Headline: Volga Relief Society
623 Lumbermen's Building, Portland, Oregon
Report on the Activity of the American Kitchens in Norka
With today's date the activity of the three American Kitchens in Norka reaches a new stage. Instead of 500 children, as in the past, as of today 1,000 children are supplied. This instant appears to me to be a suitable time to do a comprehensive review of the activity which now is behind us.
On a sunny Saturday afternoon in October the news spread from house to house, mouth to mouth, that the Americans had come and among them was our former countryman Georg Repp. The stopover of these foreign guests was of short duration but it was the topic of every conversation for days and weeks. The few village members who were fortunate enough to have seen and heard the guests had to answer many questions from the curious. After long months of despairing, hearts were again seized by the hope that rescue from famine and death was near.
On 6 November the first products arrived and on 7 November Mr. Georg Repp again appeared in Norka and organized a village committee to which he gave the order to prepare Kitchens for 500 children. Despite the strongest efforts the Kitchens were only able to be functional on 14 November. The choice of locations for the Kitchens and their repairing was quickly done, choosing and instructing the cooks also went quickly. Likewise it was a small thing to make safe, suitable and spacious areas for storing the Products and in the person of committee member Konrad Spady, in each regard, suitable warehouse managers were selected and soon at work. But, the compilation of the list of the children was time consuming. On three evenings the committee met deep into the night with this work. Earlier, much difficult work had been done by one of the committees established by Mr. Repp as part of the existing Commission. The new committee decided to accept the entire list. It turned out however, that an additional 30 children could be registered. While it was a long and boring task to go from house to house investigating the neediness, it was nevertheless pleasing to increase the number of fortunate children.
As the work was being finished and the passes about to be made, it turned out that the number of children on the list needed to be reduced by 12 so that 6 double portions could be made available for the cooks. Now we had the unpleasant task of deleting children from the list. Finally this work was finished and the passes prepared and distributed by committee member Johannes Lehl, with the support of some young men of the village who had finished their military service.
Also, in the the meantime some changes in the make-up of the committee proved to be necessary. Those appointed by Mr. Repp were as follows:
Pastor Friedrich Wacker, chairman; Treasurer, Alexander Leonhardt; Secretary, Konrad Weidenkeller; Friedrich Hartmann, chairman of the village council; his assistant Johannes Sauer; Peter Haeuser; Jacob Schlicht, Konrad Spady, Teacher Johannes Lehl, Melchior Traudt, Adam Voegler, Jacob Wacker, Philipp Weizel. -- Since among these men, six are heavily stressed by their positions but have an earnest desire to assist in this good deed, and further, that Adam Voegler withdrew from participation, it was decided to select an additional 4 members. The following persons were selected:
Heinrich Jost, Ludwig Hohnstein, Georg Weidenkeller and Georg Schleucher. The choice of these men turned out to be quite successful. All of these men worked with those who were selected earlier with total conscientiousness and eagerness.
For the large undisciplined mass of children in Kitchens 1 and 3 there could hardly have been more suitable men than Heinrich Jost and Georg Schleucher. They not only energetically kept order but also daily washed those water-shy children to near immaculateness and otherwise took on special educational tasks.
It was initially intended that the committee members were to alternate in the work but this was impossible in the 1 and 3 Kitchens. There always had to be 2 to 3 men on hand and only in the central village (2 Kitchen), where members Melchior Traudt, in spite of his age and weakness, eagerly participated, and Jacob Schlidt would alternate. They were also occasionally provided additional support by members Johannes Lehl and Alexander Leonhardt who are civil servants.
The committee meets at least once a week where we attend to current business. Initially we had no suitable area for our committee meetings, the village council building and a schoolroom proved to be unsuitable. Now we hold our meetings in the office room of the Sexton's quarters where we are the least disturbed and feel most comfortable.
At present we are again reorganizing the committee for two reasons; recently the village council term expired and a new executive committee was selected. Thus the new chairman of the village council, Konrad Krieger and his assistant Johannes Pauli came in. The increase in the number of children by 500, likewise suggested an enlargement of the committee. As a result the following were selected: Georg Albrecht, Georg Brill and Johannes Klaus. We want to hope that this now will be the last change in the committee and that the committee will remain in this form until all further tasks are finished.
The preceding 5 week period can be considered a trial period. -- It was a trial period for the committee. The committee has now become accustomed to its activities and the committee members retain for themselves the joy for having done a difficult and troublesome job.
It is not easy to keep at this work from the early morning to 1 or 2 o'clock in the afternoon. The greatest challenge facing the committee members is the vengeful gossip of bad, ill-meaning tongues. A committee member carried a bag of empty milk cans home in order to deliver them the next day to the warehouse manager and thus it was said: "He dragged half a bag of white bread home!" Those whose children were not accepted into the Kitchens and who now have brains and tongues poisoned with envy and anger are those most eagerly spreading these fantasies. Many of the committee men were truly unhappy over this gossip and had thoughts of resigning but those wavering were strengthened by mutual encouragement again and again.
The lack of support of the Soviet authorities regarding the supply of firewood for the Kitchens must also be mentioned. Otherwise, all the committee members repeatedly have to load and bring heavy chunks of wood here and split them.
There was also a trial period for our cooks. Initially they did not know how to correctly measure their ingredients. Once it seemed too thick and another time too thinly cooked. Sundays and Wednesdays caused special food headaches for the cooks. While one kitchen cooked a rice-flour mash, they cooked a butter dumpling rice soup in another. The soup tasted splendidly but it nevertheless precipitated a controversy. The dumplings swam on top so that the children who were served first got 3 to 4 dumplings and the last to be served got none, which understandably caused discontent to break out. In the 1 Kitchen the cooks went to the trouble to roast and serve the dumplings with boiled rice, this also proved to be impractical. The simple kitchen equipment which consists of only 2 powerful 8X12 former boilers, does not lend itself to the use of culinary arts. Thus we stayed with the rice-flour mash.
There are 6 inside cooks: Olga Sinner, Amalie Sinner, Elizabeth Pauli, Katharina Urbach, Eugenie Sinner, Amalie Schleuning. The cook, Amalie Sinner, was a late selection to replace Sophie Alt, who had gotten sick with Typhoid Fever and died. So far the cooks have worked without complaint and to the great satisfaction of the committee, nor have they given any cause for complaint.
It also was a trial period for the children. It was immediately made clear to the children that they would keep their right to be fed only if they behaved well and upon future and repeated offenses they would be excluded. This punishment had to be used only once. It concerned a boy who assisted his mother in a theft. We hope that the example of this punishment endures.
And finally, it was a trial period for the entire undertaking. One did not take the effort seriously. The number of children was too small and likewise the portions. Now. these distasteful objections have fallen by the wayside. The number of children has increased two-fold and so American assistance has penetrated into most families. The concern about the smallness of the portions is not valid. The children eat fully of the portions, smaller children between 1 and 8 mostly cannot completely finish them. All the committee members have taken notice, especially of those known personally to them, of the blessedly rich consequences. Children with full cheeks and a healthy color to their faces, beaming eyes and expressions. And above all the irrefutable fact stands: of the 500 children who were fed at the Kitchens, none have died, while before the Kitchens opened the number of deaths among children was large. Whoever saw the many distressed faces on that first day, to them it is clear, that these all would have died without the aid of our brothers in America. And this experience of saving countless children from death by starvation, to all those doing this great work of love over in America and over here in the Volga Colonies, may they be given courage and enthusiasm so they may continue the work of rescuing human lives for the glory of God.
At the conclusion it must be mentioned that the committee attaches importance to the activities of the Kitchens and that its friends in American have knowledge of these activities. Thus the undersigned has sent out many private letters to relatives and acquaintances in America, also two letters to the Volga Relief Society to Mrs. G. Repp. These reports were skillfully divided into time periods, thus a mental volume accumulates which secures the blessing of continued attention to the one offering this work of love. Further reports will follow.
In the name of the Norkan committee,
Pastor F. Wacker
Norka, the 18th of Dec., 1921
With today's date the activity of the three American Kitchens in Norka reaches a new stage. Instead of 500 children, as in the past, as of today 1,000 children are supplied. This instant appears to me to be a suitable time to do a comprehensive review of the activity which now is behind us.
On a sunny Saturday afternoon in October the news spread from house to house, mouth to mouth, that the Americans had come and among them was our former countryman Georg Repp. The stopover of these foreign guests was of short duration but it was the topic of every conversation for days and weeks. The few village members who were fortunate enough to have seen and heard the guests had to answer many questions from the curious. After long months of despairing, hearts were again seized by the hope that rescue from famine and death was near.
On 6 November the first products arrived and on 7 November Mr. Georg Repp again appeared in Norka and organized a village committee to which he gave the order to prepare Kitchens for 500 children. Despite the strongest efforts the Kitchens were only able to be functional on 14 November. The choice of locations for the Kitchens and their repairing was quickly done, choosing and instructing the cooks also went quickly. Likewise it was a small thing to make safe, suitable and spacious areas for storing the Products and in the person of committee member Konrad Spady, in each regard, suitable warehouse managers were selected and soon at work. But, the compilation of the list of the children was time consuming. On three evenings the committee met deep into the night with this work. Earlier, much difficult work had been done by one of the committees established by Mr. Repp as part of the existing Commission. The new committee decided to accept the entire list. It turned out however, that an additional 30 children could be registered. While it was a long and boring task to go from house to house investigating the neediness, it was nevertheless pleasing to increase the number of fortunate children.
As the work was being finished and the passes about to be made, it turned out that the number of children on the list needed to be reduced by 12 so that 6 double portions could be made available for the cooks. Now we had the unpleasant task of deleting children from the list. Finally this work was finished and the passes prepared and distributed by committee member Johannes Lehl, with the support of some young men of the village who had finished their military service.
Also, in the the meantime some changes in the make-up of the committee proved to be necessary. Those appointed by Mr. Repp were as follows:
Pastor Friedrich Wacker, chairman; Treasurer, Alexander Leonhardt; Secretary, Konrad Weidenkeller; Friedrich Hartmann, chairman of the village council; his assistant Johannes Sauer; Peter Haeuser; Jacob Schlicht, Konrad Spady, Teacher Johannes Lehl, Melchior Traudt, Adam Voegler, Jacob Wacker, Philipp Weizel. -- Since among these men, six are heavily stressed by their positions but have an earnest desire to assist in this good deed, and further, that Adam Voegler withdrew from participation, it was decided to select an additional 4 members. The following persons were selected:
Heinrich Jost, Ludwig Hohnstein, Georg Weidenkeller and Georg Schleucher. The choice of these men turned out to be quite successful. All of these men worked with those who were selected earlier with total conscientiousness and eagerness.
For the large undisciplined mass of children in Kitchens 1 and 3 there could hardly have been more suitable men than Heinrich Jost and Georg Schleucher. They not only energetically kept order but also daily washed those water-shy children to near immaculateness and otherwise took on special educational tasks.
It was initially intended that the committee members were to alternate in the work but this was impossible in the 1 and 3 Kitchens. There always had to be 2 to 3 men on hand and only in the central village (2 Kitchen), where members Melchior Traudt, in spite of his age and weakness, eagerly participated, and Jacob Schlidt would alternate. They were also occasionally provided additional support by members Johannes Lehl and Alexander Leonhardt who are civil servants.
The committee meets at least once a week where we attend to current business. Initially we had no suitable area for our committee meetings, the village council building and a schoolroom proved to be unsuitable. Now we hold our meetings in the office room of the Sexton's quarters where we are the least disturbed and feel most comfortable.
At present we are again reorganizing the committee for two reasons; recently the village council term expired and a new executive committee was selected. Thus the new chairman of the village council, Konrad Krieger and his assistant Johannes Pauli came in. The increase in the number of children by 500, likewise suggested an enlargement of the committee. As a result the following were selected: Georg Albrecht, Georg Brill and Johannes Klaus. We want to hope that this now will be the last change in the committee and that the committee will remain in this form until all further tasks are finished.
The preceding 5 week period can be considered a trial period. -- It was a trial period for the committee. The committee has now become accustomed to its activities and the committee members retain for themselves the joy for having done a difficult and troublesome job.
It is not easy to keep at this work from the early morning to 1 or 2 o'clock in the afternoon. The greatest challenge facing the committee members is the vengeful gossip of bad, ill-meaning tongues. A committee member carried a bag of empty milk cans home in order to deliver them the next day to the warehouse manager and thus it was said: "He dragged half a bag of white bread home!" Those whose children were not accepted into the Kitchens and who now have brains and tongues poisoned with envy and anger are those most eagerly spreading these fantasies. Many of the committee men were truly unhappy over this gossip and had thoughts of resigning but those wavering were strengthened by mutual encouragement again and again.
The lack of support of the Soviet authorities regarding the supply of firewood for the Kitchens must also be mentioned. Otherwise, all the committee members repeatedly have to load and bring heavy chunks of wood here and split them.
There was also a trial period for our cooks. Initially they did not know how to correctly measure their ingredients. Once it seemed too thick and another time too thinly cooked. Sundays and Wednesdays caused special food headaches for the cooks. While one kitchen cooked a rice-flour mash, they cooked a butter dumpling rice soup in another. The soup tasted splendidly but it nevertheless precipitated a controversy. The dumplings swam on top so that the children who were served first got 3 to 4 dumplings and the last to be served got none, which understandably caused discontent to break out. In the 1 Kitchen the cooks went to the trouble to roast and serve the dumplings with boiled rice, this also proved to be impractical. The simple kitchen equipment which consists of only 2 powerful 8X12 former boilers, does not lend itself to the use of culinary arts. Thus we stayed with the rice-flour mash.
There are 6 inside cooks: Olga Sinner, Amalie Sinner, Elizabeth Pauli, Katharina Urbach, Eugenie Sinner, Amalie Schleuning. The cook, Amalie Sinner, was a late selection to replace Sophie Alt, who had gotten sick with Typhoid Fever and died. So far the cooks have worked without complaint and to the great satisfaction of the committee, nor have they given any cause for complaint.
It also was a trial period for the children. It was immediately made clear to the children that they would keep their right to be fed only if they behaved well and upon future and repeated offenses they would be excluded. This punishment had to be used only once. It concerned a boy who assisted his mother in a theft. We hope that the example of this punishment endures.
And finally, it was a trial period for the entire undertaking. One did not take the effort seriously. The number of children was too small and likewise the portions. Now. these distasteful objections have fallen by the wayside. The number of children has increased two-fold and so American assistance has penetrated into most families. The concern about the smallness of the portions is not valid. The children eat fully of the portions, smaller children between 1 and 8 mostly cannot completely finish them. All the committee members have taken notice, especially of those known personally to them, of the blessedly rich consequences. Children with full cheeks and a healthy color to their faces, beaming eyes and expressions. And above all the irrefutable fact stands: of the 500 children who were fed at the Kitchens, none have died, while before the Kitchens opened the number of deaths among children was large. Whoever saw the many distressed faces on that first day, to them it is clear, that these all would have died without the aid of our brothers in America. And this experience of saving countless children from death by starvation, to all those doing this great work of love over in America and over here in the Volga Colonies, may they be given courage and enthusiasm so they may continue the work of rescuing human lives for the glory of God.
At the conclusion it must be mentioned that the committee attaches importance to the activities of the Kitchens and that its friends in American have knowledge of these activities. Thus the undersigned has sent out many private letters to relatives and acquaintances in America, also two letters to the Volga Relief Society to Mrs. G. Repp. These reports were skillfully divided into time periods, thus a mental volume accumulates which secures the blessing of continued attention to the one offering this work of love. Further reports will follow.
In the name of the Norkan committee,
Pastor F. Wacker
Norka, the 18th of Dec., 1921
Sources
Die Welt-Post, 9 February 1922, page 2.
This translation provided courtesy of Hugh Lichtenwald.
This translation provided courtesy of Hugh Lichtenwald.
Last updated March 6, 2016.