AHSGR Celebrates it’s 40th
Year As an Organization in Medicine Hat, Alberta
June 15 - 21 2009
In the past 40 years the American Historical Society of Germans from
Russia held two annual conventions in Canada. The first was
held in Calgary but the 2009 convention was held in Medicine Hat,
Alberta.
Southern Alberta has a rich heritage of German settlers and Rob
Renner, minister for environment Alberta, represented the province
in welcoming convention delegates during the opening ceremony.
Mr Renner states
“The ingenuity of those early settlers is applauded and they’ve
contributed to the fact this area is one of the most stable
economies in the province”. “We’re pleased and proud
you’ve come to celebrate your heritage and share your roots with
us.”
During his welcome, Mayor Norm Boucher stated “It’s very important to
know where you come from and it liberates you,”
An extensive hardcopy library, transferred from Lincoln for this
event, was available at the Medicine Hat Lodge while the
convention was in progress.eek. They also had an electronic database
referred to as Save Our Ancestral Records (SOAR) which contains over
26,000 obituaries that have been digitized and are online for
members to use. These are collected by volunteers and in some
cases are translated from old German newspapers.
A “Village Night” took place Thursday evening where individuals had
an opportunity to meet individuals that had connections to small
communities that their ancestors were from. I have always
found this of particular value as I meet new people and it helps to
build a friendship that goes beyond the time spent at the
convention.
The remainder of the events are best shared by sharing the
newsletters that were prepared and available for distribution at the
convention. AHSGR also has a "blog spot" where this is
available. Check out the photos and the stories to learn
more about the convention. The articles were written by Anna
Bartkowski who is also the editor of the AHSGR Journal and took the
time to document what she could during the convention.
June 18 Newsletter
- released during the convention
June 19 Newsletter
- released during the convention
June 20 Newsletter
- released during the convention
Medicine Hat, as a community, is situated near the Saskatchewan
border and is rich in history. I had the opportunity to
visit the Hillside Cemetery. A large cemetery situated near
the edge of the city. It has some 28,000 residents on a 56
acre plot of land with many beautiful trees. As I
searched for some of my relatives there, I could not help but notice
the many familiar surnames that most of us would recognize
especially if we come from the Dakotas and Nebraska. I walked
part of the cemetery taking photos of headstones of relatives I
never had the chance to meet.
Driving around Medicine Hat, one also sees some historic places
less connected to the German Russian heritage but certainly where
German Russians visited, worked etc. One such place was the
Medicine Hat Clay Industries. This pottery is now only place
where one can tour the the remains of what once was Medalta
Potteries (www.medalta.org). What I saw reminded me much of
Minnesota's own Redwing Pottery.
During my time in the library, I found it rewarding to help
numbers of people with their search but sometimes such volunteer
work has it's reward. I met a lady who was born and reared in
Medicine Hat. As she grew to adulthood, she married and lived
elsewhere in Canada. As she and her husband retired, they
longed to move back to Medicine Hat. With a little help,
she's now busy learning about her heritage. As we talked, she
told me of a POW camp that existed at the site of the present rodeo
grounds. The POW camp housed some 18,000 German
prisoners during WW II. She told me that Medicine Hat was only
10,000 in size during those years and of some of the fears and
happenings at the site including several murders within the camp and
the results and justice that happened later as the war came to an
end.
