The Reverend Bauer in Goodrich, ND

The Kassel Reformed Church near Lincoln Valley, ND

A year or so ago I came across a small book in an antique store titled “Erfahrungen Aus Meinen Missionarsleben in Den Dakotas,” translated as “Experiences from my Missionary Life in the Dakotas” by Reverend Peter Bauer, a pastor in the Reformed Church and one of the “Germans-from-Russia.” It looked like an interesting vernacular experience of early life on the northern Great Plains so I bought it. The text was written by Pastor Bauer sometime prior to his death in 1942 but the book itself was not published until later (I can’t find a date but I suspect it was the 1960s), translated from the original German by Armand and Elaine Bauer with supplemental information provided by people from the communities Pastor Bauer worked in. While the entire book was interesting, I was most intrigued by the time Pastor Bauer spent at the parish in Goodrich, ND, preaching to outlying congregations in Sheridan and Pierce Counties, which are close to where I live in Harvey. From the book I was able to photograph some of what remained from the Goodrich Parish.

Pastor Bauer was born in 1855 in Neuburg, South Russia (today the Odessa region of Ukraine). He was the pastor for a Reformed congregation in Worms. The area was home to large communities of ethnic Germans invited by Catherine the Great to settle the Black Sea and Volga River regions of Russia in the mid- to late 1700s. These Germans enjoyed cultural freedom for a time in Russia, they were allowed to live as autonomous communities in Russia, retaining their language and culture and being exempt from compulsory service in the Russian military. Things had begun to change by the 1870s with Russia now under the control of Alexander II. He wanted to assimilate these German communities into the Russian culture. They were no longer exempt from military service, the German language was forbidden to be used or taught in schools, and the Germans lost their privileges as independent communities, becoming noting more than Russian peasants. Things got even worse under Alexander III who pursued an even more aggressive “Russification” policy. The result was many of these Germans from Russia began immigrating to America, mostly to the Great Plains stretching from Canada to Texas.

In June 1893 Pastor Bauer received a call from Eureka, SD, seeking him to come serve their parish. This was Pastor Bauer’s opportunity to leave Russia and he took it. While he was sad to leave his congregation and friends in Worms he was happy to rid himself of the “Russian slave-yoke” and come to America. Pastor Bauer, his wife Dorothea, and their ten children, ranging in age from 10 to nine months, took trains from Worms to Hamburg then set sail on the “Noordland” for a ten day trip across the Atlantic to New York City. From there they took another train to Sandusky, OH, where they would spend some time visiting Dorothea’s brother Michael. He couldn’t believe they would want to go to South Dakota, “You want to go to the Dakotas, to that wilderness?” Pastor Bauer said he must heed the call of his brother in Eureka.

Between 1893 and 1910 Pastor Bauer served parishes at Eureka, Medina, ND, Loveland, CO, and worked as a traveling missionary in ND. In his book he relates numerous stories of living on the frontier, especially of blizzards and difficult conditions in winter. In 1910 he took a call from the parish in Goodrich, ND. This parish had seven congregations at the time, most located to the north of Goodrich around the village of Lincoln Valley. None of the congregations had a church at this time, including the Hoffnung Congregation, located right in Goodrich. Services were held either in homes of members or in schools. The parish did have a parsonage for Pastor Bauer, located on the northwestern edge of Goodrich (this house burned even before the book was published). Four of the congregations still have evidence of their existence remaining on the prairie, the Kassel, Zion, Salem, and Immanuel Congregations, and these are the four I was able to photograph.

A current grove of trees on the site of the Sprenger farm

Records are somewhat sparse for all the congregations but the best records are for the Kassel Congregation, which was the only congregation of the seven still active when the book was published. Kassel got its start with a meeting held on May 20, 1900, at the Georg H. Sprenger farm (located northwest of Lincoln Valley) conducted by Pastor John Arnold for the purpose of organizing a Reformed congregation. A congregation was formed and a constitution was adopted. As previously stated none of the congregations had a church. When Pastor Bauer had to hold a rite of confirmation for a class he decided the small schoolhouse the congregation occasionally used wouldn’t do. Instead he held the service in a small grove of trees on the Sprenger farm. He related that the congregational members remarked that “this was the nicest confirmation that we have yet had. How lovely the sound as the dear singers let their voices spread abroad in the woods.” After this Pastor Bauer decided they must have a church, and in February 1912 it was resolved that the congregation would apply for a loan to construct a church, which was built and dedicated in June of 1913.

The Kassel church still stands today across the road from the Kassel cemetery. Unfortunately the church lost its steeple in the wind some years back, but the roof was modified and repaired. The building no longer serves as a church today but is in good repair and appears to be in use as a cabin or hunting lodge.

Pastor Bauer wasn’t done trying to convince congregations to build churches. He next convinced the Zion Congregation (also known as the Hiebs-Gemeinde Congregation), located southwest of Lincoln Valley, to build a church. The records are lost as to the exact construction date, but children of early members believed the church to have been constructed in 1913 or 1914.

The Zion Reformed Church, now an outbuilding on a farm north of the cemetery

Pastor Bauer related a story about the dedication of this church. He came to the church on the Saturday before dedication with his son Otto and stayed at the farm of August Hieb, a deacon of the congregation, just a quarter mile south of the church. The wife of August, Lydia, also had her parents (the Herrs) staying at the farm. The old couple, Pastor Bauer, and Otto all shared a room with two beds in the Hieb farmhouse. In the early morning Pastor Bauer saw Brother Herr get up and take clothes out of a suitcase and thought, “Just so the old man doesn’t take my case. Surely he knows which is his case.” When he finished dressing he went into the kitchen where his wife and daughter were cooking. His wife looked at him and remarked, “My God, you have the Pastor’s clothes on!” Herr looked down at himself and said, “Right! You are right, wife!” He quickly returned to the room and put on his clothes. Later that morning Otto sat down at the organ and began playing the song “Fox You Stole the Goose” and singing his own, made up lyrics, “Mister, you stole the trousers, give them back again, or the Paster will come after you with a shooting weapon!” Pastor Bauer and Herr both had a laugh about the incident, and Pastor Bauer said it was even work to keep a straight face at the church dedication thinking about the morning’s incident.

Headstone for Lydia and August Hieb in the Zion Reformed Cemetery

The Zion Congregation went out of existence sometime in the 1930s. The church was eventually sold and moved a quarter mile north to a farm where it still exists as an outbuilding. The cemetery still remains and is where August and Lydia Hieb are buried (the cemetery is also known as the Hieb-Huft Cemetery).

The Immanuel Congregation was centered around a community south of Harvey. Little is known about this congregation except that services were first held in members homes and later in a small schoolhouse. There was a cemetery established, unfortunately no grave markers remain. There’s no record of the congregation after 1917. Pastor Bauer did have quite and experience once when visiting this congregation. Coming down a steep hill off the Missouri Coteau into the “Harvey Flats” a strap broke on his wagon and it lurched forward and hit his horse’s hind legs. This spooked the horse and it took off at a gallup down the hill with Pastor Bauer’s wagon right behind. Pastor Bauer attempted to slow the horse but couldn’t control it and his wagon overturned and he rolled three times. By some miracle Pastor Bauer suffered no broken bones but likely suffered a concussion, as he relates he was nauseated for some time after and temporarily lost his sight and hearing.

The Salem Congregation was located north of Martin. Records are sparse on this one as well. It is known that a cemetery was laid out on the Jacob Eckart farm, and that cemetery exists today. It’s difficult to get to as it is in the middle of a field and requires a drive down a mile of dirt trail and then hiking the last quarter mile in. When I visited I counted seven graves plus one large monument that shows the hard times the Eckart family must’ve endured on the Dakota prairie. Jacob and his first wife, Rosina, lost children (twins) Paulina and Reinhold in 1902, Heinrich in 1903, and Wilhelm in 1905. It appears that Rosina died in 1907 giving birth to and unnamed child that also died the same day. Jacob would later remarry to Sophia, but even they suffered a loss of a child, Leo in 1912. Jacob died in 1954 and Sophia in 1970. She is also the most recent burial at the cemetery. The congregation disappeared from the records after 1924.

The Salem Reformed Cemetery was laid out on Jacob Eckart’s farm

Pastor Bauer’s family suffered its own tragedy once when he was visiting this congregation. He had received word that his daughter Emma’s husband had died and he must get home immediately so they could travel to Palmyra, WI, where Emma lived. Pastor Bauer had to set out in his wagon on a 35 mile trip to Goodrich, facing into the wind with temperatures of 40 degrees below zero. Part of his face froze on the trip.

An abandoned farm near the Kassel church. This landscape was much like most of the land that Pastor Bauer had to travel over out of Goodrich.

With the vast distances of the congregations Pastor Bauer said it was extremely difficult to visit each one regularly. Five weeks may pass between visits. His primary concern was that not being able to visit his congregations frequently opened the possibility for them to be split apart by sectarians which “was especially strong at this time; they came from all sides and sought to alienate members during the time that the weak in faith were vulnerable…The missionary power in the Dakotas was alway too little and the sects snatched away many Reformed members.” Pastor Bauer tried to convince the congregations to sell the parsonage in Goodrich and instead buy one in Lincoln Valley, as it would be more centrally located. The parish wasn’t open to the idea and was one of the reasons Pastor Bauer resigned in 1915. By this time he was already 60 years old and the long distance travel was taking a toll on his health. He wasn’t done preaching yet though, he took a call to the parish at Zeeland, ND, where he worked until 1926 before going to a congregation in Leola, SD, where he worked until retiring in 1936 at the age of 81! As mentioned previously, he passed away in 1942.

The Reverend Bauer in Goodrich, ND

Mid-Dakota Softball

Freeman School Number One