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Schnake house at #19 Unterluebbe, Kreis Minden, Germany

Photographed by Roy Johnson, 1958
Since demolished

General description:  A house-barn, with a large central hall and rooms opening off the hall.  There was no distinct separation between house and barn.  One room was the parlor, another the bedrooom, another the cow stall, horse stall, pigsty, etc.  Walls were very thick, maybe two feet, and there was no smell from the animal part.  The front of the house was to the south;.There was an extension, built later than the main house, on the east side.

The house was built in 1848.  Only two Schnakes were born in this house:  Karl Friedrich Wilhelm, who settled in the Evansville area of Indiana, and Karl Ludwig Hermann, who settled in Southwest Missouri.  However, other siblings grew up in the house. In 1958 when the picture was taken, the house was occupied by the Heinrich Stickdorn family.

There was a handwritten note in the margin of the church records indicating that an older house had burned five years before this one was completed.  Where did the Schnakes live during that five years?  Probably in the partially completed building as they constructed it.

(1) Front of House, facing the street.  I understand the Germans call this the back of the house.. The front door opens into the main hall shown in picture number 5.

(2) Back of house. (Considered the front, according to a German contact.) Doris (Schnake) Johnson at right; Frau Stickdorn and child at left. The addidion can be seen in this picture.  We did not get to see inside the addition.  We assume it was used for animals.  Note the manure pile in front of it. In earlier times, when the parents arranged a marriage, they did not always consult the prospective bride and groom; it was a family arrangement, and there was a "B'schau" in which the parents of the bride examined the estate of the groom.  The manure pile was often an important part of this "B'schau".

(3) Side of house. Mrs. Stickdorn and child at left; Doris (Schnake)  Johnson on right. Other houses of similar style can be seen. The house sat almost flush against the street with a walled "hof" or court at back.

(4) Wood above the door with the names
"Johann Daniel Ludwig Schnake --- Marie Elisabeth Schnake - 1848"
Letters barely visable

(5) Interior of main hall (called the "Diehle")
The overhead beams were hand hewn - the ax marks were plainly visible. Frau Stickdorn and child on left; Doris (Schnake) Johnson sitting in doorway at right.  The hall may have been used as a threshing floor, and keep in mind that it was the entry for the animals, so it probably did not look as neat and clean as it does here.  (Also, the pastor called ahead, and the family had time to clean up beforehand). Hired help also had to find a place to sleep, and may have slept in this hall.  The door that you see here (with the light coming in) is the inside of the door shown in the view of the front of the house in picture no. 1.

(6) Parlor --This was the one really nice room of the house.  The other rooms all looked poor and bare.

Synopsis: You have to see a house like this to see how our ancestors lived and understand why they would leave everything familiar to come to an unknown land.  With the large central hall and the area for the animals taking up so much room, the rooms for the family were tiny.  Families were often large, and hired hands sometimes lived on the farmstead also.  We found at least two instances in which the residence of non-Schnakes was given as "Schnaken Stätte" (Schnake Place). These "Heuerleute" (hired people) had to sleep where they could find a place, in the hall, with the animals, in a shed outside.  Also, when the main owner grew old, he would sometimes turn the farm over to his heir and become a "Leibzuchter", a term for which there is no precise English translation.  He retained the right to live on the farmstead, but usually the main bedroom would be turned over to the heir and spouse.  The Leibzuchter and his wife might sleep in a shed or wherever there was a roof, and perhaps keep a garden and a pig, or whatever he could do. There was no new land to be had; sons other than the oldest had to become a "Heuerling" (hired hand) either to the brother who inherited the property or on another farmstead.

This farmstead was the dwelling of Schnakes from our earliest records in 1572 (Johan Schnake) to ca. 1870, when Doris Schnake's great grandfather Karl Ludwig Hermann Schnake came to America.  He was the youngest.  The last of his siblings, Minnie and Wilhelm, left for America in 1865, leaving him with his widowed mother as the "man of the house" when he was only 14.

 The story he told was that he had two cows and one cow died.  He couldn't farm with one cow, so he left for America and left his widowed mother with relatives. That must have been a difficult decision. He was the last Schnake to live at number 19, ending at least 300 years of Schnake residence here. It is probable they were there for many centuries before that. The Schnakes were serfs to the St. Martini monastery. The archbishop set up the monastery in the eleventh century and donated property in Unterlübbe from his own estate. Serfs were usually part of such a donation, and the Schnakes may have been on this estate then and for many years earlier. I have heard, but have been unable to confirm, that the monastery did not really exist but was only a false front for the Bishop to collect the rents.

A 1682 document lists for farmstead no. 19 three horses, two cows, and one two-year old heifer. Our records show that in 1677 Marieke Schnake married Ernst Kriete, who was already living at "Schnaken Stätte" and who took the Schnake name.  They married in October 1677 and had their first child in November 1677. That was not such a disgrace then, as the engagement required a contract and was considered nearly as binding as marriage. They had six children between 1677 and 1692, and her parents died in 1691 and 1692 so they were also living in the house until then.  Thinking of three horses, two cows, a heifer, and eight or nine people in that house boggles the mind.

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