ROOTS & BRANCHES

Last week’s “Roots & Branches” column reviewed the late Corinne P. Earnest’s third edition of Papers for Birth Dayes: Guide to the Fraktur Artists and Scriveners.

It’s a massive four-volume compilation of Earnest’s life work, again amply securing her reputation as the “Queen of Fraktur.”

As I noted last week, Earnest helped me on many times when she’d find Fraktur or registers in family Bibles to submit to Der Kurier, the journal of the Mid-Atlantic Germanic Society, while I was its editor. On several occasions, without knowing it she found documents relating to my personal pedigree.

On one occasion, she found a Bible printed in Europe that had gone up for auction with registers from the related Wilhelm, Unruh and Kintzer families in my pedigree. The Bible obviously had been brought along by the family when they immigrated. Alas, the Bible had already been auctioned and when I contacted the winning bidder about possibly selling it, he told me “it looks really nice on my coffee table.” Sigh.

Another after-auction experience worked out much better. Earnest knew I was interested in Fraktur showing the baptisms performed by the Rev. Isaac Miesse, a Reformed pastor in the mid-19^th century who served many congregations but left “holes” in the record books at all of them.

Earnest contacted me to say that she had seen the certificate of a Miesse baptism for a Thomas K. Hiester in a large auction lot. What she didn’t know was that Thomas was one of my great-grandfathers! The winning bidder, who sold me several certificates, including Thomas’s, his wife Emma Amelia Ruth’s, those of Thomas’s parents Harrison K. Hiester and Rosabella Kershner, and Harrison’s mother Catharina Kremer.

When added to the photocopy of Rev. Daniel Schumacher certificate of Catharina’s father Johannes Kremer (again secured by Earnest) and the certificate framed by my mother of Thomas’s son Walter (my grandfather), I have knowledge of six consecutive generations of Fraktur.

Using the Birth Dayes volumes, I was able to gain insight on the scriveners who did the in-fill for several artifacts in my personal collection.

The scrivener for Harrison K. Hiester’s certificate was the prolific Francis D. Leavan, for whom more than 300 samples survive, and who Earnest describes as “the folkiest of the angel-type decorates. She notes he was active from 1826 to 1850, which fits Harrison’s 1832 birth.

I also have two family Bibles and the Birth Dayes books identify them, too. One from the Harrison and Rosabella Hiester family was scribed by Gottlieb Schmid, who used a distinctive, illuminated handwriting (in addition to the Bible, Thomas’s certificate was done by Schmid).

A Bible from the family of Peter Daub and Christianna Rupp was scribed by Charles B. Smith, who used a difficult-to-read handwriting called Spencerian, according to Earnest. The family lived in Lebanon County, which matched Smith’s prime area of operation.

For information on buying the third edition of Papers for Birth Dayes, go to the website www.rdearnestassociates.com. or write to Russell D. Earnest, P.O. Box 1132, Clayton, DE 19938.