This Web Site is dedicated
to the memory of

Josef Marx

November 26, 1881 - July 3, 1939

 

 

 

Josef Marx was born in the village of Klein Betschkerek, Banat, Hungaria.  His father was Wilhelm Marx and his mother was Susanna Lorenz.  Click here to see his obituary at it appeared in ‘Heimatbote’, a German language newspaper that he had founded and published.

 

An Idea is Born…

 

In 1931 Josef Marx developed the German-Hungarian Family Calendars as a means to keep his countryman informed and connected to each other in their adopted homeland of the United States.  News, stories and photos of the old country, along with subscribers names and addresses provided the majority of the content for these calendars.  The idea he had to publish the subscriptions lists have made his calendars a valuable research tool to those who are tracing their German-Hungarian ancestors in the United States back to their original villages.

 

Acknowledgements…

 

I’d like to thank…

• David Dreyer who has extracted the names of over 7,700 individuals from the calendar subscription lists, along with their Banat village and the year the individuals has subscribed to the calendars. 
• Linda Ellis who worked hard to locate and prepare complete copies of many of the missing issues.
• Dennis  Bauer for not only adding 600 new names to the extraction database, but providing a missing calendars from the year 1942.
• Monika Ferrier who translated the obituary of Josef Marx which may also be found on this web-site. 

…their help and support was key to getting this data captured for future researchers. 

 

Special Thanks…

 

I want to give a very special thanks to the daughter of Josef Marx, my Aunt, Katharine Susanna Marx-Muschal-Blair, for loaning me original copies of the calendars for the issues covering the 1930’s.  Aunt Kate told me stories of how she and my Aunt Anna regularly took these calendars in a wagon, down to the post office to mail them to subscribers.  She also contributed directly to the publication by typing and organizing the subscription lists.  It was a big family effort and it meant a lot of travel to sign-up subscribers from the German-Hungarian communities across the country. 

 

Shock and Awe…

 

I did not know my family connection to these calendars at the time, but I knew of Dave Dreyer’s extractions from these calendars during the late 1990’s, and I had worked with Dave in the late 1999 to write some software that would help him maintain the thousand of entries he has extracted from the ship lists over the past few years.  During a visit with my Aunt Kate in 2002, I told her about Dave’s work and his extractions from the calendars.  She left the room for a few minutes and came back with several original copies of the calendars…this was the first time I had seen a copy…then she told me how her father was the publisher.  I couldn’t believe it--I was shocked.  I realized that these calendars needed to be made more available for researchers, so I began working toward that goal.  My Aunt Kate also gave me a copy of her father’s obituary which was written in an old German font and was very difficult to read.  I am very grateful to Monika Ferrier who translated this document for me. 

 

Carrying the torch…

 

The idea Josef Marx had to keep his fellow countrymen connected is now one of my important goals.  This web-site is a tribute to his work and will help keep his memories and ideas alive for new generations to find their heritage with the help of Josef Marx and the Deutsch-ungarisher Familienkalenders. 

 

Computers to the rescue…

David Dreyer’s extractions of names in the subscriptions lists have been available on the internet since 1997, but they were difficult to maintain and update.  During the past 18 months I have converted Dave’s extractions into a computer database and indexed all the scanned images of the subscription lists to link them by city and calendar year to the actual calendar pages.  The most time consuming part of this effort was indexing over 1,200 pages to identify the cities available on each page.  There are 81,744 entries within those pages and each city for each entry has been indexed.   All of the years, with the exception of 1941-1946, and 1950 have been scanned into digital images and all issues that can be found will eventually be available. 

 

Future Plans…

 

Due to space limitations only the subscription lists and photos from the calendars will be posted on the web.  Later this year or early next year I plan to create a CD set or DVD to hold all of this data (The complete calendar issue with stories, advertisements, photos and the subscription lists. 

 

To Err is human…

 

Like anything associated with human endeavor, mistakes in spelling or content will be found.  If you find any let me know and I will do my best to correct them.

 

Feedback…

 

If you have any comments, questions or corrections please click here:

 

If you have a 1941, 1943, 1944, 1945, 1946 or a 1950 issue of the calendar and want to help, please contact me via email.

 

The Banat Mailing List…

 

You can also send a message through the Banat List.  If you are not a member you may want to join and find others who are also researching the Banat region in Eastern Europe.  Its free to join…here is the link to find out more about the Banat List: http://www.banaters.com/banat/MLInstructions.asp?category=ML

 

The Donauschwaben Villages’ Helping Hands Project…

 

One of the best places to meet others doing research in this area and find a lot of stories, photos, and information on the Banat is at the DVHH website.  Here are a few links…

Main Exchange: http://www.dvhh.org/mainex/

Culture and Life Style: http://www.dvhh.org/culture/index.htm

Village Coordinators: http://www.dvhh.org/vcreg.php

To Join their free mailing list click on this link:

https://mailinglists.rootsweb.com/listindexes/legacy/intl/HUN/DONAUSCHWABEN-VILLAGES.html

 

 

Enjoy…

 

Peter Schmidt,

Web-Meister

Knoxville, TN