ma was a sensitive child, vulnerable even then, and the easy target of brutish schoolmasters.  Shouted at and rapped on the knuckles by her teachers, if she hesitated over a sum, Ma would then be forced by her father to kneel on dried corncobs at home, if she failed at a school task.

This institutional abuse left my mother with a dislike for formal education, and a sense of shyness with strangers.  Amazingly enough, it did not undermine her confidence in her own abilities.

That self-confidence was further bolstered by Ma’s total certainty that she had a guardian angel standing constant watch over her.  Considering all that she survived, perhaps she did.

I continue to excavate for the truth.  Much, however, has been lost to history.

Copyright © 2008 – Present Anna Waldherr.  All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-60247-890-9

FOR MORE OF MY ARTICLES ON POVERTY, POLITICS, AND MATTERS OF CONSCIENCE CHECK OUT MY BLOG A LAWYER’S PRAYERS AT: https://alawyersprayers.com