This picture is in the Watson-Curtze Mansion in Erie. It's a family picture and it shows part of my Eriete family. There is Louis Albracht with his family, Frederick and August Albracht and the Mertens family, who are descendants of Louis' elder sister Wilhelmine. I had no pictures of them before and I am so glad that Patti knew that I use to talk often about my Albracht-family when she visited the museum. She remembered the name when reading it on this photo.
Thank you so much, Patti!
Playing with strong colors... I made a cup series for my kitchen with this picture on it.
I you have got such a nice cousin like I have got, you can praise yourself lucky! He sent me the most valuable item I can think of, the family violin af my Albracht-family. Don't resent me the name, dear cousin, I used it in the originally German version.
Dr. Kenneth Albrecht from Erie
Kenneth and his sister Grace
Erie Highschool Orchestra
Kenneth plays the sax; picture taken in the Todd Studios, St. Louis
The violin is from Kenneth Albrecht (in the center with sax). Kenneth and his sister Grace were grandchildren of Louis Albracht about whom I just posted on my blog. His father was Frederick Albracht, who was a master plumber in Erie. The family went to St. Louis in the 1920ies, were the family owned a music studio. He later came back to Erie. Dr. Kenneth Albrecht, his son, played in several orchestras of the roaring St. Louis during the 20ies and 30ies. He also played on several records and made some film music for Hollywood. His sister Grace wa a singer in New York City.
These are early recordings of 1928, where Dr. Kenneth Albrecht plays the clarinette in Wylie's orchestra.
Ken Albrecht with band on a show boat, St. Louis
Kenneth died young at the age of 46. He had a car accident in Michigan, Ann Arbor. This was in 1950. The newspapers reported about this tragic accident.
His grave at Calvary Cemetery, Erie
He is not forgotten. I left a virtual bunch of flowers at his grave a few days ago, because I found a memorial of him in the internet. And once I will be able to lay real flowers down on his grave, I'm sure.
RIP, Kenneth.
Yesterday was the big day I held his violin in my hands for the very first timeand couldn't believe this. After I fetched it from Kassel, where it arrived, I put it reverential on the drawer in our present living room and I was very, very touched. Here it is, a present of unmeasurable affection value. I am speechless about the fact that I was found worthy to own it. Thank you, dearest cousin, simply thank you, that you gave me such heirloom of your father.
Let me hug you, dear cousin. I don't know how I can ever thank you for a present like this.
It's November again. A month, we use to think of our beloved family members and friends, who are deceased. A month, we use to bring flowers and wreaths to their graves and light candles, that brighten the night on the graveyards.
And when you can't go there, you can bring virtual flowers. Yesterday I found an interesting site where I found a lot of graves of my Eriete family. Here is one, just as an example: Louis Albracht, who went to Erie with his twin brother Henry. Both were born in Rhoden in the beautiful Dukedom of Waldeck. Louis was a carpenter and reconstructed the Lutheran Church in Erie, Henry was an engineer. Both constructed sturdy brick houses at French Street 309 and 310 after they attended and survived the Civil War. Their nephew Carl Reins died in Tennessee, but both brothers were lucky and came back to Erie. Louis married Lena Curtze. He died in 1910.
Here is a picture for Louis from where he is born:
I'm sure he can see all this from his cloud in heaven.
Findagrave.com is a wonderful site, where you can find a lot of information about your family. And it's a wonderful way to send virtual flowers. Thank you for this! Theanks to the people who made this site and thanks to those who helped with all the pictures of tombstones.
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Tombstone of Louis: Picture shot by my cousin Mary Kappelt Skol at Erie Cemetery
Rhoden: Old Postcard owned by my Aunt Louise Klapthor of Erie
Sometimes you need a little cheering up, especially when you have been working on a construction site for more than a half year and it still looks awful and you nearly can't recognize that the rooms will hopefully look some time in the future as beautiful as you imagine.
Look, I bought these two plates at an auction, two brother plates, so to say: souvenir plates from Erie and from Lake Eder in Waldeck and both plates maybe about the same age. The two Lakes are like the two halves of our family, one in Erie and one in Waldeck.
I'm going to display them in a glass cabinet in my study or in the hall of our new old great-grandfather-house we are currently renovating. And an old map of Erie will be placed above my desk and maybe another also in the hall.
This is the map. It shows Erie at about 1870, the time when my family arrived there.
Which of the two is the most beautiful? For me it is Lake Erie because of the waves and the white beach. Lake Erie is a bit like an ocean. It's a big wish of me to walk there along the shore, my feet in the water and looking for some beach glass. - Lake Eder doesn't have such beautiful beach. It is an articifial lake and it is mostly surrounded by woods. For me it is most interesting when the water level is down and you can walk between the ruins of the sunken villages, which formerly accompanied the river Eder in it's deep valley, which is now filled with water.
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Pictures:
- plates and map: taken by Georgia, all rights reserved
- Lake Erie and Lake Eder: Public domain
Renaissance Center:
Patti inspired me to find out more about the Erie Renaissance Center with her beautiful photos she took from the reliefs of the entrance of the Reanaissance Center.
In my postcard colleciton I found this old one from the 1940ies. The architecture is pure Art Deco. The building was constructed in 1926 by Dennison & Hirons who also constructed some really impressive buildings in New York, New Jersey and other Cities in the USA between 1918 and 1937.The building is made of grey brick and limestone. The arched entrance and huge windows in the first floor are decorated with sort of a Reanaissance like design, but clearly Art Deco, when you take a closer look. Gems are seven murals of Edward A. Trumbull, which show scenes of Erie's history. Unfortunately I found no pictures of them.The building formerly was a banking department of the National Bank and Trust Company. Today there are still ofices in it. As far as I know it's Erie's tallest office building.
I tried to make a short trip to the Reanissance Center at State Street/10th Street via Street View, but the pictures are very bad.
See? Quite a bad and ugly picture. But here are better ones and also a lot of interesting stuff about Renaissance Center and the architects: http://www.emporis.com/application/?nav=building&lng=3&id=130332
Boston Store:
Another gem in the same style is the Boston Store in Erie, which was the premier department store in town. As I heard shoppers were attracted by the quality of the goods, an excellent service and many other special features of the store. It closed in 1979. This is very sad and reminds me of many closings of old department stores in Germany the last years. Department stores seem to be no longer up-to-date. Nobody seems to need them any more. The Boston Store building is an example of typical Art Deco architecture and I love the colorful but decent decoration, the clear lines of the storefront and the beautiful watch tower, which is a distinctive landmark in town.
Today I went on with my sightseeing tour through Erie. I visited State Street with the old Warner Theater.
Two picures taken from nearly the same place... from about the 1940ies and today. The sign of the old Warner Theater is still there, but nearly hidden behind trees. And there is a building in the background with a rectancgular shape on it's roof that still can be identified. Between these two still existing landmarks a new and higher building was constructed and the building in the left foreground seems to have lost it's upper stories.
The right side of the street looks totally different. Not a single building survived. Instead of the ornated structures of the old architecture there are simple concrete blocks, which don't look very invitingly, just the opposite. They look like simple functional buildings, faceless and - please don't resent me this - boring.
Comparing both pictures the lack of urban life in the new one is obvious. What has happened to this beautiful and busy spot of the city? Why are the old buildings gone? Where is the street life, the shops with marquees and nicely decorated store windows? Where are the sidewalk cafés? It looks a bit like Kassel (Hesse) in Germany, where there huge town highways turned formerly alive town quarters into bleak urban canyons. But Kassel was totally destroyed in 1945, only nearly 10 percent of the town survived the heavy bombings and later several blazes bolted down the rest of the town. Later the architects denied all traditions, all heritage of the town, because they wanted to create a modern town. A town for car drivers.The result looks quite similar (but much, much, much worse): Broadloom streets, nearly no streetlife, concrete blocks....
But perhaps it is only a not very representative picture of the business district of Erie.... It's difficult to learn something about a place when you can't visit it personally. Street View is a good thing, but it is only a snapshot.
I fell in love with Erie, long ago. So this is no slandering and this post is filed under "I love Erie", because I do love Erie very much. Please don't understand my words this way, I don't want to slander Erie. It's just the opposite, an ardent avowal of my interest in Erie: The deep wish that things will turn out good for Erie after losing a lot of it's industry, that this wonderful street life will come back. I nearly daily experience how difficult the revitalization of a town can be when urban life is gone. I experienced how the architects of the period after WW II murdered the old town of Kassel. Erie is so beautiful, the landscape around so awesome and breathtaking. There are so many beautiful spots in the town. But the urban districts become more and more desolate, in Erie and in Germany or Kassel. There are big changes which cause this deployment: The demographic change, new kinds of retail (internet shops, shopping TV, factory outlets, malls) cause shrinking business districts in our towns. The formerly beautiful department stores close and empty buildings or 1-Dollar-Shops follow. The shrinking process and de-industrialization leave empty buildings and street canyions with no urban life. Our business districts have to become more concrete. The retail must be concentrated and pedestrian zones should support the retail. Old and characterizing buildings should be conserved, because these landmarks are important for the identification of the citizens with their home town.
I would like to know if you are thinking similar in America or if you think different. I'm very involved in town planning since my study was town geography and my daughter currently is studying architecture and town planning. I also love old buildings, so I'm very interested in conserving them and the protection of historical buildings. In Germany nearly all old buildings are historical buildings (even my great grandfather's house I'm currently renovating). We lost too many architectureal gems in Germany during WW II and during the 1960ies and 70ies, when many old buildings were broken down to build concrete blocks, which are called "Plattenbau" in Germany. The translation is "plate building", because they were made of concrete plates.
Here is the most cruel way of town planning I know: The Altmarkt (Old Market) of Kassel before 1943 und today (nearly the same view; look at the two church towers) after it was rebuilt in the 1950ies, 60ies and 70ies. Simply terrible, isn't it?
Today I made a trip to Waldameer. When I arrived I first took a photo of the sign:
No, not really, only virtually. Sigh!
It was mainly a historical trip with the help of my postcard collection I made today. But maybe you enjoy these old photos as much as I did:
Cafe in the Woods, 1911- I wonder if the building is still there. It looks very, very nice and I would like to have a cup of coffee or some Coca Cola there. And some ice cream would be nice! Vanilla ice cream, please.
Later a long walk along the beach would be fine. I love to watch the waves and to listen to their noise. I love to walk on the sandy beach. And then I would put off my shoes and walk through the low and cool water. It's pure fun. I would look for a little beach glass...
The first picture must be taken abaout 1920, the second is from about 1940. I guess it has changed again a lot since then.
From the beach I would walk back to the roller coaster.I wonder, if this one is still there and if it is at it's place. And I wonder what it might look like today. The picture is from 1911. I love the nice little tower on the right. Riding this old fashioned roller coaster would be fun although I usually don't like such thrill. I never visit any fairs.
Later, when sunset is near I would prefer strolling through the wood or walking on the Board Walk. I guess this wonderful place is long gone? The picture was also taken in 1911.
Waldameer is a lovely piece of earth!
Mike wrote an interesting article about the Erie Farmers Market:
http://www.erieblogs.com/2011/08/10/visit-the-south-east-erie-farmers-market-this-weekend
It's a good thing to buy local products at a market, where you can talk to the producers and where you know that the veggies and fruits are fresh and produced properly. I learned that there is such market in or near Erie for three years now.
I wonder, whether this is the only market in and around Erie or if it is a very, very special market. In Germany there are still markets in all towns several days in the week, in some towns even daily. And there also mostly local vendors sell their goods. These markets take place on the main market place of a town. How about Erie? Are there such markets in the main business district? I would eagerly like to know.
The article inspires me to visit our market in Warburg the next days to take some photos for my blog and to write something about our local market. Wait a few days, there will be an article about a small German local market in Warburg!
Here you find some information about the town: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg
Warburg, view from the river Diemel
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