Most of my ancestors were Weingärtner, which literally translates to wine gardeners, or wine growers and vineyard workers. After a long day digitizing documents, John and I took a drive to the Heuchelberg mountain by Leingarten. The Turm, or tower on top of this small mountain stands as a sentinel over the vineyards where my ancestors farmed. Some of this land is still in the Laemmlen family, now farmed by Martin Laemmlen and his cousins.
Martin explained to me that in today’s world, machines pick the grapes. In former years, everything was done by hand. Below are some of the containers that were strapped to the backs of the farmers and pickers. These were in Grandpa Rudolf’s barn when I visited in 2006.
These next 3 photographs were displayed at the restaurant at the Heuchelberg restaurant where we had dinner the first night. They show families picking and working in the vineyards, and the type of transportation they used back then.
Here are some pictures my father had that were in a collection of photos taken by Otto Huber from our area in the 1930s:
And here are these vineyards today:
Our Frankfurt Germany Mission 