The sketches below are from
an article, “The Disciples of Menno
Simonis (sic), Their Settlement in
Central Kansas,” published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper
(New York), March 20, 1875. My grandfather Willems’ family arrived in
Mountain Lake, Minnesota, the summer of 1875, and I imagine they looked much
like the people in these sketches. Although
these sketches were made in Central Kansas, the conditions my family faced
would have been much the same. That area
of Minnesota is prairie, and Mountain Lake had a Settlement House for the large
group of Mennonites who descended on it beginning in 1873.
I came across the article and
its illustrations one day while browsing the shelves of the library at the
Columbia campus of the University of Missouri, which has a surprisingly large
collection of books about and by
Mennonites. Titled Brothers in Deed to Brothers in Need: A Scrapbook about Mennonite
Immigrants from Russia 1870-1885[1],
the book was compiled, edited & published by Clarence Hiebert, Professor of
Religious Studies at Tabor College, a Mennonite Brethren school located in Hillsboro, Kansas.
This thick, large format book
is a compilation of photocopied newspaper articles, government documents, ship
lists, old photos, sketches and advertisements pertaining to the emigration of
Mennonites from Russia to North America between the years 1870, when the
Mennonites in South Russia began to seriously considering leaving Russia, to1885,
when the largest wave of migration subsided.
The arrival of thousands of these strange foreigners—about 15,000 to the
prairie states in the United States and about 8,000 to Manitoba in
Canada—evoked a flurry of curiosity.
Newspapers and magazines sent reporters who researched the history of
these people, their beliefs, values and reputation. They wrote long articles informing their
readers abound the Mennonites reasons for migrating, describing what they
looked like , what they offered to the communities where they settled, what
their new neighbors might expect from them:
“The emigrants are a conscientious, hard-working agricultural people,
and most of them are the possessors of a moderate capital. A very large amount of money has thus come
into this country, as it is estimated that the head of each family brought from
$2,000 to $10,000. They will be welcomed
by any State within whose limits they settle.”
--*--
Those words are from the
article which accompanied the sketches above.
An even earlier example comes from a long, very thorough article printed
in The
Chicago Times, August 26, 1873, when the very first Mennonite emigrants
began to arrive:
THE MENNONITES
(Special Correspondence)
“ELKHART, Ind. Aug. 23.—The 19 families of Mennonites
that recently reached this country from Russia, and who have been heralded
throughout the country as the advance of a very large immigration, arrived at
this place on Wednesday of the week and are furnished with temporary quarters
until they decide upon a permanent location.
The party consists of exactly 90 persons, old and young, all healthy and
hardy-looking specimens, with the blonde complexion so common to the people of
their native country prevailing among them. . . .
“The Mennonites are good agriculturalists, but are
particularly noted for their plantations of fruit, forest, and mulberry
trees. This culture they have followed
with great success on steppes that were formerly perfectly bare. The intended emigrants are, according to the
best accounts, intelligent, industrious, and persevering. In addition, they are very clean, moral, temperate
and economical. They are excessively
religious. Petzoulet (?) in his travels
in 1835, says that it is his “firm conviction that Russia, cannot show any more
diligent or more useful citizens.” There
are schools in every village, attendance at which is made compulsory. Education is universally among them. . . .
“…they also bring a large amount of ready money. They are most acceptable as future citizens.”
--*--
Not all reports were this
positive, and not all their new neighbors welcomed them. However,
their agricultural ability was generally praised, and the gold they brought
with them was never turned down.
