"Westfalen in Amerika" Landwirtschaftliches Wochenblatt, Friedrich Schutte, p38 2004
this magazine page was sent to Mabel Busdieker from one of her friends from Germany.
English translation below
Everything is free here!
Nothing in the villages of Westphalia in the 19th century promoted emigration to America as strongly as the rural, life-like descriptions of acquaintances
and relatives from the New World.
Travel reports and books about America already existed in Germany around 1830. In flowery words, they promoted emigration to America to the land where milk and honey flow.
However, the majority of ordinary people, the kotters, day workers, small farmers and artisans, hardly trusted these reports at the time. They had a test run that was safer for their needs: They sent out scouts to the Atlantic, men like the daring son of Heinrich Wilhelm Gerdemann from Westerkappeln, the later founder of Cappeln (Missouri) and pioneer for thousands of Americans from Tecklenburg and Osnabruck. Gerdemann regularly wrote long letters to parents, siblings, friends and acquaintances. He reported realistically, practically and always from the perspective of the landless and lawless, often starving little people. From his letters they learned comprehensively and realistically about life in the target area: the weather and farming conditions, cattle breeding, the markets and the completely different economy.
At 22 in the USA
Heinrich Wilhelm Gerdemann was just 22 years old in 1833, his traveling brother Johann Heinrich had just turned 19 years old.
Heinrich Wilhelm Gerdemann described in his first letter of July 22, 1833 from St. Charles, Missouri, the travel route and the costs,
but also the location of the Tecklenburger who had arrived a year earlier.
He described exactly the clearing of the jungle, the cultivation of fruit and "that a cow here does not cost more than 12 dollars".
It goes on to say: "There is a beautiful horse for 40 to 60 Reichstaler, the fattening pig for 3 to 4 Reichstaler. They do not come into any stable.
They eat themselves fat in the forest. Those who are able to breed cattle here can live very well and conquer more gold than a farmer in Germany.
"The monthly wage is many times higher than in Westphalia: "You can make up to 20 dollars in the city, which some people don't get half a year at home."
However, it is better to bring some gold from Germany to buy a farm straight away.
"If you don't feel like working, you'd better stay at home."
On the other hand, the hardy man could also feed his family well with hard work without a dollar in his pocket:
"There is one named Brinkmann from Lengerich, who has a wife with four children. He told us that he would earn as much in three days
as his wife and children eat all week. They eat meat three times a day! "
A Spot of Home
Then Gerdemann passionately appealed to all those who stayed at home to come to America as well: Oh, you are with us, everything is free here, there is no need to become a soldier.
So we hope that you may soon move out of the slave country!"
Finally, Gerdemann gave his friends at home, depending on the profession, good tips for their future activities in Missouri. The smith Stephan Heinrich Ludinghaus in Westerkappeln
would like to say: "He can live very well from his crafts here: a wagon wheel costs 6 Rt., The wagon 40 Rt." And: "Greet also the (tailor) Friedrich Schemme, because he can finish well here.
In St. Charles is a tailor who earns 40 Rt. every month with food and drink." And as far as the poor health "of the tailor Schemme is concerned, he should worry the least:" The thin ones were often the best on our ship and did not get sick so easily!
These letters did not miss their advertising effect. In 1834 another 155 residents moved to America from Westerkappeln alone, most of them to Missouri.
Between 1835 residents to America, most now to Missouri. Between 1835 and 1860 at least around 1,300 adults and children followed other Westerkappelners to the "New World".
Wilhelm Gerdemann worked his way up, became "merchant assistant in a general store, learned English "and did everything you need to know about business here", as he wrote.
In 1837 he married the 19-year-old Regina Elisabeth Schroder. In 1841, the couple followed the Westphalians to Femme Osage. Gerdemann bought a store there from his savings.
Later the Gerdemanns shifted their business eight kilometers further to a higher elevation, "The Westerkapplener liked that landscape just like one egg to another".
Therefore Gerdemann gave his new place the name "Cappeln".
A generation after the Gerdemann brothers, the chain hike from Teutoburger Forrest to Missouri around Femme Osage and far into the West was still in full swing.
At times, catastrophic epidemics and the civil war led to a decline in the immigration flow. But from 1865 the number of emigrants from the Tecklenburg rose again.
Now it was Wilhelm Bruggemann's letters that drew wide circles and attracted many to America. Bruggemann came from Lotte near Osnabrck and
followed his older brother to St. Charles in 1859 with his wife and children.
"Useless worries"
Bruggemann had barely caught on when he teased his younger brother Heinrich, the brother-in-law and "everyone else in Lotte and the surrounding area",
where they would find friends on arrival in the city of St. Louis who could help them: If you have made up your mind, go ahead calmly and cheerfully and
do not worry with unnecessary worries. "And then I gave names and addresses of born Tecklenburgers in the USA," where you can stop in ".
A bit awkward, but clearly, Bruggemann continued: "We don't want to write about this country in a big and broad way, but we still want to bring
something because of the money we have to bring with us: A local dollar is 100 cents. If you bring 5 francs, they are 95 here worth cents,
Prussian double louis-doors are $ 7 80 cents, Dutch 10 guilds are $ 4. After that you could calculate which is the best.”
On January 13, 1861, Wilhelm Bruggemann told his best friend Rehorst in Lotte, who had stayed at home, about how his boat trip had gone:
"We had a storm for the first two days, and then everyone became seasick, but I didn't. The others were all lying there Life going on:
'Oh, if we stayed in Lotte ...' But it didn't take long. We then had a good trip, just nine weeks on the big sea. "
On December 1, 1859, the Lotter Group arrived in St. Louis. A man took us along. "A man named Kallmeier took us home with his wagon. Then life started again.
That was 'Bruggemann is here!' It was as if the lost son had returned to his father, so we celebrated!
Bruggemann was able to acquire an abandoned farm in Femme Osage. He described in detail about the harvest and the yield, how he brought in the harvest,
what the yield was and what he bought for his family at affordable prices - from household items to horses and carriages.
Bruggemann especially celebrated eating and drinking in his "New World". Bread was even baked from wheat flour, he was amazed.
Back then in Westphalia, Wheat Bread was the privilege of the nobility and upscale and an unmistakable sign of luxurious prosperity - not so in America.
Bruggemann's conclusion: "It is the truth, it is better here, then lower class had in Germany!"