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How did the Schwenkfelders influence Montgomery County? · Centrally Speaking

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Centrally speaking, is the Central Schroinfeller Church's podcast.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: It speaks about issues that would be of interest to our society.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: In particular, it addresses how a Christian worldview intersects with Western secular culture.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: In the spirit of the church's founder, we take the perspective of the Middle Way, which is in agreement with the historic Christian Church.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Dr.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: Drake Williams, Minister of Mission and Theology at the Church.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Our website is www.cscfamily.org.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: Today and in the coming months, we're aiming to present an array of topics that would generate interest to those living near the church or in Montgomery County.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Today we're going to have a conversation about the Schwenkfelder and how they have influenced Montgomery County.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: Many of you may have driven past the Central Schwenckfelder Church or past sister churches in our area, such as the Palm Schwenckfelder Church on the Gravel Pike, Pennsylvania State Route 29 in Upper Hanover Township, or past the Olivet Schwenckfelder United Church of Christ on Township Line Road in East Norriton, or past Schwenckfeld Manor on Allentown Road in Lansdale, or even past the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center in Pennsburg.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: And you may have driven past these buildings and seen the word Schwenckfelder, and you may have wondered, what does that mean?
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we would like to discuss this with you today.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: Today it's my pleasure to have my father with me, also named Drake Williams.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: Besides being my father, he is a member of the Central Schwenckfelder Church here in Lansdale, Pennsylvania, along Valley Forge Road.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: He is also a former moderator of the General Conference of Schwenckfelder Churches, and also a former moderator of the Central Schwenckfelder Church.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: And he is currently treasurer at the Schwenckfelder Library and Heritage Center.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: He also has several historical interests and particularly in the Schwenkfelder.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: We warmly welcome you to uh day to the show, Dan.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for coming.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm happy to be here.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: Let's start by asking a few uh basic questions uh about the Schwenkfelders.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: How long have the Schwenkfelders been here in Montgomery County?
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: Well, they came uh starting in night in 1731 through the period of uh 1737, but the major migration was in 1734, that's when the vast number of them came over.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_02: And why were they called Schwenckfelder?
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_02: Ah, because they were followers of uh Caspar Schwenckfelder von Osick, who was a reformer born back in 1491, and lived uh was a contemporary of Luther's.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_02: And uh coming from Europe, how did they get all the way here to Montgomery County?
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_02: Well, um they had actually a very interesting trip.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um they they left uh uh Saxony uh in 1734 in the spring of 1734 and took uh a flat boat ride down the Elba River and ended up in Holland, the Netherlands, and eventually then uh traveled from there over to England and then came across uh the Atlantic Ocean on the St.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_02: Andrew in the summer and uh early fall of 1734.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's the major migration I'm referring to now.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then you must uh say that the there are also several other migrations that took place?
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they all came over basically the same time, and I don't know if they all followed exactly the same route.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_02: I'm most familiar with the the 1734 one.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: And why did they decide to leave Germany to come all the way over here to Montgomery County?
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: Well, they'd been persecuted for years.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_02: They they were followers of Schwenkfeld after he died, and they lived in the Lower Silesia, and from time to time they were persecuted both by the Lutherans and the Catholics.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_02: Eventually they were forced to leave uh Silesia and spent some time in Saxony, and that's a neighboring country.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um they were under the the the protection of Count Zinzendorf, and they lived in Saxony for the about eight years or so, but the pressure then was on uh Zinzendorf to uh to to convert them or do something with them, and the Schwenfelders thought it was time to go somewhere else.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: And they had some people who had been over here in America and they they they liked the reports they had and they thought it was time to go.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the relationship with Zinzendorf, then there must be also some other relations that they had with other Christian uh uh bodies today.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_02: That was a period of Reformation.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: There were a lot of things that were going on over there.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: Zinzendorf was a Moravian and uh he welcomed other people, not just the Schweinfelders there, so they did rub some shoulders there, particularly I guess with the Anabaptists.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_02: They were not on good terms with the Lutherans, so they tried to avoid them.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Now you said that they had experienced some poor treatment in uh Silesia, Germany.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: Can you uh share anything about the treatment that they've uh had Well it's it's it it's it's been told that uh they were uh both um in stocks and pillories, uh some of them apparently were even sent off to the galleys uh from Vienna.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: Something similar to what you might have seen in the the Ben Hur movie.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then they came through uh from Germany, through to the the Netherlands, on to England, and then settled here in southeast Pennsylvania.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh why here rather than somewhere else?
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: Is that just where the boat landed?
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, they were specifically coming here.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there are probably several reasons.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that there'd been some people over here before, a couple of them, and maybe they you might have considered them advanced scouts, I'm not sure, but they had sent back some uh good reports.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's interesting because uh uh Zinzendorf himself was actually interested in having the Schwenkfelders uh go to Georgia, and there was a lot of discussion about that.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_02: Zinzendorf actually put a little bit of pressure on them to go to Georgia, but uh they decided uh that maybe uh Pennsylvania was more appealing.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_02: Of course, uh there was always the uh the religious freedom idea that uh William Penn had uh was promoting.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think they they were concerned about religious freedom, and I think they saw that as a help.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_02: And the other interesting thing was that they they spent some time arguing amongst themselves whether or not they should stay in Europe and stay in the Netherlands for a while.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_02: But uh uh the I think wiser heads prevailed and they came over here.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: And they settled in this area along with some other uh groups like uh the Mennonites, uh the Moravians, and have had some contact with them over the years too.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, they have, yes.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: They've always been on good terms with them.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I think originally when they got here they were hoping to all live together, but uh that was not possible, so they ended up uh spreading out a little bit, but still all in southeastern Pennsylvania.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_02: They were looking for farms.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_02: They had hoped that they would actually all be in one place together, but it didn't quite work out that way.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: If you could tell us a little bit of uh who some of the more well-known Schweinkfelders uh have been.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_02: Well, in most recent times, uh uh many people will probably remember Drew Lewis and Dick Schweiker.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_02: Uh they were in the same church, they grew up together.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_02: Uh interesting enough, they both served in President Reagan's first uh cabinet.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_02: That was very unusual.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: It was the first time that had happened since the revolutionary times.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: Drew Lewis was the Secretary of Transportation, and many people will probably remember his uh rather significant role in the air controller strike.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: And then later he became the president of Union Pacific Railroad.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_02: Dick Schweiker was a member of the House of Representatives for a short period of time, and then he was appointed the Secretary of Health and Human Services.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's probably worth mentioning, you're thinking about Schweinfelders, you might have heard about as uh Dick Schweiker's father, uh Malcolm Schweiker, who was very well known in this area, the Lansdale area.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: He served as a president of the American Ole and Tile Company.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_02: So this is not an insular group.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: Initially, they did keep to themselves.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that was one of their characteristics in the first hundred years or so, but then a little bit later on they w reached out and were in lots of areas.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_01: They can you say something about uh the meeting houses where the Schwenkfelders uh first met to worship?
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: Well, when they came over here, um they actually just met in homes.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_02: In the Pen Pensburg area, there were three meeting houses built.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_02: Uh there were meeting houses at Worcester and Tomensen and Salford, and they eventually became the central Schwenckfelder Church.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh up up in the northern area, outside of Pensburg and Hosensack and Crausdale, and in in the area around here, uh Salford.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: They do have worship services there.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_02: Matter of fact, in Salford they have one every year.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: But they're primarily uh worshiping in church buildings now.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: How many uh Schwankfelders are there today, and uh are they all in uh Montgomery County?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_02: Well, all except a few in Philadelphia.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_02: There are a little little more than two thousand Schwenkfelders uh worshiping uh now.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um five churches.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_02: Four churches, excuse me, one in Palm, uh one in Central Schweinfelder Church, then Olivet Schwenckfelder Church, and then uh a missionary church in Philadelphia.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_02: So except for the missionary church, all of them are in Montgomery County.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: And they get together periodically all as a a group uh for uh Day of Remembrance, um Day of Remembrance, the longest standing continuous running Thanksgiving uh service uh in America.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh how did this service first start, and are there any distinctives uh about it today?
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it started in 1734 uh when they arrived here in September.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: They arrived in September 22nd, and they'd had a very very rough trip.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_02: If Christopher Schultz's diary is to be believed, uh and I think it is to be believed, uh shortly before they arrived here, they describes possibly a very heavy storm, which I would say was probably a hurricane, probably before they recognized what a hurricane was, but they in many ways I think they were lucky to have survived.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_02: And when they got here, they they decided that they needed to give thanks to Almighty God for their safe deliverance.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_02: And so they started that on September 24th, 1734.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_02: And every year since then they have met for a day of remembrance.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_02: Not always on that day, although for many years it was always on that day.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: But in recent times, it's usually on a Sunday closest to that day.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_02: And they they they have apple butter and bread as their as their meal.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_02: Actually, I think they had apple beer when they landed in 1734, but we've decided not to have the beer now.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I know some of the uh heritage from uh the Schweinckfelders is preserved at the Schwenkfelder Library and Heritage Center in Pennsburg.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: Can you tell us a little bit uh about this heritage center and what might be of interest uh to the general public?
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: Well, the heritage center uh really began in the uh 1800s uh when the original Schwenksfelder's and some of those uh people who followed them then passed away.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_02: There was a lot of material that they came over with.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: Well, a lot of m they they had everything that they came over with.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: They didn't come over with very much, but they came over with were Bibles and and books, and they kept those things, and uh they began to think that they needed to collect them together.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: So eventually they started collecting from everybody that they could all this material, and they kept it uh in the Carnegie Library, which is found in Pennsburg, and then they eventually in the 1950s and finished actually in 1951, uh, of library, and they moved that material there.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that library then was uh uh expanded in 2001, and actually there's another expansion being worked on right now here in 2019.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_02: But there's all kinds of interesting things that go in that library.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: Did you want me to uh to describe what the Yes, please do?
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: Well it it houses all kinds of uh interesting items.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: I think one of the most fascinating items is uh is Schwenkfeld's Bible, which was uh the his original Bible in which he had his own notes, and for years it was wondering what had happened to it.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: And in the late 1800s, uh a dealer over in London wrote over here to the Schweinfelders and said, I think we found something that you might be interested in.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_02: It turns out he was absolutely right.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: He had found Schwenckfeld's Bible.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_02: The Schwenkfelders got together some money and went over and bought it and brought it back, and it's housed in the Schweinfelder Library and Heritage Center.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: Other interesting things that are housed there are the original document that the Schwenkfelder signed when they got off the boat in 1734.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that's all that document is also housed up there.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_02: And then a document that was written in 1742 by Frederick the Great inviting the Schweinfelder's back after they've been gone for a period of time.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um Frederick the Great thought he missed the Schweenfelder so you'd like to have him come back, and he he issued an edict inviting him back.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and we have that copy of that document too, and that's also in the library.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: Now I have to tell you that none of them went back, but uh at any rate, that's another interesting thing.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_02: Also, up there is our all manner of diaries and old books and letters.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, what does the library do besides have housing all these things?
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it sponsors all kinds of things.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: It has it has an antique fair, which it's been doing every year.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: It's called Pen Dry Goods Market Antique Show and Sale, which it does every every May.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: It does things every fall, and here are some of the things that just doing this fall called American Girl Tea Time, Hands-on History Program, Fall Harvest Day Camp, and History Detectives.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_02: It's just some of the things that uh I can mention that uh going on in the Schwankfelder Library.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you so much for coming uh and uh sharing uh about the Schwankfelders and providing some history.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you to those of uh uh who have been listening to Centrally Speaking, a broadcast from the Central Schwankfelder Church in Worcester, Pennsylvania.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: Our Sunday morning services are the following.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: We have a traditional service at 9 a.m.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: with organ and various choirs.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: Our praise team leads the contemporary service at 10 35.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: Sunday School for Youth and Children is at 9 o'clock.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: Sunday School for Adults is at 9 o'clock and as well as at 10 30.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: We warmly welcome you to join us.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you again for listening.