Was awesome!
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the tactile experience of it all. I spent several months entering in data from the people who emigrated to the U.S. I enjoyed finding the names and the people, but I enjoyed these even more. The ability to hold and smell the old records was surreal. The records can in an large green box. Here's a picture of the box with the writing indicating what was inside
Once I opened the box, you find the record bundled with string:
Then inside you see a lot of great information about the men (it was almost exclusively about men) living and serving in the area:
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I only looked at the 1821-22 records, but I plan to make time over the next two years to come back and look closely over all the records here. I was most excited about this record:
And here's another picture with the headings (also this shot lists a Peter Basta)
Back to the first record... it comes from
November 1820. If you look at the 5th
line up from the bottom you will see a man named Marko Klaich. He lives in Kurjak, house number 9. At
the time he is 45 years old. He indicates that he is Orthodox. I'm less sure about the rest (German is not my language...) that it indicates that he is married, has 4 sons, 1 daughter, and then gives information about the property he owns.
Awesome!
Any chance you can find the house (number 9) in Kurjak when you go there? Perhaps Dragan could help you find it? I wonder if relatives married and then lived close to each other--is it more likely that families are related if their homes are next to each other on the same road?
ReplyDeleteI just found new records from 1903 and 1905 that Milanko and Stana were living in house #16 at the time. I will post that information sometime in the next few weeks.
DeleteWhy did you choose to check the 1821-1822 records first? What are the chances that Marko Klaich (was it spelled Klaich or Kljaic?) is a relative? Is he the only Kljaic you found?
ReplyDeleteGreat question. I wrote a new post to answer the year portion of your question. The short answer is that 1820-1821 was the oldest record available.
DeleteI found one other Klaich. I don't know the likelihood that they are relatives. I want to wait until we have looked through all of the archival records.