Finding the Vonier Farm

Our (Sue and my) great great grandfather, Andreas Vonier was born in Schruns, Austria on October 13, 1822. We were thrilled to be able to locate his birthplace! 


How did we find this remote site? It was with the help of Joe Springer of the Mennonite Historical Library in Goshen, Indiana, and the Österreich Voralberger Landesarchiv, which noted the house number, 273, but no street name on Andreas' birth record. An town official in Schruns located an old plan which translated the house number to a current address, Plattsweg 3. Driving up there involved numerous scary hairpin turns.


We were finally close but found that our car would not be able to negotiate the steep gravel road, so we had to park and walk.


Not too far up the road, we caught sight of a building.



The shutters were all closed.


This photo shows the separate barn. Marlin noted that there were newish roofs.


Probably the owner checks on the place from time to time, but the driveway was overgrown with vegetation. No one had been there for some time. I wrote a note which Marlin carried through the vegetation to the house, and he placed the note under a rock on a table under the overhang.



Andreas' grandfather is listed as a farmer in one of the official records, and he lived nearby at a similar house number. There were a few more dwellings further up the road that were more modernized but which could well have been renovated from old buildings. There is little land for farming. This above photo is of a small hillside meadow across the road from the Vonier home. Farming must have been subsistence only. One can understand why Andreas left home to pursue masonry elsewhere, in his case as a "guest worker" in France (where he met and married our great great grandmother).

Is this really the birthplace and the same dwelling? As we were driving down, we met a man who had come up to take a look at his place, which he said was from the 1600's. Tearing down a building is not a common thing to do there. The Schruns official also was not absolutely certain about the address. Andreas immigrated to France (becoming André), and then to Ohio (becoming Andrew). He has many descendants in NW Ohio and elsewhere, but my guess is that none have travelled to his birthplace. Sue and I were pleased to have this opportunity.
by Janice

Comments

  1. UnknownJune 27, 2022 at 9:10 AM

    Such love expressed in this legacy piece… wonderful to read the tale. Xo

    ReplyDelete

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