I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what life was like in Yugoslavia. We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in 1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would load the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would bring it back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the dirt for the walls to strengthen them. Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid picture in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon and the dirt. Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what else went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the summer or too cold in the winter. Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which were for wine-making. -- Darlene http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D

I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. Liebe Grüße, Daniela Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter <[email protected]>: >I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >life was like in Yugoslavia. > >We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would load >the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would bring it >back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the dirt for the >walls to strengthen them. > >Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid picture > in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >and the dirt. > >Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what else >went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. > >Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >summer or too cold in the winter. > >Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >were for wine-making. > > >-- >Darlene >http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D >

Hello Daniela, How to keep a Banat-Swabian home clean - before and after the War: http://www.dvhh.org/alexanderhausen/memories/cleanliness-eng-de~NT.htm Nick -----Original Message----- From: Daniela Hieslmayr [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: March 13, 2018 2:54 PM To: Darlene Dimitrie; [email protected] Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. Liebe Grüße, Daniela Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter <[email protected]>: >I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >life was like in Yugoslavia. > >We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would load >the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would bring it >back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the dirt for the >walls to strengthen them. > >Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid picture > in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >and the dirt. > >Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what else >went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. > >Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >summer or too cold in the winter. > >Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >were for wine-making. > > >-- >Darlene >http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D >

My mother told me about how it was her weekly chore to "do" the floors in her parents' home. They were dirt floor but with the weekly cleaning it had become almost like a ceramic floor. She would wash the floor and then, with a broom, she would create a design on the floor. It wasn't until my grandparents sent money home from America that a wood floor was put in (it was my grandmother's brother who put in the floor--he had a lumberyard in the village). My grandparents' primary reason for going to America was to improve their home and to buy more land for farming. Rose Mary -----Original Message----- From: Nick Tullius <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2018 3:46 PM To: 'Donauschwaben Villages Helping Hands (DVHH) ' <[email protected]> Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls Hello Daniela, How to keep a Banat-Swabian home clean - before and after the War: http://www.dvhh.org/alexanderhausen/memories/cleanliness-eng-de~NT.htm Nick -----Original Message----- From: Daniela Hieslmayr [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: March 13, 2018 2:54 PM To: Darlene Dimitrie; [email protected] Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. Liebe Grüße, Daniela Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter <[email protected]>: >I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >life was like in Yugoslavia. > >We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would >load the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would >bring it back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the >dirt for the walls to strengthen them. > >Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid >picture > in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >and the dirt. > >Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what >else went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. > >Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >summer or too cold in the winter. > >Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >were for wine-making. > > >-- >Darlene >http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D > --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus

Two things: walls and floors. I do not have the benefit of having lived in Banat, so I am speaking just from hearsay. If I am full of baloney, I hope someone will set me straight. With respect to whitewashing walls, I believe it was for more than just esthetics. My understanding is that the walls were made of mud and straw bricks which were then plastered over with mud to make a smoother surface. Then they were whitewashed for appearance and _protection_. The whitewash protected the mud coating from wicking up water. Not sure if this was continuous from the water table or just from the surface when it rained. If you go to Banat today, you will find that most of these old houses are not well cared for and the plaster for the bottom three feet or so has fallen away. With respect to dirt floors, I have an account of Banaters building a sod house in Canada in which they somehow used cow dung to give the floor a smooth and polished finish. I am not sure if it was mixed with mud or just smeared on the dirt floor. Does this sound familiar to anyone? Glenn Schwartz President, Zichydorf Village Association (http://zichydorfonline.org) Searching: Schwartz, Kleckner, Schönherr in Zichydorf, Banat; Schüssler, Millecker, Lenhardt in Kudritz, Banat; Schwartz, Kory, Pierson/Person in Morawitza, Banat; Kalupsky/Chalupsky in Blumenthal, Banat; Bardua, Kandel, Heuchert in Kolomea, Galicia; Kuntz, Holzer, Kraft, Wolfe, Folk (Volk) in Kutschurgan, Russia; Macht in Volga, Russia. Email: [email protected] On 3/13/2018 2:58 PM, Rose Mary Keller Hughes wrote: > My mother told me about how it was her weekly chore to "do" the floors in her parents' home. They were dirt floor but with the weekly cleaning it had become almost like a ceramic floor. She would wash the floor and then, with a broom, she would create a design on the floor. It wasn't until my grandparents sent money home from America that a wood floor was put in (it was my grandmother's brother who put in the floor--he had a lumberyard in the village). My grandparents' primary reason for going to America was to improve their home and to buy more land for farming. > > Rose Mary > > -----Original Message----- > From: Nick Tullius <[email protected]> > Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2018 3:46 PM > To: 'Donauschwaben Villages Helping Hands (DVHH) ' <[email protected]> > Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls > > Hello Daniela, > > How to keep a Banat-Swabian home clean - before and after the War: > > http://www.dvhh.org/alexanderhausen/memories/cleanliness-eng-de~NT.htm > > Nick > > -----Original Message----- > From: Daniela Hieslmayr [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: March 13, 2018 2:54 PM > To: Darlene Dimitrie; [email protected] > Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls > > I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. > > 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). > > It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. > > Liebe Grüße, Daniela > > Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter > <[email protected]>: > >> I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >> life was like in Yugoslavia. >> >> We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >> She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >> 1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >> would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would >> load the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would >> bring it back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the >> dirt for the walls to strengthen them. >> >> Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >> was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid >> picture >> in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >> and the dirt. >> >> Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >> their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what >> else went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. >> >> Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >> their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >> every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >> roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >> thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >> summer or too cold in the winter. >> >> Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >> which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >> were for wine-making. >> >> >> -- >> Darlene >> http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D >> > > > > > --- > This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. > https://www.avast.com/antivirus >

Folks, it is crucial to mention time and place. The houses of the Banat villages around 1950 when I lived there, bore little resemblance to the houses of the early settlers in the 1700s. To start with the roof: virtually all roofs in the village were of thin red burned bricks. They lasted almost forever, but did not provide much thermal insulation: It was very hot in the attic during the summer. I remember very vaguely a house with a roof of cane, it was a kind of rare specimen. Some walls were still stomped ("gestampft"), made of a thick layer of earth mixed with chaff, which did provide superior thermal insulation, but in time the humidity from the soil tended to penetrate the foundation and move upwards. Also, the mice would dig channels through them. All the gables that I have seen were made of heavy burned brick. The basic ones were triangular, but the more expensive ones had more elaborate shapes with decorations, the so-called village baroque style. The bottom part of the gables had typically two large windows. The top part had two small, uncovered openings, and an inscription of the names of the owners (usually husband and wife) and the year of construction. Larger, more expensive houses had replaced the mud walls by bricks and added a basement used to store the wine barrels and some food items. The interior walls were plastered (with clay or cement?) and then painted. The painting consisted of a grounding in light colour, followed by stencilled patterns in one or more darker colours. There was an earlier discussion of this process on the DVHH list. The ceilings were white. The floors were mostly wooden, but some were very hard clay that felt like cement. The entire floor or only the walk-on sections were covered with rugs, often home-made from strips of textile material ("Fetzeteppiche"). Either the front or the side of the house formed the border to the street. They were no longer whitewashed, but painted in two colours: a darker "socket" about one meter high, and a lighter-colour upper part. The row(s) of trees in front of the houses were whitewashed. A fence or wall stretched along the rest of the lot, interrupted by a narrow gate for the entry of persons, and a wide gate for vehicle (mainly horse-drawn carriages). Adjacent to house and fence was a sidewalk paved with burned bricks. I know that it was not identical in all villages, but it was pretty much similar in the villages of the Banater lowlands ("die Heed"). Nick Tullius -----Original Message----- From: Glenn Schwartz [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: March 13, 2018 5:57 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [DVHH] Re: whitewashed walls and dung floors Two things: walls and floors. I do not have the benefit of having lived in Banat, so I am speaking just from hearsay. If I am full of baloney, I hope someone will set me straight. With respect to whitewashing walls, I believe it was for more than just esthetics. My understanding is that the walls were made of mud and straw bricks which were then plastered over with mud to make a smoother surface. Then they were whitewashed for appearance and _protection_. The whitewash protected the mud coating from wicking up water. Not sure if this was continuous from the water table or just from the surface when it rained. If you go to Banat today, you will find that most of these old houses are not well cared for and the plaster for the bottom three feet or so has fallen away. With respect to dirt floors, I have an account of Banaters building a sod house in Canada in which they somehow used cow dung to give the floor a smooth and polished finish. I am not sure if it was mixed with mud or just smeared on the dirt floor. Does this sound familiar to anyone? Glenn Schwartz President, Zichydorf Village Association (http://zichydorfonline.org) Searching: Schwartz, Kleckner, Schönherr in Zichydorf, Banat; Schüssler, Millecker, Lenhardt in Kudritz, Banat; Schwartz, Kory, Pierson/Person in Morawitza, Banat; Kalupsky/Chalupsky in Blumenthal, Banat; Bardua, Kandel, Heuchert in Kolomea, Galicia; Kuntz, Holzer, Kraft, Wolfe, Folk (Volk) in Kutschurgan, Russia; Macht in Volga, Russia. Email: [email protected] On 3/13/2018 2:58 PM, Rose Mary Keller Hughes wrote: > My mother told me about how it was her weekly chore to "do" the floors in her parents' home. They were dirt floor but with the weekly cleaning it had become almost like a ceramic floor. She would wash the floor and then, with a broom, she would create a design on the floor. It wasn't until my grandparents sent money home from America that a wood floor was put in (it was my grandmother's brother who put in the floor--he had a lumberyard in the village). My grandparents' primary reason for going to America was to improve their home and to buy more land for farming. > > Rose Mary > > -----Original Message----- > From: Nick Tullius <[email protected]> > Sent: Tuesday, March 13, 2018 3:46 PM > To: 'Donauschwaben Villages Helping Hands (DVHH) ' <[email protected]> > Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls > > Hello Daniela, > > How to keep a Banat-Swabian home clean - before and after the War: > > http://www.dvhh.org/alexanderhausen/memories/cleanliness-eng-de~NT.htm > > Nick > > -----Original Message----- > From: Daniela Hieslmayr [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: March 13, 2018 2:54 PM > To: Darlene Dimitrie; [email protected] > Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls > > I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. > > 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). > > It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. > > Liebe Grüße, Daniela > > Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter > <[email protected]>: > >> I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >> life was like in Yugoslavia. >> >> We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >> She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >> 1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >> would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would >> load the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would >> bring it back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the >> dirt for the walls to strengthen them. >> >> Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >> was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid >> picture >> in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >> and the dirt. >> >> Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >> their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what >> else went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. >> >> Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >> their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >> every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >> roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >> thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >> summer or too cold in the winter. >> >> Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >> which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >> were for wine-making. >> >> >> -- >> Darlene >> http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D >> > > > > > --- > This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. > https://www.avast.com/antivirus >

My mother was the daughter of Danube Swabians. She always called the living room the front room. Now I know where the name comes from — Vorzeigezimmer. We never sat in the front room unless there was company — until the TV came along. Then the whole family sat in there and watched the family TV. Fran Matkovich Sent from my iPad > On Mar 13, 2018, at 3:45 PM, Nick Tullius <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hello Daniela, > > How to keep a Banat-Swabian home clean - before and after the War: > > http://www.dvhh.org/alexanderhausen/memories/cleanliness-eng-de~NT.htm > > Nick > > -----Original Message----- > From: Daniela Hieslmayr [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: March 13, 2018 2:54 PM > To: Darlene Dimitrie; [email protected] > Subject: [DVHH] Re: Spring - Time to whitewash the walls > > I don’t know much about how the house of my grandmother was build. > > 1,5 year ago I visited her home town Sotin. I stood before the house, she > lived in. It was very nice, renovated and people lived in there. It has > been the house of her Danube Svabian grandmother. My grandmother, her > siblings and parents had a room in this house, where they lived. They had > floors of mashed earth she told me (so maybe loam). > > It was the typical type of house, small front, way far long back and on > the side a long corridor under roof with columns. She always says, that > there was a „Vorzeigezimmer“. She says, it was the room with the window to > the street. It was the prettiest room, but they never sat in it. Only in > rare cases, when special visitors came or on holidays. > > Liebe Grüße, Daniela > > Am 13.03.18, 16:35 schrieb "Darlene Dimitrie" unter > <[email protected]>: > >> I was visiting a cousin the other day and we were talking about what >> life was like in Yugoslavia. >> >> We were talking about how the walls were constructed in their homes. >> She was telling me about when my grandparents built their own home in >> 1937-38, how my grandmother, who was very pregnant with her 7th child, >> would take the horse and wagon to somewhere in town where men would load >> the yellow dirt (loam, I believe) onto her wagon and she would bring it >> back to the house. They would roll wood and straw into the dirt for the >> walls to strengthen them. >> >> Nothing stopped my grandma, she still had a vegetable garden when she >> was 90 years old, and passed away the next year. I have a vivid picture >> in my head of her, heavily pregnant, dealing with the horses, wagon >> and the dirt. >> >> Every spring, the walls were whitewashed inside and outside to give >> their homes a fresh look for the spring. Does anyone remember what else >> went on in the springtime - besides the obvious, planting of the crops. >> >> Was wondering if anyone would talk a bit more about the construction of >> their homes. My mom's house had loam floors, which they would sweep >> every day. You were considered rich if you had wood floors Was the >> roof mud too? What about interior walls? She said that the walls were >> thick enough that it kept the temperature regulated, not too hot in the >> summer or too cold in the winter. >> >> Across the front of the house, the porch was covered with grapevines, >> which were for eating, as opposed to the ones in their vineyards, which >> were for wine-making. >> >> >> -- >> Darlene >> http://www.dvhh.org/membership/associates.htm#D >> > > >