Baptismal cards were probably used in combination or in lieu of the traditional baptismal notices (Taufzettel) from the sponsors. The godparents would buy a card, write in their name and date and present it to the family of the child on the day of the baptismal. The family kept the cards as a keepsake and valued so much that brought them with other documents to America. This card with a greeting "Be Good and Happy" comes from the Dean family collection, and probably dates back to the 1860s, the years when Gottlieb Schuetz and Anna Parli had their first four children in Switzerland. A son of soap manufacturers Hans (John) Schuetz and Magdalena Luthi, Gottlieb was born in 1838 in Canton Berne, Switzerland. He married Anna Parli who also came from Canton Berne, Switzerland in 1863 and they had four children: Arnold, Elize, Maria, and Friedrich between 1864 and 1868. Having lived in various places in the Burgdorf district between 1863 and 1868, they finally immigrated to Humboldt, Nebraska in 1870. Their daughter Maria (Mary) Schuetz, born in 1867 in Switzerland started the Dean family line marrying German-born Dirk Sutorius in 1889. Sutorius' daughter Emma, born in 1890 married a recent emigrant from Germany (1908) Edo F. Harms in 1914. All three generations lived in Humboldt, Nebraska in close proximity with various relatives (Emma Sutorius's uncle John Schuetz lived right next door to her family according to the 1930 census). For interviews and oral histories of this and other items please visit the History Harvest YouTube Channel.
Family of Bill Dean, Nebraska City History Harvest, 2010
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.