Hallo Karl, unfortunately I found interesting informations for you just in German. Do you speak or understand German? Here are good links: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meisterfamilie http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehrling (here in the last part: Geschichte) Hm, and I think your impression is a little bit wrong... in German we still have a proverb: "Lehrjahre sind keine Herrenjahre!" what simply means, that in an apprenticeship you have nothing to laugh.. :-) It means, that these years of training were hard, sometimes very hard, when the the family the kids had to live with were not friendly with them. Most of these "kids" lived for up to 7 years in the households of their (Meisterfamilie) "master families". They got just a very little money or nothing, but food and a bed. Mostly the "Meister" took over the custody which went so far, that they also had the rights for corporal punishment. They had to learn everything about profession/occupation/trade and in addition to that they mostly had to to help in the house or family like a maid or a worker (?). At the end of these years they had to pass the "Gesellenprüfung". Often the families of these kids had to pay for the education (Lehrgeld). When they couldn't pay for it, so these y! oung people had to stay longer after finishing the apprenticeship and passing the "Gesellenprüfung" until the payed the "Lehrgeld". Unfortunately these informations are not that much and allthough my grandparents also passed these years I don't have any informations about having maybe days off they could go to there families or about money they maybe got. But if you are interested in I can try to find out more about it, but the translation then needs a little bit longer... :-) Sabine > -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- > Von: "Karl von Loewe" <[email protected]> > Gesendet: 03.04.09 18:32:10 > An: <[email protected]> > Betreff: [PRUSSIA-ROOTS] Apprentices in West Prussia > My father became an apprentice to a watch maker in Putzig, West Prussia in 1913. He was certified by the appropriate guild in Danzig three years later, but stayed on as an assistant for another year before leaving. I'm curious to learn how one apprenticed at that time. Did his parents have to pay for the training? Was it customary to live with the master (my father was 14 when he started)? My impression is that it was a twelve-month year of study and practice, summer vacations, etc. Any information would be helpful. > Thanks, > Karl von Loewe > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message > ____________________________________________________________________ Psssst! Schon vom neuen WEB.DE MultiMessenger gehört? Der kann`s mit allen: http://www.produkte.web.de/messenger/?did=3123

Thank you so much for the information, Sabine. My family werte master brick/tile makers in the 1600,1700s. i have never been able to find a registry for the "meisters". Does one exist? Carol

Sabine, Thank you for you interesting comments. Google will, after a fashion, translate those pages into English - here are the resultant links: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meisterfamilie&ei=7ALpSeKvMuDRjAfsw4n3Aw&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meisterfamilie%26hl%3Den and http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehrling&ei=DBnpSeGCLZqSjAfr89GeCg&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dhttp://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehrling%26hl%3Den Kind regards, Bronwyn. On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 12:20 PM, <[email protected]> wrote: > Hallo Karl, > > unfortunately I found interesting informations for you just in German. Do > you speak or understand German? Here are good links: > http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meisterfamilie > http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehrling (here in the last part: Geschichte) > > Hm, and I think your impression is a little bit wrong... in German we still > have a proverb: "Lehrjahre sind keine Herrenjahre!" what simply means, that > in an apprenticeship you have nothing to laugh.. :-) It means, that these > years of training were hard, sometimes very hard, when the the family the > kids had to live with were not friendly with them. Most of these "kids" > lived for up to 7 years in the households of their (Meisterfamilie) "master > families". They got just a very little money or nothing, but food and a bed. > Mostly the "Meister" took over the custody which went so far, that they also > had the rights for corporal punishment. They had to learn everything about > profession/occupation/trade and in addition to that they mostly had to to > help in the house or family like a maid or a worker (?). At the end of these > years they had to pass the "Gesellenprüfung". Often the families of these > kids had to pay for the education (Lehrgeld). When they couldn't pay for it, > so these young people had to stay longer after finishing the apprenticeship > and passing the "Gesellenprüfung" until the payed the "Lehrgeld". > Unfortunately these informations are not that much and allthough my > grandparents also passed these years I don't have any informations about > having maybe days off they could go to there families or about money they > maybe got. But if you are interested in I can try to find out more about it, > but the translation then needs a little bit longer... :-) > > Sabine > > > > > -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- > > Von: "Karl von Loewe" <[email protected]> > > Gesendet: 03.04.09 18:32:10 > > An: <[email protected]> > > Betreff: [PRUSSIA-ROOTS] Apprentices in West Prussia > > > > My father became an apprentice to a watch maker in Putzig, West Prussia > in 1913. He was certified by the appropriate guild in Danzig three years > later, but stayed on as an assistant for another year before leaving. I'm > curious to learn how one apprenticed at that time. Did his parents have to > pay for the training? Was it customary to live with the master (my father > was 14 when he started)? My impression is that it was a twelve-month year > of study and practice, summer vacations, etc. Any information would be > helpful. > > Thanks, > > Karl von Loewe