The Trades as Practiced in the Homeland
by Alfred Opp
Weavers
From the beginning, weavers were well-represented - imported
yard-good fabric was non-existent. It was the weavers who provided
cloth and blankets for the pioneer settlers. Fibers such as wool and
flax were used by these early weavers. The weaving trade served the
colonists until commercial yard goods became available. Teplitz had
a commercial weaving plant called “Jesse & Co.” that started
operations in 1895. It produced fine woolen cloth for private and
commercial use. After that, our town had very few weavers, but one
did live next door to my parents. These weavers made floor runners,
Plachta (blankets),
spreads and horse blankets, among other things. Our neighbor kept
busy, Mom said, and did well. These same types of items made by the
Bulgarians were available at the market, but the colors were not to
our taste. We have a Plachta
in our possession, given to us by my aunt as a souvenir from back
home.
Millers
To grind grain into flour is a very ancient practice. Our ancestors
made do with a hand-operated mill device that later was upgraded to
using horse power. But this was still slow and produced poor quality
flour. Then someone thought of using wind power. My ancestor Erhard
Müller has been named as one of the first to build and use a
windmill. But using wind power to run a mill didn’t work out either
due to an unsteady supply of wind. In the mid- to late-1800’s,
things changed when steam-power became available. That was a big
improvement that worked well for us until we left in 1940.
Our grandmothers were always
looking for high quality flour. My ancestor J. Zacher helped to set
up the steam-powered mill in Teplitz. The steam generators were
fired with straw. Wood and coal were expensive, but straw we had in
abundance.
Masons
The masonry trade was in demand in Teplitz from day one. These
masons did their work with limited resources and their work was not
fancy in design. The first houses built in Teplitz were little more
than one-room huts that had a hearth in the middle of the room with
no flue – only a hole in the roof. The masons were kept busy
building the hearths and bake ovens. In addition to these jobs, the
masons also lined the wells. In later years, the Russians and
Bulgarians took up the trade, and they were masters at their craft.
Our local masons were kept busy building hearth ovens, retaining
walls and cellars. The jobs of building stone houses and other large
projects went to the outsiders.
Butchers
To kill an animal is not a new idea, and we had butchers among us
from the first settler in Teplitz. The books about Teplitz give
names of butchers who at one time worked their trade under a license
set up by the community. This means that these butchers either
worked or sold meat from an outlet under supervision. This could
indicate that these butchers needed guidance to be honest and fair
to the settlers. A butcher named K. H. learned his craft in Germany
and set the standard for meat cutting.
Smoking and salting of meat was not new either. What changed in meat
preparation was the method of preparing sausage meat for casing.
Today we have meat grinders – back then meat was chopped by hand.
That had to be done just right, and not everybody had the talent.
People who lacked this skill hired those who were good at it. Word
of mouth has it that these “expert” choppers did their chopping to a
rhythm.
In my time, we had many butchers who were available for hire.
Unemployment forced men to seek more than one trade to feed their
families. The good ones stood out from the rest. My parents chose
Friedrich Keller, a big man, to do this chore. His wife, Justine,
was the midwife who introduced me to this world. My Zacher
grandparents used a man named A. Dreher, who had the reputation of
being the best in the business. That came with a price. Friedrich
Keller was so precise and fast that he was capable of butchering two
pigs in one day.
When the day set for butchering work arrived, everything had to be
ready down to the smallest details. Mom got help from Dad’s mother
and sister who showed up at daybreak to do the preparation work.
Plenty of hot water was needed along with a clean place to work,
clean towels, and containers on hand. The pigs we raised were heavy,
and fattened up to produce meat and lard. When the pig was killed,
it was not an easy thing to watch. Then work started, with everybody
running according to their assigned orders. The intestines had to be
cleaned, the meat was ground up, and then everything was ready for
sausage making. Meat cuts for salting and smoking were set aside for
preparation on a later day. For us kids, butchering day was a feast
– for our parents it was a hard day’s work. We children got the
first taste of “pot meat” – usually the pig’s tail, or a slice from
the liver.
We learned to get by on what we had, and to make the best of it.
With no time to spare in our struggle to survive, all creative ideas
for improvements that came along got a try. One person helping
another created a community bond. To survive, we all needed each
other. From the time we were removed to Germany in 1940, and then on
to Poland for settlement, the lives of the Bessarabians has been a
school of new things to get used to. After 1948 our men and women
adjusted to jobs in the modern industrial world. It was amazing how
well our people were able to adapt to a modern system. This can be
explained solely by the fact that our people had developed a great
deal of common sense over the years. I’m proud of them and can speak
on a personal note. Our people left nothing undone, and they did not
quit a task without finishing it. They had many challenges to
overcome and faced one obstacle after another. People have energy
and strength, but it takes a will to put that to work. I’m battling
a serious illness for which there is no cure. What I do have going
for me is my will to live. According to the doctor I have already
passed the dateline.
If you stand up for what you believe, you are already half-way to
succeeding.
Alfred Opp
Edited by Connie Dahlke
____________________
Alfred Opp is
the author of "Pawns on the World Stage" - the memoirs of his
childhood in Teplitz, Bessarabia and the experiences of his family
in war-torn Europe (Poland during 1941-1945 before they fled to East
Germany in 1945, then the reconstruction of West Germany 1945-1955)
- available from the NDSU website.