Okla-homey
10/6/2008, 05:57 AM
Today is German-American Day in the United States, now a word about the first Germans in America and the "Hardest Working People in North America"...
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October 6, 1683: First Germans arrive in America
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Encouraged by William Penn's offer of 5,000 acres of land in the colony of Pennsylvania and the freedom to practice their religion, the first Mennonites arrive in America aboard the Concord. They were among the first Germans to settle in the American colonies.
They would ultimately become known by the English neighbors as the Pennsylvania Dutch. Dutch was a corrupted form of the word Deutsch, meaning "German" in the German language.
"For true evangelical faith...cannot lay dormant; but manifests itself in all righteousness and works of love; it...clothes the naked; feeds the hungry; consoles the afflicted; shelters the miserable; aids and consoles all the oppressed; returns good for evil; serves those that injure it; prays for those that persecute it."
— Menno Simons, Founder of the Mennonite Sect, 1539
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Menno Simons
The Mennonites, members of a Protestant sect founded by Menno Simons in the 16th century, were widely persecuted in Europe. Seeking religious freedom, Mennonite Francis Daniel Pastorius led a group from Krefeld, Germany, to Pennsylvania in 1683 and founded Germantown, the pioneer German settlement in America and now part of the city of Philadelphia.
Pastorius hailed from a wealthy, aristocratic German family; he was trained in the classics and in law.
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/2533/pastori1ix7.jpg
Unveiling festivities for the Pastorius Monument in Philadephia were postponed because of the U.S. entry into World War I. Anti-German sentiment caused the government to dissolve the German-American Alliance, and the monument was encased in a large box by the War Department until its dedication in 1920. When the United States entered the Second World War, the monument was 'boxed' again and remained concealed until the war ended.
Numerous other German groups followed, and by the American Revolution there were 100,000 Germans in William Penn's former colony, more than a third of Pennsylvania's total population at the time.
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/6996/pastimage3va3.gif
Germans in America were the first group to publicly oppose human chattel slavery in North America. Inspired by their Mennonite faith, it really came down to application of the Golden Rule for them. In short, because they would not be enslaved, they believed no one should be subjected to enslavement
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/9030/pastgermanamerican20daygj0.gif
October 6, 1683: First Germans arrive in America
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/8848/pastcmpbl6013gix8.jpg
Encouraged by William Penn's offer of 5,000 acres of land in the colony of Pennsylvania and the freedom to practice their religion, the first Mennonites arrive in America aboard the Concord. They were among the first Germans to settle in the American colonies.
They would ultimately become known by the English neighbors as the Pennsylvania Dutch. Dutch was a corrupted form of the word Deutsch, meaning "German" in the German language.
"For true evangelical faith...cannot lay dormant; but manifests itself in all righteousness and works of love; it...clothes the naked; feeds the hungry; consoles the afflicted; shelters the miserable; aids and consoles all the oppressed; returns good for evil; serves those that injure it; prays for those that persecute it."
— Menno Simons, Founder of the Mennonite Sect, 1539
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/7071/past498pxmenosimonisvg3.jpg
Menno Simons
The Mennonites, members of a Protestant sect founded by Menno Simons in the 16th century, were widely persecuted in Europe. Seeking religious freedom, Mennonite Francis Daniel Pastorius led a group from Krefeld, Germany, to Pennsylvania in 1683 and founded Germantown, the pioneer German settlement in America and now part of the city of Philadelphia.
Pastorius hailed from a wealthy, aristocratic German family; he was trained in the classics and in law.
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/2533/pastori1ix7.jpg
Unveiling festivities for the Pastorius Monument in Philadephia were postponed because of the U.S. entry into World War I. Anti-German sentiment caused the government to dissolve the German-American Alliance, and the monument was encased in a large box by the War Department until its dedication in 1920. When the United States entered the Second World War, the monument was 'boxed' again and remained concealed until the war ended.
Numerous other German groups followed, and by the American Revolution there were 100,000 Germans in William Penn's former colony, more than a third of Pennsylvania's total population at the time.
http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/6996/pastimage3va3.gif
Germans in America were the first group to publicly oppose human chattel slavery in North America. Inspired by their Mennonite faith, it really came down to application of the Golden Rule for them. In short, because they would not be enslaved, they believed no one should be subjected to enslavement