Day Three: Fri. June 6th -Freiburg

Before I continue with this next part of our journey I would like to give a bunch of background information of why we went to Freiburg in the first place. To do this, I have to explain my genealogy...which means shedding my pseudonym "S" for awhile and referring to myself with my full name, Sarrita Hunn [*gasp!* you didn't know it was me, did you!? : ) ].

Some of this information I knew before the trip and some because of the trip, but the story goes something like this...A German named Helmut Hunn became a sort of country records clerk for a small four-village office just north of Freiburg. With daily access to the records, he decided to do a bunch of genealogy research on his family who had been living in the area for as long as anyone could remember. He discovered that a few generations back a whole wing of the family moved to the United States and ended up around St. Louis. Helmut contacted someone he knew in St. Louis to get the information listed for all 'Hunns' in the phone book for that area. After a few years and a few letters later, my Dad's cousin Ramona (who I believe was already doing genealogy for our family on this end...?) ended up writing Helmut back and an exchanged ensued.

From my side, my Dad's family had always been aware of the German heritage (I mean, how much more of a German name can you have besides Hunn, right?)...and it was said that even though the Hunns has been in the States for a few generations, they mostly married other Germans (until my generation) and so my great-grandparent's still spoke German. Maybe I am making all this up, and someone can correct me, but that is what I remember from family conversations.... anyway ...from my side, I knew that my great-great-greatgrandfather was the first German to moved to the States (around 1828). From me it is my Dad (Paul), Grandpa (Norbert), Great-Grandpa (Vernon), Great-GreatGrandpa (Richard)...and Joseph Hunn, who moved outside St. Louis (where my Grandpa grew up) from Germany.

OK, let's see if we can still follow this....it turns out that this Joseph "that moved to St. Louis" Hunn was the Grandson (I believe, but maybe Great-Grandson) of Anton Hunn (born 1779) in Germany. We are descendants of Anton Hunn's and Helmut's side of the family are descendants of Anton's brother Paulus Hunn...and, of course, we share their father who was named Johann Konrad Hunn.

Anton had 4? kids, one was another Joseph Hunn....the father of 11 kids, one of which was Joseph "who moved to St. Louis" Hunn....but actually, according to the records, most (if not all) of Joseph I's kids moved to the States and most (if not all) moved to the St. Louis area...and so, it was really an expansion of that whole side of the family on that side of the ocean.

Are you following me so far?
OK. From the German side....Paulus Hunn had a son (also) named Josef Hunn. Josef had 2 sons named Michael and Johann. Michael's Great-Great-Granddaugter was Maria Hunn and Johann's Great-Grandson was Martin Hunn. Maria Hunn and Martin Hunn married (which was convenient since they already had the same last name) and they are Helmut's parent's. Helmut also has two sisters Irene and Lydia.

So, to summarize, my Dad and his brothers and sister are roughly the same generation on the US side as Helmut and his sisters on the German side. We have a common ancestry in two brothers, Paulus and Anton...one whose decedents mostly stayed in Germany, and one whose decedents mainly left Germany and came to St. Louis.

whew. Well that's enough for now...but all of this will be discussed further in the following posts.

To go back to our trip, one of my main goals when in Germany was to visit these distant Hunn relations. Shortly before leaving Missouri I was in contact with Irene, who happened to be in St. Louis on a business trip (her Freiburg-based company happen to open a field office there about 3 years ago!) but I missed her there. But, once in Germany I corresponded with her to arrange this visit. She had worked as a translator so is a very good English speaker.

When arriving in Freiburg Irene, and her husband Willi, meet us at the train station and immediately gave a us a quick tour of the city.


Here is R and I upon arriving in Freiburg, walking into the old part of the city.


Here is R, Irene and Willi.


R and a city street in Freiburg. You can start to notice the little water gutters on the right of the street. These are all through out the old part of the city and Freiburg is very famous for them. There is a saying in Freiburg that if you visit the city and accidentally fall into the stream, you will end up marrying a girl from Freiburg. Willi, who is originally from Bavaria, said that happened to him and that is why he and Irene got married.


No, 1120 is not the address of the building...it is the date of the original building... that was then rehauled in 1995.


The Freiburg Cathedral (going through some reconstruction)


I believe that Irene said this was the oldest hotel in Freiburg. You can get a sense of the native architecture.


In addition to little gutters, the city is also full of river/canal systems. Lots of water everywhere.




Willi works for the University of Freiburg, one of the oldest universities in Germany (founded in 1457), whose notable alumni and professors have included Hannah Arendt, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. As a special treat he took us to the highest tower of the school to have a great view overlooking the city. The picture above overlooks Freiburg (to the West I believe). I think the distant mountain is the Kaiserstühl, which I will discuss later.