Friday, 1/11

Let me introduce you to the very small town of Stobno--

Stobno sits right on the German-Polish border, and over the years has been part of Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Prussia, France (don't ask), and now Poland. It's the Prussian part in which we're interested, because about 140 years ago a guy named Andrew left Stobno and made his way to Marquette. He had a son named Frank, who also had a son named Frank, who had a daughter named Darlene, who gave birth to the dork who's typing this.

That's right. I have finally found from where the Schwemin side of my family came.

Those of you who've been reading this for a while may recall my attempts to find out where my grandfather's family lived before coming to the U.S. After all, I'm in Germany a lot, and figured that it might be nice (or weird, or strange) to visit the ancestral hometown. I was never able to dig out much information until I had my DNA done by Ancestry, something that allowed me to use their family tree service to figure out that my great-great grandfather came to the US in 1880 from the very small Prussian village of Stobno, which sits about an hour and a half north-northeast of Berlin, a city where I will actually be in a few months.

Unfortunately, I'll have a very tight schedule and no car while I'm there. Oh well...it's always an excuse to back yet again, right?

8-)

Like I said, while Stobno is currently on the Polish side of the German-Polish border it spent most of the past 300 years as part of Germany. It wasn't until after World War II that it switched. In fact, the way the Allies drew the border it was still supposed to be part of Germany, but Joseph Stalin wanted control of the nearby city of Szczecin (which is now Poland's 7^th largest city and pronounced “Stetchin”, if you're keeping score at home) and so the whole area was given to Poland, which proceeded to kick any German citizens out and replace them with Polish citizens whose homes had been destroyed in the war, something that happened a lot in the months following the end of the conflict.

Have I ever mentioned World War II was a horrific event that tore an entire continent apart and whose reverberations are still being felt today?

Anyway, after having spent years wondering about the Schwemin family's upstream origins it's a little weird to look at the satellite view of that very small town and realize that I'm here only because one person left there 140 years ago. I'm constantly amazed how the twists and turns of life have led to the here and now; this is just another small part of that.

I know I'll be spending part of the weekend staring a little more intently at that picture. I hope your weekend is just as mind-boggling!

(jim@wmqt.com)