Klaus Wust has been mentioned here. A much more significant recognition of his work was made by the Society for the History of Germans in Maryland when they elected him to the position of Honorary President of the Society. Klaus has worked with the Society for many years. He was the editor of The Report, the Journal of the Society , from 1957 to 1992.
Klaus was born in Germany in 1925. He almost escaped service in World War II but did serve in the Navy transporting Germans escaping from the Russians in the eastern regions to the western regions late in the war. His first civilian job was as editor of the Social Democratic Free Press , but he obtained a one year leave in 1949 for attendance as a scholarship student at Bridgewater College in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. It was here that he discovered the legacy the Germans had left in America, and especially in the Valley. He decided to spend his life recording their achievements. (In the process, his one year is turning into a lifetime.)
I hesitate to use the past tense since Klaus is alive and still working. We are expecting more major books from him. His first major book was the " The Virginia Germans ", published first in 1969, and reprinted many times since then. This book has won many awards. Though writing and editing seem to be his first loves, he had done many other activities, nearly all of them in the German-American world.
He was editor of the weekly Washington Journal , from 1957 to 1967, and wrote articles on politics and immigration from German-speaking countries. Klaus was one of the originators of the Museum of American Frontier Culture at Staunton, Virginia. He was in charge of the selection and transportation of a Palatine farm to the museum. He has been the guest curator of several German-American exhibits, notably at the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Center in Williamsburg, and at the Pratt Graphics Center in New York City.
He has been a guest lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania, James Madison University, and Nottingham University in England. He has been a popular speaker at genealogical and historical society meetings. I have heard him twice at Seminars sponsored by the Germanna Foundation, and his talks were always solid with original material. (Klaus is a believer in using source material even if means traveling to archives half way around the world.)
He has served the German government in many ways. He was an advisor on a commemorative exhibition honoring German immigration to America. For many years he was an official interpreter for German delegations, including being the personal interpreter for the highest German officials. For several years he worked with the U.S. Department of State.
The material today comes from an article by Gary Carl Grassl, in the "
Washington Journal
" for 11 Jun 2001.
(21 Aug 01)
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.