It was on a winter's day in the village of
Moravitza, Hungary that Peter was born.
(Peter will one day become Wayne Bettendorf's great-grandfather.)
(Peter will one day become Wayne Bettendorf's great-grandfather.)
His mother Nettie would have given birth at home
with the help of family or friends
while Johann listened for the first cry of their newborn.
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| Typical Hungarian Farmhouse by Hungarian artist Sándor Bihari. |
While we don't know if the Bettendorf family were farmers
or if they had a small business in the village,
we can see that the community is agrarian still today.
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| A present day view of the town shows the typical rectangular grid of villages. Click here to zoom in and out; touch the bottom right arrows to see photos in the area. |
What was life like for the family?
Sometime shortly after his birth on January 21, 1890
Peter would have been baptized,
probably in the village Protestant Church.
Church events of all kinds were special times
to gather with family and friends.
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| Village Bridal Procession by Lajos Deák-Ébner, 1888 Click here to visit the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest. |
All ages attended, whether springtime or winter,
weddings or funerals.
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| The artist Teodor Axentowicz was born in a Hungarian town east of Moravitza and painted many scenes of village life such as this burial procession. |
Peter would have played at home with his older brother Mathias and friends until he was 6 years old,
when all of the children entered the Elementary School.
when all of the children entered the Elementary School.
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| Springtimes in Hungary were beautiful; Path of Wild Flowers by Lajos Deák-Ébner. |
Like his brother Mathias,
when Peter reached 13 he might have continued with
his education or he might have begun to work with his father.
It was around this time that a few automobiles
could be seen driving through town and along the rural roads.
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| The Goose Girl by Teodor Axentowicz. |
Throughout the Austria-Hungarian Empire
both Hungarian and German were spoken.
We know that Peter's home tongue was German
from one of the questions on the 1930 US Census:
"Language spoken at home before coming to the United States."
By the time Peter was a teenager there were many conveniences.
Use of the telephone was widespread
throughout the Austrio-Hungarian Empire,
and rural post offices frequently had a public telephone
such as this one from 1890.
In the cities, electric streetcars were popular. The one below is in
Timișoara (now Temesvár, Romania), just 40 miles to the north.
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| 1910 vintage postcard of Timișoara with electric streetcar. |
Quite modern, Timișoara was the second city in the world
to be lit by electric street lamps--in 1884.
And in Timișoara one could board a train, travel
just over 1,000 miles east to the port in Antwerp, Belgium,
and board a ship to cross the Atlantic.
Railroads had been expanded from
one end of the country
to another, and eventually even
villages like Moravitza
had their own railway stop.
In 1910, when Peter was 18,
he booked passage
from Antwerp to New York.
He might have traveled by steam locomotive
much like this one from 1909.
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| The recently expanded port in Antwerp, 1910. |
From the ship manifest we learn that Peter's final destination
was to be Cincinnati, Ohio, where he would
join his brother Mathias who lived at 17 West Liberty.
Look soon for more posts about Peter.
Thanks for visiting! See you next time.
Thanks for visiting! See you next time.
Ginny
© 2017 Copyright by Ginny Bettendorf, All Rights Reserved
