This is the introduction page for my family documents. It begins with documents relating to the Felbinger family sent to me 1979-1981 by Ludwig Wendel, Schlesienstraße 21, Neustadt/Aisch, Germany. The documents are transcribed from various Kirchenbücher ("church books"), especially those in the home village of the Felbingers: Ickelheim, Germany, approximately 6 km. south of Bad Windsheim, in the province of Middle Franconia, state of Bavaria. The documents are transcribed as I received them.
Following the Wendel documents both for the Felbinger and Fichtelmann families, I have added several documents of my own transcriptions from the Kirchenbücher and other archival material from several places where the Felbingers and their related families have resided. These documents begin with the sections superscripted "Preliminary studies : researches in the Brenner Archives" and "Felbinger documents from Germany transcribed by John Edward Felbinger".
Following these documents are several documents concerning my mother's side, the Prahls and their related families.
SPECIAL NOTE: many documents found below, especially Documents No.7-9 for the Felbinger families and "Der Super-Schlegel" for the Prahl families, are being written, revised and (hopefully) improved on an ongoing basis. These documents are what we in the library trade call an "intergrating resource"; in the old days we called it "loose-leaf", but that seems inappropriate in an electronic format. (8-)) As a practical matter, a visitor should return from time to time to see if there have been particular changes. There will be changes, some significant, some minor. -- JEF, October 19, 2005.
To go *directly* to the Documents section, Click Here.
For those who want to know how I have actually done all of this, read on!!
Why does anyone do genealogical research; Warum treibt man Familienkunde? For myself, I always found "the family stories" interesting and fun. When I was a child, the stories told me about the people I knew, or people my parents knew. As I have grown older, becoming more aware of my own mortality and that the universe does not revolve around me alone, the stories place me in the larger groups of family and community and that we all have something to pass on to future generations yet unborn. Not a bad place to be, really. Perhaps at this point I (and others) begin to think about basic questions: how did we get here anyway? Oh sure, it's clear we came from my parents, but then where did they come from? Well, grandparents of course, and perhaps if we're lucky they were alive when we were children. But then we get to thinking about their parents (and some are lucky enough to know their great-grandparents personally). And where did they come from? And so it goes, further and further back. Then one thinks more about it: if I count back ten generations, do I have all 1,046 men and women who spent the time and energy creating more human beings (I being one), or did any of them "double up"? Do I trace myself through a single or through multiple lines? Just who are all these people anyway?
From these questions some people start trying to learn who all their ancestors were, at the very least to find out their names. Of itself, this alone can be a formidable undertaking, given the bizarre ways records and artifacts are kept, or lost through accident or design. If we are the descendents of famous (or notorious) people, their stories are well recorded. But what of those not famous, but who simply lived, had children and died, in the words of the Bible (Ecclesiasticus 44, 9): "And some there be, which have no memorial, who are perished as though they had never been, and are become as though they had never been born, and their children after them"? If we are fortunate, and I have been in much of my research, we may be able to discover our forebears' names and their dates of birth and death. For some, that is enough. For others, however, the situation becomes that as expressed in the following cartoon:
As Linus says, "It almost makes you wish you had known the fellow". At
this point genealogy takes on a different quality. The larger questions
become compelling: just who were these people, really?
How can I know them? Where and when were they born; what did they look
like; what *were* they like in terms of their personalities; what were
their joys and sorrows, made them laugh and weep; what problems did they face,
what trials of life did they live through and overcome, or not? What did they *do*
(or fail to do) that brought it all ultimately to where I am now? Genealogy at this
level becomes a detective story, ferreting and teasing out information from all-too-few
real clues and docmentary evidence, and rather more conjecture and speculation.
It becomes a great (auto-)biographical and historical adventure, the deepening and growing
appreciation of the infinite varied richness of life itself, and the preciousness of its gift.
And through genealogy, these people, our ancestors long gone, become alive again.
So in the pages that follow, I will try to provide the memorial my ancestors never had:
"For the honor of God,
and in memory of my
ancestors,
I write this book
that they may not be forgotten before Him or us."
As I do this work, I am again mindful of finite time in a limited life span: not a "renewable energy source", as people say in the conservation trade. So, I have to concentrate on those aspects of family history research that my skills uniquely qualify me for: I can handle both English and German (and some Latin) easily, and I have some skill in reading the old handwritings. There are times when researching the materials can be like "working the mines", trying to discover the basic historical records, so that other family members can piece the story together. Of course, I should add a few stories of my own as well. (8-)) How well I succeed in this effort, these pages will reveal.
Listed below are the annual reports that I have written for myself, so that I might have a narrative record of how I have actually done the research and the work. They also record several observations and feelings that I have had while doing the work. For any who would like the details of how I've done all this, please read the reports.
Annual Report for 2001
Annual Report for 2002
Annual Report for 2003
Annual Report for 2004
Annual Report for 2005
Annual Report for 2006
Annual Report for 2007
Annual Report for 2008-2009
Annual Report for 2010
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For information on the village of Ickelheim, click here. This document was brought
to my attention by Mr. Dieter Kett of Nuremberg, and was part of a larger document by Mr. Manfred
Gößwein on the area surrounding Ickelheim that I wish gratefully to acknowledge here also; to see this
document, click here.
For a large map of Ickelheim that shows many of the place-names mentioned in the records, click here;
for a smaller map of Ickelheim representing much of the same area,
click here. I want to thank Robert Scott of the Electronic Text Services Dept.,
Columbia University Libraries for taking the time to scan these maps so that I could mount them here.
Click on BIBLIOGRAPHY for a list of printed materials I have found
helpful in preparing these documents.
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Sometime in 1980-1981 Ludwig Wendel also transcribed a number of documents relating to Maria Barbara Fichtelmann and her ancestors. Maria Barbara, born 15. August 1844 in Linden, was my great-grandmother with my great-grandfather Johann Georg Felbinger, born 4. June 1842 in Ickelheim (document no. 3 supra). The Fichtelmann documents are arranged in the following order:
For citations that I have extracted from the Brenner Archiv, a significant source of genealogical information located in Ansbach, Germany, click here.
Here begin transcriptions done by me in March 2001 and subsequent years of entries in the
Ickelheim and several other Kirchenbücher. These documents are arranged as follows:
Here begin several documents relating to the Felbingers and their related families upon
their arrival in the United States and their settlement in Brooklyn, New York. These
documents are arranged as follows:
The records of my mother's families, the Prahls and related families, are available in Volume 3 of Schlegel's German-American families in the United States, published in 1918 at the height of American involvment in World War I. I have the family copy in my possession, which contains in addition to the printed material a number of handwritten marginal notes made by various family members. I transcribe these records here, indicating the emendations through the usual devices, noted in italics.
"Der Super-Schlegel: or, Schegel revisited". In this document, I report all my own research on the Prahl and related families. The documents presents my efforts to confirm and extend, or revise and correct, the information found originally in Schlegel's German-American families in the United States. -- Under construction, starting October 2005
The Prahl family tour in Ridgewood/Glendale, 2008. The report of Alice (Felbinger) Korfman about our tour to Ridgewood/Glendale: the preliminary research prior to the trip, and the actual visit to various places where the Prahls lived in Queens.
--Revised: March 2010
