Posted on Fri, 11/01/2024 - 11:35am

In Touch with Prairie Living, November 2024
By Michael M. Miller

I extend Thanksgiving Best Wishes to you and your family. We can be deeply grateful our ancestors decided to immigrate to America from the Black Sea, Bessarabian and Volga German villages.

The GRHC will have a booth at the Pride of Dakota Holiday Showcase at Scheel’s Arena, 5225 31st Avenue South, Fargo, on Friday, November 1, 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. and Saturday, November 2, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Join us where we will have many German-Russian books, cookbooks, and other items.

Dr. Ann Braaten and I traveled to Steinbach & Winnipeg, Manitoba, and to Regina, Saskatchewan on October 10-13. In Steinbach, we visited the Mennonite Heritage Village to view the impressive exhibit, "Mennonite Reflections of Manitoba: Arriving in Manitoba 150 Years Ago." We saw the Quilter’s Room with many handmade quilts and embroidery work. In Winnipeg, we visited the Mennonite Canadian University and the Mennonite Heritage Archives.

The Regina Chapter of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia hosted presentations at the German Club. Dr. Ann Braaten, former curator of the Emily P. Reynolds Historic Costume Collection at NDSU, presented "Traditional Textiles and Clothing of Germans from Russia Immigrants." My presentation related to the history and culture of the Germans from Russia and the work of GRHC. Sponsorship in part was provided by the Saskatchewan German Council. Our appreciation to the Regina Chapter for their warm hospitality.

It was very special to meet Christina Bast Krismer & Wilfried and Mona Wetstein Leippi, Regina, who were interviewed in July 2006 for GRHC’s Dakota Memories Oral History Project. Their interviews are available at digitalhorizonsonline.org.

A highlight of the trip was a visit to the St. Peter’s Colony, near Kronau, southeast of Regina. The Colony includes a church, museum, grotto, and shrine. The area was founded by immigrants from the villages of Katharinental, Rastatt, and Speier in the Beresan District, near Odessa, Ukraine. In the spring of 1890, ten families and seven single men left the Black Sea village of Rastatt. They homesteaded near Kronau, southeast of Regina. They soon established a colony, initially known as Rastatt or Seven Colony, which they modeled after their original home. This name would be later changed to St. Peter’s Colony.

The first church at St. Peter’s Colony was built in 1903. The grotto was built in 1917 to honor Our Lady of Lourdes and is a popular pilgrimage site. St. Peter’s Colony was the home of one of the largest German group settlements in Canada and its first Benedictine Monastery. 

Christina Bast Krismer’s grandparents lived in St. Peter’s Colony. In her childhood, she has memories of the Grotto. She shared, “Going to the Grotto Feast on the Sunday closest to the 15th of August (this is considered the feast of the Assumption of Our Blessed Lady, Mary), there would be hundreds of attendees, maybe even thousands. The day started with the celebration of the Holy Mass followed by an early afternoon meal. Then at 3 p.m., there was Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament followed by the Blessing of the Sick.

There was a procession from the church to the church to the Grotto. The procession included the archbishop, priests, altar servers, along with young ladies in blue and white carrying the statue of our Blessed Lady, and parishioners. As they processed from the church to the Grotto hymns were sung – many of them in German. The one hymn sung in German I remember is Grosser Gott (Holy God We Praise They Name).”

Paul Eberle (87), Regina, was our tour guide to visit St. Peter's Colony. Paul attended the St. Peter's Catholic School grades 1 to 10. His favorite teacher was Sr. Benedicta Stangl, a member of the Ursuline Sisters Convent at Vibank, SK. Paul lived four miles away so they would travel to school with horse and buggy. He remembers as a child as a Mass Server for Fr. Henry Metzger, who was pastor from 1916 to 1949. Fr. Metzger was famous for his oil paintings. Many of his art works are at St. Peter's Church and St. Joseph's Colony.

Paul commented, "My mother, Katherine Coch Eberle, learned how to write and read the old German script. She would help the neighbors to read and write letters. She had no formal education. My grandparents only spoke German and really never learned English."

Marie Eberle/Metz Reid, Regina, writes, "My great grandparents, Michael Seiferling and Clara Neigum, and Johannes Eberle and Elizabeth Lanz, as well as, my grandparents, Joseph Eberle and Helen Seiferling helped build the St. Peter's Grotto both physically and financially.

When we were growing up, we went to the grotto every summer. There were some benches for the older people. Children were up on the top sides of the grotto. There was a stream of water on the north side of the grotto that people thought was holy water. People thought if they made the Sign of the Cross with Holy Water or touched the water they would be healed. This was our highlight of the summer as my mother made a new dress for my sister and me to wear for the pilgrimage."

We also visited St. Paul’s Catholic Cemetery at Vibank, SK, founded in 1904. The Ursuline Sisters established the first convent in Vibank in 1923. The convent also served as a girl’s school and dormitory. The school building remained as a Motherhouse until 1953 and served as a school and convent until 1977.

Near Balgonie, SK, we visited the settlement of St. Joseph’s Colony (Josephstal), established in 1886. At the St. Jacob’s Catholic Cemetery, Blumenfeld, stand beautiful wrought-iron crosses surrounded by Canadian prairie grasses. We visited this cemetery while filming Prairie Public’s 2002 award-winning documentary, “Prairie Crosses, Prairie Roses: Iron Crosses of the Great Plains.”

For more information about donating family histories and photographs, or how to financially support the GRHC, contact Jeremy Kopp, at jeremy.kopp@ndsu.edu or 701-231-6596; mail to: NDSU Libraries, Dept. 2080, PO Box 6050, Fargo, N.D. 58108-6050; or go to www.ndsu.edu/grhc. You may also contact me directly at michael.miller@ndsu.edu or 701-231-8416.

November column for North Dakota and South Dakota weekly newspapers.