On leaving Gresten, Eleanor and I drove to Dietenhofen, north of Ansbach, in Mittelfranken (a part of Bavaria), Germany. This was a Saturday and we stayed overnight, and went to church at the local Lutheran church. The pastor was Jürgen Lehner, and he spent some time with us after the service (using his excellent English). In Gresten, students of its history always refer, almost reverently, to Dietenhofen. In Dietenhofen, they are well aware of the role that Gresten played in their history.
We asked a few questions about the church structure, which was originally a Catholic structure. Many parts have been maintained unchanged, including the beautiful, ornate altar. Some of the other physical characteristics were unusual and they came about because the influx of refugees from Gresten had made the Dietenhofen church too small. So the ceiling was changed from a flat surface to an arched construction, and two balconies were built along one side of the church. Pastor Lehner told us about the efforts to trace and document the migration from Gresten to Mittelfranken. He gave us the name of another pastor who is spearheading the work.
We arrived in Dietenhofen with a couple of hours to spare, so we drove up to Dottenheim. Visiting the church cemetery there, people who were tending graves told us that the pastor lived in the village. After some inquiries, we found him and talked to him. He too was well aware of the Gresten influx. (We had chosen Dottenheim to visit because it was known that some Blankenbakers appear in its church records.) He too told us about the historical effort. He gave us a book, " Evang. Luth. Dekanat Neustadt an der Aisch ". He invited us to come to the church services in the morning, but we had made our plans to attend in Dietenhofen.
Several days earlier we had visited Unterschweinach, Oberoßbach, Herrnneuses, Markt Erlbach, and Emskirchen. The first two of these were collections of farms, and the others were villages with churches. All of them have a record of Blankenbaker involvement, either as a church or as a residence. They are located about eight to eleven miles from Dietenhofen. Whether the Blankenbakers were ever at Dietenhofen is unknown, but the church books do exist for Dietenhofen. They have never been microfilmed, but the pastor said they would like to have them microfilmed.
In previous notes, I have mentioned Lonnerstadt and its cemetery. After church services in Dietenhofen, we drove the twenty-three miles or so to Lonnerstadt past the other villages and farms that are mentioned above. I have already reported on this experience.
Protestant churches are usually to be found locked. Unless there is clerical staff present, which is rare, they will not be open. Pastors usually have more than one church, and the schedule of services can be complicated. (The pastor at Dietenhofen had already had one service at another church before the 9:30 a.m. service in Dietenhofen, but this second church had only two services per month. A third church of his had monthly services.) The church interiors that we saw varied considerably in their style. Some maintained the artifacts from their use as Catholic churches, while others had severe and plain interiors.
(02 Jun 00)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.