The following monograph traces the history of nineteenth century German-American artists who decorated mission churches erected by their immigrant countrymen in North America. The majority of the churches were Roman Catholic, but a few of them belonged to the Protestant faith. The activities of these artists included the design and construction of altars and pulpits, the painting of altarpieces and murals, the decorative stenciling of the structural supports in church interiors, the installation of stained glass windows, and the sculpting of religious statues. The main focus of the book will be on the German-American painters whose themes and individual styles will be demonstrated with accompanying illustrations. With a few exceptions, the time frame of my discussion will be the second half of the nineteenth century.

      My interest in the nineteenth century German-born church artists dates back to 1991 when I had the opportunity to be an art consultant for the Benedictine Monastery of the Immaculate Conception in Ferdinand, Indiana. Archivist Sister Mary Kenneth Scheessele had received an Indiana Heritage Research Grant from the Indiana Humanities Council and the Indiana Historical Society to research, catalog, and document the art collection at the Monastery. Together we discovered a wealth of religious art that had been created by German-American artists in southern Indiana.

      My subsequent visit to the Benedictine Archabbey of St. Vincent at Latrobe, Pennsylvania, afforded me an insight into the German Benedictine Order's role in providing opportunities for church artists from the Old Country to practice their skills in the United States. Brother Nathan M. Cochran, O.S.B., curator of the St. Vincent art collections, had done considerable research on this topic and had gathered valuable information about the artists and their works. His demanding duties at St. Vincent prevented him from further investigation. By generously turning over his research results to me, he enabled me to continue what he had already started to pursue as an important historical project.

      St. Vincent Monastery and College were founded in 1846 by the Bavarian Benedictine missionary Boniface Wimmer with the support and financial aid of King Ludwig I of Bavaria and the Ludwig-Missionsverein. Wimmer, his king, and the Missionsverein played important roles in the dissemination of German church art in the U.S. Several of the German-American church artists had studied in Munich and had absorbed the lessons of the Nazarenes. My discovery of a close link between this early nineteenth century German Romantic artist group and their disciples, who came to North America, was an unexpected thrill.

      The German Nazarene artists were part of a Western European Romantic historicism that professed a need to resurrect earlier styles in the arts. A love for the Middle Ages and an admiration of the religious fervor that dominated the pre-Renaissance period, led to a rejection of worldly sophistication in the arts - literary as well as visual. The German Nazarenes felt that the practicing artist should only live and work in the service of God. Their Catholic religious outlook and their belief in the pursuit of a Christian art by a brotherhood of men came to motivate a number of the German-American church artists as well.

      Whereas the German Nazarenes did not get much opportunity to paint murals and altarpieces in their homeland, the German-American artists found an unlimited field of opportunities awaiting them in the U.S. Such opportunities arose with the growing number of Germans who arrived in North America during the 1830's and 1840's. Many newcomers came from southern Germany and nearly half of them were Catholics. Some 40,000 German Catholics entered the U.S. in the 1830's. The number tripled in the 1840's. [1] The German Catholic settlers wanted to preserve their language, liturgy, church architecture, and parish schools. They formed strong ethnic communities, mostly founded on regional ties, where their churches became bastions of maintaining a German cultural presence.

      Nineteenth century German Catholic immigrants found themselves a cultural minority in the United States where the Irish with different linguistic and liturgical traditions dominated. Hence the Germans' first interest was the erection of a church and a school. They needed to hear sermons delivered by a German priest and to have their children receive instruction in their mother tongue. [2] Pride dictated the German immigrants' desire to worship in a beautiful, uplifting House of God. Historian John Bodnar in his book The Transplanted describes the need of newcomers to "huddle together in churches where they could find solace in a strange new land." [3] To reinforce their feelings of a shared past, the German Catholics set out to build their new churches in the traditional styles of their homeland.

      The building of a parish church in most cases presented great financial hardship for the newly arrived immigrants. A small log structure was usually their first religious meeting house, and an itinerant priest on horseback their first spiritual leader. As the German Catholic congregations became prosperous and a number of architects, who had studied and trained in Germany, arrived in North America in the 1850's and 1860's, Neo-Romanesque and Neo-Gothic brick churches with dramatic twin towers began to dominate the skyline of American towns and villages. They may be found mainly in the so-called German triangle defined by the cities of Milwaukee, Cincinnati and St. Louis. The beautiful German churches were built with German money, were founded quickly one after the other, and became the source of great pride for the settlers.

      The new churches needed interior decorations by experienced artists. Fortunately a number of such artists had come to the U.S. from Germany to explore opportunities that were not available in their homeland. It is the goal of this monograph to honor them and to pay tribute to their accomplishments. It needs to be pointed out that my discussion of German-American church artists is by no means complete. Future research will uncover more sites and art works. However, time is running out for a great number of nineteenth century churches that have fallen victim to neglect, removal, or alterations. Due to ethnic population shifts and to urban sprawl, former German neighborhoods have undergone drastic changes. In addition, the Second Vatican Council, which met between the years 1962 and 1965, reintroduced a freestanding altar in Catholic Church sanctuaries. The priest celebrating Mass now faces the congregation and no longer the wall behind the altar. [4] Such change prompted many members of the clergy, intent on modernizing the Catholic Church, to alter all of the interior furnishings. Altars, altarpieces, pulpits, statuary, pews, and other "old fashioned" art objects were removed or stored and can no longer be located. Such has been the fate of a large number of works by German-American church artists. There is great danger of more loss.

      On the bright side, many local historic preservationists have become aware of the problem during the past twenty years. Dedicated parish members have in many instances collected funds from private and corporate donors for restoration of their churches' interior and exterior. Librarians and archivists have started to research parish records for the purpose of documenting the ethnic and artistic history of immigrant churches that are again regarded as important American edifices. It is also heartening to discover that the Archdiocese of Chicago maintains a repository for art objects and church furnishings that were removed whenever a parish church has been closed during the past ten years. Such objects are then distributed among less prosperous parishes where they can be displayed and enjoyed by the congregation. The effort of the Chicago Archdiocese is just one example of recent awareness by Church officials that steps need to be taken to halt the loss of precious materials.

      It is to be hoped that this discussion of one aspect of German-American contribution to the cultural life in the U.S. will stimulate interest among students of history and art. They will be richly rewarded.