^{The News}
Dedicated to Austrian-Hungarian Burgenland Family History

1) THE PRESIDENT'S CORNER (by Tom Steichen)

This month's random bits and pieces (Article 1) begins with a bit about women in the Austrian Armed Forces, continues with a bit about where Americans were born, reports on an Austria-wide anti-inflation plan, jumps back into the SPÖ leadership battle, then repeats (for the third and final time) two requests for assistance, the Großpetersdorf request for materials for their 750th anniversary book and the Vienna University student's request for interview subjects.

Our regular tidbits include the monthly BB Facebook report, book sales, a member-recommended recipe (you should consider providing one too!) and some words for thought.

We follow that with an Ancestral Trip report to Olbendorf by Dick Schmalzl. People are traveling again! It sounds like he and his family had a rewarding trip.

The remaining articles are our standard sections: A Historical BB Newsletter article, Ethnic Events and Emigrant Obituaries.



Ed: Because there will not be a newsletter at the end of June, I've chosen to add this short update to the current newsletter:

June 4 Update, Austrian SPÖ Chairmanship Election: A number of tidbits below, I reported on the SPÖ member survey expressing preference for the party chair, but I noted that the chairmanship would actually be determined by the formal election at the party congress on 3 June. Burgenland governor, Hans Peter Doskozil, led the survey with 33.7% of the vote, followed by Traiskirchen mayor Andreas Babler with 31.5%, and incumbent Pamela Rendi-Wagner with 31.3%. The remaining 3.5% of the vote was cast for "none of the named candidates." As promised, Rendi-Walker withdrew from further participation given she failed to win the survey. Babler said he would further contest the election and he did.

As planned, the vote of the party congress was made public yesterday with Hans Peter Doskozil being elected as the new SPÖ party chair with 53% of the vote to 46.8% for Babler (apparently 0.2% [one vote] was for neither). So, change will soon be coming for Burgenland.

Ed: And then I was forced to add another update!

June 5 Update: Chaos Ensues: Did you read above that I said "apparently 0.2% [one vote] was for neither"? Well, that was an impossibility, so it had to be an invalid vote. And that led to a re-examination of the ballots, where it was determined that the vote was indeed invalid and should have been included in that count. But what else was discovered was that a spreadsheet transfer error had caused the votes for Doskozil and Babler to be reversed. Thus the electoral commission has now declared Babler as the winner of the election and released new numbers.

However, not so quick... the numbers released, a least to my eye, do not add up properly. In the first (wrong release) it was said there were 601 votes cast, with 596 valid. Doskozil was said to have received 316 votes and Babler 279 votes, which is a total of 595 valid votes, which led to the re-examination.

The current news release says Babler received 317 votes and Doskozil 280 votes, for a total of 597 valid votes, two more than the corrected previous valid total (which is not a simple swapping of votes between candidates!). The news release also included the percentages these counts represent (52.66% and 46.51%), and me, being a statistician, quickly calculated whether those percentages and counts made sense together. The answer is, yes, but only if you bring the total to 100% by including 5 invalid votes. But, if you do that, then the total vote count is 602, one more than the total previously reported!

So what is correct? As of now, Doskozil announced that he would accept defeat and withdraw from federal politics "once and for all." Babler, however, called for an additional review and recount, as he did not want to accept the leadership role if the legitimacy of doing so remained in question. Such a review is underway. But, as of now, it appears there will not be a leadership change coming for Burgenland.

Ed: Last update (we hope):

June 6, Babler Confirmed: The recount was completed and the corrected numbers were confirmed. As a result, the head of the electoral commission apologized to everyone and then resigned. Now the SPÖ has the difficult task of regaining the trust of the Austrian voters.



Women in the Austrian Armed Forces: On April 1, 1998, women were first allowed to volunteer for a career in the Austrian Armed Forces. However, 25 years later, participation by women remains limited. In Burgenland, the proportion of women is less than three percent, whereas at least ten percent is the target. Overall, the active military is quite small in Burgenland, meaning there is just 28 women among the 976 soldiers.  

Unlike men, women in Austria do not have a compulsory military commitment. Men must go through six months of what is called "basic military service" ...essentially boot camp and initial specialized training. Thereafter, they can opt to continue active service in the military or can move to the reserves.

Women, as noted above, can volunteer for a military career. Like as for men, volunteering involves at least a one-year commitment and possibly as many as four years. This lengthy commitment was believed to be a deterrent to participation. So, as of April 1, 2023, women can volunteer for just the six-month "basic military service."

Karl Schifflhuber, from the Army Personnel Office, claims basic military service is a great opportunity to inspire and retain people for the armed forces, saying "40 percent of the junior cadres among the men decide to enter a cadre career during their basic military service." It is hoped that the same will happen with women, as the program provides the same opportunities and pay as for men.

[Ed. notes: 1) The claim of 40% of junior cadres opting for a career must refer to a subset of inductees, as the Austrian military would be much larger than it is if 40% of all Austrian inductees stayed in the military. Recent statistics place total active Austrian military personnel at ~22,000; the number of Austrian men reaching service age annually exceeds that, so a 40% retention among all inductees would cause the active military to more than double in three years, and there is no indication that this is occurring.
2) Elsewhere it was stated that "The total proportion of women in the Armed Forces is 25 percent." I assume that referred to both soldiers and civilian support personnel involved with the Austrian "Armed Forces" ...unless the participation rate by women elsewhere in Austria is significantly different than the 3% in Burgenland, which seems unlikely.]



For Each State, Where Were the Citizens Born? I stumbled across an interesting infographic that I thought I would share with you.

The best infographics are dense with information yet simple to understand... and it's a bonus if they are pretty to look at. This one does a admirable job of answering its own question: Where are Americans born? It also gives you a clear view on trends and outliers, both nationally and regionally.

This one uses Alaska as its key at the top: As you can see, the x-axis is time, from 1850 to 2020; the y-axis is percent of the state population; and the colors separate the population into three groups: orange for immigrant, light blue for born in another US state, and dark blue for born in-state, plus gray for no data. An added feature is that the states are (roughly) arranged like they would appear on a map. Have a look:



There are some interesting findings, though I'm not convinced most are unexpected. For example, Nevada has the lowest share of residents born in-state (though Arizona is close). Conversely, Ohio and Pennsylvania have had consistently large majorities of native-born citizens. Of no surprise, the District of Columbia is also low on native-born. Further, a lot of the sun-states (i.e., retirement states) show decreasing proportions of native-born residents. One exception is California, where (I think) the cost of living has discouraged out-of-state transfers. Of some surprise to me, New York consistently has had few residents born in other states.

Given the nature of our group, I can't forget to mention foreign-born residents, who make up a significant part of many state populations... but not all. There are relatively many immigrants in New York and California, but relatively few in the middle-south states. The share is clearly on the increase in states like Florida and Texas, but has been much higher in the past in the northern and western tiers of states.

An interesting anomaly: West Virginia didn’t become a separate state until 1863, which is why its “native-born” population before 1870 was 0% (as they were all born in Virginia).

Do note that the data comes from the US Census (1850 to 1990) and American Community Surveys (2000-2020). The older data usually does not include Native- or African-Americans, and is therefore less accurate. Nonetheless, I hope you find it interesting!



Anti-Inflation Package in Austria: The Austrian Federal government recently announced three measures intended to curb inflation and its consequences for the Austrian population.

The first involves energy companies, who would be taxed more heavily via profit skimming if they did not lower prices. According to the Austrian Chancellor, Karl Nehammer, energy prices are the "root" of the "epidemic of inflation" and it is clear that "these energy prices must come down now." The measure calls for skimming of profits from energy companies when consumer costs exceed thresholds of 120 or 160 euros per MWh. The excess profit tax is to come into force as early as June. According to Nehammer, this will lead to a reduction in the customer price by a third for the currently most expensive energy supplier. [As a comparison, the current average residential cost per MWh in the US is $165 = 151€, and select areas in the US have significantly higher cost than this average value.]

The second measure affects grocery chains, who are to be put under greater pressure through increased price transparency. The government wants to regularly publish the price of a defined "food basket" in a food transparency report. Further, the food trade must publish the quantities of food made available to non-profit organizations as donations in kind and of food that has been destroyed. However, no actual price reductions are to be required.

The third measure involves the fees that the Federal government imposes. All federal fees will remain frozen in the coming year and will not be adjusted for inflation. In addition, the electricity and natural gas levy, which is currently suspended, will be suspended an additional six months. Finally, the fee measure recommends that municipalities reduce their fees for services such as sewer and garbage; municipalities that do so will be compensated by the federal government.

The package was immediately lambasted as too small and unlikely to reduce current costs, especially for foods. Most Austrian states had already imposed direct price interventions in energy and a fee freeze lowers nothing, so those measures do not change the status quo.

The government argued back that these are sustainable contributions to inflation dampening, noting that the federal deficit has to be halved in order to get back on a sustainable path. Therefore, "expansive" measures such as additional aid payments are "no longer expedient."



Results of the SPÖ Members Survey:



The results of the SPÖ member survey on the party chairmanship were announced Monday, May 22... and the results were a little bit surprising to me.

Among the 147,939 SPÖ members who were entitled to vote, 107,133 questionnaires were submitted and 106,952 were validly filled out (181 votes were ruled invalid), which corresponds to a valid voter turnout of ~72%.

The big surprise to me was that Andreas Babler polled so well, even to the extent that he garnered more votes than incumbent Pamela Rendi-Wagner. I expected the vote to be close, but only as a two-horse race.

While this survey carries some weight, the chairmanship will actually be determined by the formal election at the party congress on 3 June. Rendi-Wagner earlier said she would leave politics if she did not win the poll... but with a vote this close, I thought she might be inclined to remain a candidate and take her chances with the party functionaries she helped assemble. However, she announced her withdrawal from the party leadership on Tuesday morning and said she will not run again at the upcoming party congress.

Babler, however, said he would run if the gap was small, and it certainly was. In fact, the under-2500 gap in votes among the three candidates was significantly less than the 3700 who voted for none of these. Thus he declared his continued intention to become party chairman and will compete at the party congress.

Doskozil immediately claimed the chairmanship and said the party congress should honor the vote.

As for Burgenland, Doskozil had said that he plans to relinquish the office of governor with the start of the intensive election campaign for the National Council leadership (which would be about July 2024). Of course, that would only occur if the party congress confirms him as chairman. In his comments after the poll results, he acknowledged his previous statement and left unsaid who might succeed him as governor, saying instead that he feels obliged to continue his agendas as governor. The Burgenland Green party spokeswoman was less reserved, saying, "We have the obvious solution: Astrid Eisenkopf is a very competent deputy governor and I think we should soon elect the first female governor of Burgenland in the state parliament." However, during a medical leave last autumn, Doskozil was replaced by State Councillor Leonhard Schneemann, which many saw as an indication of a possible successor. Neither the FPÖ or ÖVP opposition parties addressed the governor situation, instead both used the poll result to claim Burgenland will suffer because Doskozil and the SPÖ will be distracted.

Thus the drama continues.



Großpetersdorf 750th Anniversary Book: I recently received a request from Dr. Gerhard Baumgartner, a historian from Vienna. He said that the municipality of Großpetersdorf will soon be celebrating the 750th anniversary of its first documented existence, so wants to publish a history of Großpetersdorf and the four villages belonging to it: Welgersdorf, Kleinpetersdorf, Kleinzicken and Miedlingsdorf. He has been commissioned to put together this volume (I have confirmed this) and is looking for documents and photographs of all kinds of things relating to either the history of the villages or the families that left for the USA, Canada, and South America.

He tells me that he has, so far, concentrated on finding relevant material in the Hungarian archives, but he soon realized that the material about emigration is especially weak. He went on to note that this especially true for Welgersdorf, a place where he has been led to believe had many migrants to the US—apparently about 400—but he says it is a lot of rumors with very few hard facts and very few photographs.

Therefore, he is requesting its emigrants and the descendants of its emigrants to provide documentary materials, both for Welgersdorf and the other villages in the municipality. If you have ancestral items related to the municipality... village and/or emigrant photos, passports, travel documents, heirlooms, diaries, emigrant/emigration stories, etc., please consider sharing these. Dr Baumgartner states that, "All materials will be archived digitally at the city hall. If the owner agrees, some will be published on the city homepage and in the printed volume in September. Owners of published materials will get a free copy of this book."

From this, it is evident that you will retain your original items and copyrights, as only digital copies will be used in this project. And given that digital is how this will be done, it is extremely important that the scans and photos be of as high quality as possible.

Dr. Baumgartner's email address is gerhard.baumgartner57@gmx.at. Please reach out to him for more details if you believe you have materials of interest for this project.

This is a project for which I strongly encourage you to respond if you have appropriate materials!



Vienna University Student Needs Interview Subjects: Nikola Blagojevic, a Master's candidate at Vienna University in the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, needs digital interview subjects for a class project regarding Burgenland's natural environment. I have confirmed that he is, in fact, a student there and that this is a legitimate request. Therefore, I am asking you to assist him by participating. I will present his request then add a few additional comments.



Nikola writes:

Dear BB members! I am a student at the University of Vienna conducting research on the Perception of the Environment at the National Park Neusiedlersee-Seewinkel for my ethnographic course. The research also encompasses the perception of the general environment of Burgenland. Due to the intended digital methodology of this project, I wish to talk via email with people from the United States who are affiliated with the Burgenland ecosystem in some way.

As we know, nature is almost always intertwined with our lives, so I would like to hear about your personal experiences or family stories related to Burgenland. In order to achieve this, I have prepared a number of questions that can be answered by email. Of course, if there are other things you would like to add or talk about in relation to Burgenland's environment, please do so. My email address is niko.bvic@gmail.com.



Editor: Nikola's project centers on the Neusiedlersee and the Seewinkel (but also includes the whole of Burgenland). Still, he has special interest in those of you who are familiar with this part of Burgenland. He also has special interest in BB members who live in Burgenland or frequently visit it. If you fit these categories, please strongly consider responding. Nonetheless, participation by people interested in other parts of Burgenland are needed.

Nikola has prepared nine questions, shown below, that they ask you to respond to. Please copy these questions, paste them into an email, then provide written responses. The questions provide some guidance on the level of detail desired but you may respond as you see fit. Your responses should be sent to: niko.bvic@gmail.com. He may have follow-up questions to clarify or expand answers.

(If you are unable to move the questions to an email, just write to Nikola and ask to have the questions provided directly in an email.)

Also, according to data privacy laws and school policy, Nikola is required to obtain written consent from each interviewee to be able to use your data, thus you will need to give your consent. The University of Vienna provides a standard consent page and corresponding privacy notice for this purpose, which I have translated to English. You can read them here: Consent/Privacy. However, it is sufficient merely to acknowledge that you have read and agree to these documents, so a one-sentence "consent to use data" has been added to the bottom of the questions. Please fill in your name in the space provided and send it with your answers when done.

Again, I strongly encourage you to respond.



Questions:

Part A: Please provide brief answers to these questions:

1. What is your relationship to Burgenland? That is, are you an emigrant or a descendant of an emigrant, and, if so, when did the emigrant emigrate and from which village?

2. Why did you or your ancestors migrate to the US?

3. Have you ever visited Burgenland? If so, which parts and when?

4. What do you like the most about Burgenland?

Part B: Please provide moderate answers to these questions:

5. Please share any stories about Burgenland regarding its lifestyle and, if possible, about the environment, either in the past prior to migration or in the present. For example, your family stories and experiences.

6. Do you have any contact with any of the Burgenland residents today? If so, do you talk about life and the environment in Burgenland? If so, please describe.

Part C: Please provide extended answers to these questions:

7. Taking into account the aforementioned questions about family history and life in Burgenland, would you say that you feel connected to nature in Burgenland - in the sense that you are familiar with how people perceived the environment and the role it played in their lives, both past and present?

8. Do you know how people in Burgenland take care of their natural habitats? If so, please describe.

9. Are you aware of how nature affects people, and do you know how they perceive the environment in Burgenland today and in the past? For example, agriculture, economy, climate, wildlife, tourism, water, and biodiversity. Please describe.

Consent to use data:

I (place your name here) have read the consent form and privacy notice provided by the University of Vienna and hereby give my consent to use this interview data under the conditions described.



The Facebook Bunch (from Vanessa Sandhu):

Greetings, Burgenland Bunch!

I hope that this message finds you all happy and healthy! Here is a little review of what we had going on in our Facebook group in May. We gained 11 new members and our membership count now stands at 2031. If you are missing from this number, please come join us! We would love to have you! facebook/TheBurgenlandBunchOFFICIAL/

BB staff member Johnny Santana provided us with a “Save the Date” for the First Burgenländer Austria SC’s 100th Anniversary Celebration. It will be held on Sunday, October 22nd, 2023 at the Plattduetsche Park Restaurant, 1132 Hempstead Turnpike, Franklin Square, NY. More details will be forthcoming, and we will be sure to share those with you as they become available.

Speaking of fun events, The Coplay Sängerbund will host its Stiftungsfest on Sunday, June 25th, 2023. Music begins at 2:30 pm. The Coplay Sängerbund Chorus and visiting guest choruses will perform. The Emil Schanta Band will also be playing afterwards. The event is open to the public. The Sängerbund is located at 205 S. 5th Street, Coplay, PA 18037.

Member Fred Knarr shared photos from his trip to the Austrian consulate in New York City as his daughter obtained her Austrian passport. He said the staff was wonderful, in case anyone ever needs their assistance!

I was fortunate enough to be able to attend 2 great events at the Coplay Sängerbund this month. I got to see the Alex Meixner Band perform and they were fantastic. As mentioned last month, Alex comes from the very musical Meixner family hailing from Eisenberg an der Pinka. He played many traditional songs and had a great gathering of local polka musicians join him on stage. I also got to attend the Maifest a few days later. Kudos to the Coplay Sängerbund’s Heritage Committee! They always do an amazing job of keeping the Burgenländer culture alive and well. I have many videos and photos of the events in the Facebook group, so if you are longing to hear some traditional music, swing on by and have a listen!

Member Christine Rubba shared a great video showing the members of the fire department setting up the Maibaum. It is very neat to see!

Member Martin Wolf shared many excellent historical photographs from Neuhaus am Klausenbach.

We had many queries about long-lost relatives this month, but our amazing members managed to find almost every single one! If you are trying to break down a brick wall in your genealogy search, let us know. We love to help!

Until next time, be well!

Vanessa



Update for book "The Burgenländer Emigration to America": Here is this month's update on purchases of the English issue of the 3rd edition of Dr. Walter Dujmovits' book "Die Amerika-Wanderung Der Burgenländer."

Current total sales are 1720 copies, as an interested person purchased 1 book during this past month.

As always, the book is available for online purchase at a list price of $8.89 (which is the current production charge for the book, as we purposely choose not to make a profit so we can avoid dealing with the income tax consequences and so you can obtain the book at as low a cost as possible!), plus tax & shipping. Unfortunately, the price above is somewhat higher than in previous months, as our on-demand publisher, Lulu, recently raised is printing prices by 9.5%, meaning we must charge more. See the BB homepage for a link to the information / ordering page and for information about current discounts (there is at least one discount on price or shipping available most of the time... if not, wait a few days and there will be one!).

The book is an excellent read for the Burgenländers in your family.



Burgenland Recipes: Many of our recipes have been passed down from grandparents or earlier, but as time passes, we recede farther from those generations, and the originals are becoming lost to time. To supplement our collection, we have featured some from cookbooks compiled from the originals. Others are from more current sources that capture the vibe but are from material like recent magazine articles. Moving forward, we may from time to time rely on our members' memories or personal experimentation to help fill this gap.

Steve Lamberty and his mom were searching Internet recipes and found a variation of potato salad which was very similar to what his family used to make. To provide due credit, the original recipe, along with additional photos and notes, can be found on foodie Aleksandra's website Everyday Delicious at this link.

Austrian Potato Salad
(suggested by Steve Lamberty)

Ingredients:

Note: Our recipes sortable list has links directly to the recipes or food-related articles published in our past newsletters. You can access the list by clicking our recipe box (to the right). Thanks to the contributions of our members over the years, we have quite a collection of Burgenland recipes, some with several variations.

However, whenever we use up our unpublished recipes, this recipe section will become dormant. So, if you have a favorite family recipe, please consider sharing it with us. We will be happy to publish it. Our older relatives, sadly, aren't with us forever, so don't allow your favorite ethnic dish to be lost to future generations.

You can send your recipe to BB Recipes Editor, Alan Varga. Thanks!



Words for Thought:

 

I am very interested in joining the Burgenland Bunch and have visited your website quite a few times. But I am concerned about my name and email address appearing on your list of members on the internet. I think that information can easily be scanned by the automated robots in use all over the internet to pick up names and email for spamming purposes. Has this issue been discussed by your members in the past? I wondered what others think about this. I'd like to join, but I am a bit concerned about how public our information is on your (wonderful) site.

I replied (in part): The BB website walks a careful line between sharing information (which is our purpose) and defeating web-harvesting spiders. There is actually some anti-robot coding in use, so what is in the underlying page code (which is what a robot reads) is not the same as what you see (specifically, email address are not in the underlying code in the form of a standard address, so robots do not see them). We implemented that system seven years ago and complaints/concerns by members have essentially disappeared. Before that, rightly or wrongly, we did receive complaints.

Having said that, there is no way to provide shareable information that a dedicated programmer can’t figure out how to harvest… but one website is usually not worth their time and we have no indication that our system has ever been decoded. If we did feel it had been broken, we’d rewrite our code (which is easy for us) and break their harvester again… and they know we’d do that so they don’t bother; there are easier ways to get email addresses! Based on our tracking software, we know our pages are scanned by 15-20 robots every month (some are good ones, like Google, etc.; others are bad boys); as I said, there is no evidence that any of these are breaking our code.

Generally, I consider the BB website to be low risk to our members. Nonetheless, you’ll have to decide for yourself. Truthfully, if people can’t contact you, there is little reason to put your information on our site… and, in reverse, other people’s info would be of little use if you could not contact them.

Thanks for the kind words about the BB.

Ed 2023: I'm pleased to note that we still use the same anti-robot coding from 10 years ago and that it apparently remains effective, as we continue to receive no complaints from you our members!



Another Burgenland? Are you aware that there is another region in Europe that is known as "Burgenland"? There is, and it is situated below a region known as Heideland, much like the Heideboden of Hungary abuts our northern Burgenland!

This Burgenland—unlike our Burgenland—is so-named because of the many castles in the area (one of its advertising slogans is that "a detour here is to visit the Middle Ages"); its name is not an official governmental-unit designation of any kind (although there is a Burgenland Kreis (District=County) in the neighboring German state). Both this Burgenland and its neighboring Heideland are found in the center of the German state of Saxony, beside Poland and above the Czech Republic, and between Leipzig and Dresden (marked 'A' in the map to the right). It generally follows the Mulde and Zschopau River valleys, with Romanesque castles perched on cliffs or on the densely wooded hillsides above the rivers.

The Heideland, is heathland, with the Dahlen and Duebener heaths being the major nature and cycling attractions.

So, if you see the names Burgenland and Heideland associated with Germany, now you know why. If interested, you can visit its (German-language) website at http://www.saechsisches-burgenland.de/.

Ed 2023: This bit remains relevant today and the link above for that other Burgenland is still active!



The "Other" Lakes of the Seewinkel: On April 13, the Austrian Times published a short article entitled "Forgotten Lakes Return to North Burgenland."

Due to the heavy precipitation of last winter, coupled with spring rains, the Seewinkel region in Burgenland has standing water in many meadows and fields. The article calls this a "spectacle of nature" and a "flashback to a long forgotten time."

However, this flooding should not be a great surprise; after all, these meadows and fields were created on the dry beds of lakes drained many years ago. Nonetheless, it is a situation that, according to Thomas Zechmeister, head of the biological station in Illmitz, "only occurs every few decades or centuries." How long will the water remain? He says that "will depend on the upcoming weeks and months: if the regular rainfalls stop occurring, the important bird habitats will soon vanish." But for now... well, there are more lakes in the Seewinkel!

Ed 2023: This bit struck me as interesting because I have been running a series of bits over the past months about the severe drought in the area and the drying up of the salt lakes that exist there in "normal" times. Historically, water levels in this region has been subjected to great variation. Although the bit above is from the June 2013 edition, the May 2013 edition had a full article on the Seewinkel (Lake Corner) that included a map showing high waters in the 1700s (I think, but we did not date the map in the 2013 article). I include below it a current GoogleMaps clip of essentially the same region so you can see what is now dry land versus the open water and swamps from back then:  





An "American Immigrant": Hannes Graf recently sent a message that included a photo, entitled "Grösster Baum" (clicking the thumbnail clip to the right will open to the full picture), that he recently took. His message read:

Hello all, I found an "American immigrant" in Burgenland, which lives in the middle of nowhere in a forest beside Oberpetersdorf.

While it was obvious to me that this was indeed, by far, the Grösster (largest) tree in this forest, it wasn't clear why Hannes called it an American immigrant, so I inquired. Hannes replied by sending two more pictures and an explanation. He said:

It's a 50m redwood tree (Sequoiadendron giganteum) in the middle of European mixed (very rare, especially in Burgenland; I know that one, in-between 2 other, but not so tall).

A little reading in Wikipedia quickly informed me that the only natural stands of Giant Sequoia (Redwood) are in California, so that explains Hannes' American immigrant notation... but what was a 50m tree doing in Burgenland?

Further reading said that Sequoia require particular conditions to reseed themselves; in particular, a low-intensity burn off of ground cover to release the seeds from the cone, give actual, moist soil for them to embed in, and to allow enough sunlight for the seedlings to thrive. These are not seeds that can be carried by birds or animals and replanted a long way from the mother tree. So again, why is there one so large (and apparently two smaller ones) in Burgenland?

A 50m Sequoia is big... normally they grow to 50 to 85m tall, with the very fastest growing taking a full 150 years to reach 50 meters! So this is an old tree too (well, young in Sequoia years, given some are over 3500 years old, but old in people years). Thus this tree likely took root sometime before 1860, which was well before my Burgenland ancestors emigrated!

Still further reading in Wikipedia reveals that man is responsible for spreading Sequoia trees to Europe. Such trees were planted across Europe after William Lobb, acting for the Veitch Nursery at Budlake near Exeter, England, sent a large shipment of seed that was collected in 1853 in the Calaveras Grove of California (the place where most well-known pictures of Giant Redwood were taken). Seed from this batch was widely distributed throughout Europe and is the likely source for the tree Hannes found. With luck, this tree will still be standing when our 13,000th generation of grandchildren are born... quite a thought, eh?

Ed 2023: I became curious whether I could find Hannes' Grösster Baum via GoogleMaps, as I certainly expected the tree to still exist. A surprise, though, was that it is now a labeled "tourist attraction" (perhaps Hannes started something!). While I could not figure out where Hannes snapped his long-distance image (the first above), I was able to find a similar "Street View" image when positioned on the Schnellstraße across the valley and above Oberpetersdorf. To no surprise, it looks very similar 10 years later!

5) BURGENLAND EMIGRANT OBITUARIES

Maria Kaufmann (née Domitrovits)

On May 7th, 2023, Maria (Mitzi) Kaufmann of Fort Lee, New Jersey, passed away peacefully at the age of 95.

Born on December 16,1927, in Strem, Austria, she was a daughter of the late Franz and Theresia (Hafner) Domitrovits. Mary immigrated to Canada in 1954 before entering the United States in 1963.

Mary was predeceased by her husband Franz Kaufmann, and by her son Joseph Franz Kaufmann.

She is survived by her daughters Rosemary Marino and Anne Marie Daidone; sons-in-law, Joseph Marino and Thomas Daidone; and grandchildren, Anthony Carmine Marino, Maxwell Franz Cataldo and Olivia Anne Cataldo.

Mary was a loyal, hardworking, loving and deeply religious matriarch. Her passion was family, faith, and Austrian tradition; and nothing was more important to her than being in the presence of those she loved.

A mass will be held at 10:30 am on June 1st, 2023 at Madonna Church on the Hill, 2070 Hoefleys Ln, Fort Lee, NJ 07024.

NOTICE (Informal Terms and Conditions): The Burgenland Bunch (BB) was formed and exists to assist Burgenland descendants in their research into their heritage and, toward that end, reserves the right to use any communication you have with us (email, letter, phone conversation, data upload, etc.) as part of our information exchange and educational research efforts.
    ● If you do not want your communication to be used for this purpose, indicate that it is "confidential" and we will attempt to abide by that request.
    ● Correspondents who communicate with the BB without requesting confidentiality retain their copyright but give a non-exclusive license to the BB allowing us to forward to BB members, publish in our monthly newsletter or on our website, and/or subsequently and permanently archive all or parts of such communications.

The formal Burgenland Bunch Website Usage Agreement can be found here: Agreement

The Burgenland Bunch homepage (website) can be found at: the-burgenland-bunch.org

Burgenland Bunch Newsletter, copyright © 2023 by The Burgenland Bunch
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