Dear Rooters, I have just loaded a page on the Schawalder families of the Schawalder families of canton St.Gallen - all based on data provided by Ernst Schawalder : not many data on individuals, but you might enjoy the coat of arms. As the page is written in German, let me give some explanation in Englisch : The name was likely spelled Schoenwalder originally ("forester looking after the beautiful forest") - this spelling is mentioned in St.Gallen as early as 15th century : no explicit links to these generations is possible due to lack of sources, however. The coat of arms of the Schawalder of Diepoldsau/Schmitter and Widnau is based on a seal used by Johannes Schawalder during 1730...39 : as Johannes Schawalder was a smith, this will be smith's tools - a hammer and another tool we are not quite sure about. Take a look at : http://www.eye.ch/swissgen/members/schaern1.htm The Diepoldsau line uses yellow on blue, the Widnau line black on yellow. Compare the design with the seal also depicted on that page. The coat of arms of the St.Gallen line (originally from Schmitter) is much more recent : not dating back to 1796, as one may assume - this is the year of birth of Hans Jakob Schawalder, the oldest proven ancestor of the St.Gallen line. Best regards - Wolf -------------- Wolf W. Seelentag, PhD, e-mail : wolf.seelentag@kssg.ch Klinik fuer Radio-Onkologie, Kantonsspital, CH - 9007 St. Gallen, Switzerland Tel : +41-71-4942233 Fax : +41-71-4942893