21 Aug 2011 Chemnitz, Annaaberg & Freiberg FHC

CHEMNITZ FAMILY HISTORY CENTER














We woke up early and got ready for church. We planned to go to three FH Centers today. Chemniitz, Annaberg and Freiberg. We drove to Chemnitz and found Bishop Jentzsch, who by the way, was the engineer for the Freiberg Temple. He acted as the interpreter for Sister Katja Sacher, the Director. This center is a great example of a smooth running center. They have 30 or more people visiting each month and they are only open 12 hours a week. 95% of those people attending are non LDS. We hear this same story in every FHC in Europe. Actually that is probably the same in the U.S. The spirit of Elijah is strong among the non LDS people. The Lord does work in mysterious ways. They also have 5-6 people who volunteer in the center.

Sister Sacher related an amazing story about her family to us. In 1998, she met the missionaries and a year later she was baptized. During that first year her desire for Genealogy work became stronger and stronger. She was instrumental in adding quite a few names to her ancestral line. She asked her Grandmother about her Great Grandfather who lived during the early 1900's. She was told that he had died in WWII when his house was hit by a bomb, and he was killed. Her Grandmother was only 5 years old at the time. She wanted to know everything there was about him. She felt very close to him at this time. She learned that he was a wonderful oil portrait painter, a shoe repairman and could fix anything electric. Her Grandmother was very sad that she had nothing to remind her of her father.

One day in 2000 she was at her Grandmother's house and she was prompted to go down into the basement. There she saw a large clothes trunk which she moved so she could get into it. The back of the trunk fell apart exposing a small hole next to the lining. She reached in and pulled out three small diaries that belonged to her Great Grandfather. She was amazed that they were still in one piece as they had been there for over 50 years. When she opened the pages they seemed almost transparent. After 5 years, she was able to transcribe the words he had written everyday before and during the War. It spoke allot about how hard it was in the 1930's not having any work yet having the talent and the desire to work. She is now writing a book about the life of her Great Grandfather. It is amazing how much the spirits can help us from the other side if we will just let them by working on our Genealogy. This was another great center we were able to visit. On to the next one.

ANNABERG FAMILY HISTORY CENTER









On to Annaberg about 25 mi away. We arrived just in time to take the Sacrament and then we were able to talk to Brother Dieter Richter, the Family History Director. He took us through the center and we were able to take photos of the chapel and the center. They are open one day a week with an attendance of about 10 people, again, all non members. Bro Richter did not speak English, but the full time Missionaries were there to translate for us. He said he was very appreciative that we had come to visit him. He mentioned that no one was indexing there. The Family History Support Office in Europe has a huge goal this year to teach all the youth to do indexing. In this way, they will help release the much needed European records. With the Lords help, this will happen.

FREIBERG TEMPLE & FAMILY HISTORY CENTER


























On to Freiberg where the Temple for Eastern Germany is. When we got there the Wards had shut down for the day, but there were two Sister Missionaries who graciously offered to show us around the chapel and they just so happen to have a key to the Family History Center. We were able to go in and take pictures. While looking around, I found their Patron sign in log and I figured out that in the month of July, there were 35 people signed in. This is another great working center in Germany. I would expect this center to be doing allot of indexing since we have given quite a few seminars to the youth here in Freiberg.

FYI, the German people are at a disadvantage, when they index German or Austrian records prior to 1938, they have to struggle with the Sutterlin (old German) hand writing. After that time, the hand writing was better because when Hitler took over, he did away with the Sutterlin and institued a more uniformed latin handwriting. In any case, it takes more time to transcribe the records.

We left the centers and found a hotel for the night. We were so thankful that we were able to do the Lords work.