2 MS IL ERLEBNISSE UND REALITAETEN: VIRTUAL REALITIES!
Part 18: Elisabet! Written By: Kenn Knopp Turmoil of Soul...Struggle for a Woman’s Independence & Equal Opportunity Germany’s Foremost Sculptor...A Lady! Friedrich Schnerr of Friedricksburg, Texas, Commissions Her final Sculpture
Preface... This story describesthe mounting restlessness and insult of conscience of the many thousands of Germans and other Europeans: the average person and worker, the intelligentsia, well-heeled plutocrats, and the highly educated in the mid-1800’s. Their innate sense of social justice and desire to be freed of the mold of the Prussian-Austro-European “Gott Mit Uns”—literally, “God Is With Us” (Divine Right) feudalism was festering in their souls and nagging them on to revolution. Action was mounting to overthrow the royal dictatorships: of city-states and independent kingdoms. They were searching for personal independence and the democratic process was to be their panacea. Or, in the game of being boss and being bossed perhaps they resented the fact that “inherited” position and title eluded or discluded them, even from the game, much less the chance to become boss. So, destroy the boss: if that was not possible, leave. Their neighbors had accomplished it, or at least were in the process of freedom’s birth pangs and Sturm and Drang: Garibaldi in Italy; and just across their border the on-again off-again French Peoples’ Revolution. Elizabet Ney exemplifies why so many of the best and the brightest of Germany finally had their fill of hollow and false promises, or, being flatly rejected; and then would come a precipitating event—a last straw, so to speak—that brought on the decision to leave for Gelegenheit, opportunity else where, particularly, the New World or America once and for all. The process of the “butterfly” being freed from the cocoon is the strange, almost providential (or diabolical) primal urge. Such was the dilemma of Elisabet Ney to find personal fulfillment, despite the angst of a certain form of government, the noose of bureaucracy, the subjugation of a certain reli-
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gion, profession, family, marriage, or the structures of a particular culture. Once unschackled, however, one’s point of view, or Weltanschauung, can ultimately discover “true birth” outside of the constricting cocoon. That is why Benjamin Franklin is to have said that a German talent blossoms to its very best...in America! The notion that most of the pioneer immigrants to the Texas Hill Country were poor farmers, laborers and uncultured is patently false. Just as numerous as the agrarian and the skilled but jobless workers were the technically trained and the highly educated, such as the Latinists, many teachers, physicians and professors of science and those ingenious in the arts. It was the raw Texas wilderness that reduced each and every immigrant to one stark fact of life—or death: survival. In the uncultivated wilds of Texas, everyone, even the well educated, had to swallow intellectual pride and join in with the experienced farmers in clearing the rocky flats of the Hill Country in the arduous task of transforming them into productive fields and pastures on which their cattle could graze and thrive. The ticking of each day’s clock, schizophrenic weather changes, poor marketing conditions—as well as health conditions made each and every person roll up their sleeves and be an important spoke in the wheel of survival and ultimate success. All, surveying their accomplishments after the pain of unaccustomed toil, they breathed in and felt, through and through, the sheer joy of work and pride in bringing in the harvest and going to the markets together. After the markets came the celebration! To this day, this is the secret of Fredericksburg’s awesome success. Together, scientists, teachers, and farmers planted crops, especially vital life-giving corn (Mais). They had ample meat: but to survive theyneededgrains,vegetables and fruit. Necessity gave them the best lesson in democracy: to pull together—and every able-bodied person must pitch in! What pride they felt as that initial corn crop came in, or as they butchered together, many for the first time, and their economy and health began to improve. As an example, Elisabet Ney, Germany’s foremost
woman sculptor, and her husband Edmund Montgomery, biologist and social liberal, spent many years promoting constitutional, democratic government in the Germany they loved so much. Despite rebuff after rebuff by the autocratic royals or “Koenigstreuen”and their industrial leader lackeys, Elisabet and Edmund finally could take no more. Their idealism matched the keenness of the minds of a significant number of eminent Germans who left Germany years earlier. Elisabet felt her individualism and talent to paint and create sculptures of heroes would find ample opportunity in Texas. Many of the highly educated and talented were a threat to the royals, especially if they wanted to change the political system. Perhaps Elisabet and Edmund felt democracy was a lost cause in Germany. The weather, or climate, was also a factor in their decision to leave Germany. Their health declined because of Germany’s long and gruesome winters. Famine in the 1840’s caused dire joblessness and pauperism that was yet another threat to monarchy. The Adelsverein or Society of Noblemen was organize in 1842 at Schloss Biebrich in the Rheingau when the royals saw the possibility of the intellectual-idealists and the jobless joining forces to bring revolution in behalf of democracy and a constitution supporting one-person one-vote. The Adelsverein quickly went to work to rid Germany of these real and potential troublemakers, finding the Republic of Texas begging for inhabitants and offering settlers free land. The Adelsverein devised a plan which included opening an import-export route which would also, in effect, dump the troublemakers onto Texas soil. Today, German-Texans comprise at least 15% of the total population of Texas, the third largest minority after Mexican-Texans and African-Texans. Anglo-Texans, the largest ethnic group, are in the majority—at least presently. It is said that by the year 2020 the Mexicans will be in the majority in Texas. (Kenn Knopp, Fredericksburg, Texas)
Woman
TEXAS FREDERICKSBURG
www.fbgwoman.com