In studying early American folk art, there is no shortage of folk art documents that express early pioneer immigrants’ gratitude for reaching America in a time when many individuals still feared the world was flat, or worse, that sea serpents lurked in the troubled ocean currents enduring their lives. Crossing the vast Atlantic Ocean at the mercy of the sea captain’s nautical skill in the wake of unexpected storms, thousands of Europeans expressed their faith in God and gratitude for their safe crossing once they set foot on the ground of the New World. Perhaps, because of this, there were no more religious believers than the PA Dutch immigrants who saw in Penn’s Colony a promised Land of Milk and Honey, exactly what these war ravaged European farmers sought, thus, creating one of the nation’s most successful farming Commonwealths.
Furthermore, these frontier PA Dutch immigrants had to endure other natural and Native American Indian threats in the New World, and their newly born children were considered no less than a God given miracle. But among literate PA German pilgrims, each one wanted to express gratitude to the Lord, either by having a scribe pen a cherished Fraktur Birth and Baptism certificate, or by having a woodworker build a personalized decorated dower chest with their child’s name celebrated on front with American folk art. Almost all the Church PA Dutch had Fraktur Taufscheins made for their children with the exception of the Plain Dutch Anabaptists. American Fraktur-style decorated Birth and Baptism documents traced the child’s maternal and paternal genealogy and often included the name of the clergyman who baptized and gave them their Christian name, a practice popular among the Church Dutch. But again, Anabaptist sects as the Amish and Old Order Mennonites refrained from getting their children a Taufschein, since they were “Plain People.”
Among the popular early American fraktur artists who designed elaborate folk art baptisms were Friedrich Krebs, Heinrich Otto and Frederich Speyer, who traveled the Dutch Country making colorful baptism documents for farm families who were illiterate. Most often, the fraktur was attached to the lid of the child’s dower chest, so it could easily be seen when the chest was opened. Furthermore, in the Oley Valley, a scrivener of the early 18th Century scribed a folk art design on the interior door to the 1753 Jacob Keim cabinet shop. A unique pattern of three flat heart designs grouped together created a lovely tulip design within their cluster. Coincidentally, the Keims were wood crafters like Jacob and John Bieber, their neighbors who also painted bulbous folk art flat hearts on their dower chests, which they would be known later for. A sentimental symbol of love, each immigrant expressed to the Lord in their belongings for having made it safely to America, the land of liberty and freedom, regardless of ethnicity.
However, these PA Dutch scribes made such elaborate Fraktur folk art designs so well executed, that in our contemporary culture these American folk art designs can bring as high a price as $100,000 plus at high end art auction galleries such as Sotheby’s Gallery in New York City. In contrast to later hex signs painted on forebays of barns or even on the gable ends, the earlier American folk art known as “Fraktur” is a scrivener’s illumination (art) done by monks in medieval times. The most popular images on baptism documents, for example though, were hearts and angels surrounded by tulips in their borders; but being PA Deitsch, our early PA German printers used this Germanic type face known as fraktur, though not easily read compared to English-type faces.
Richard L.T. Orth is assistant director of the American Folklife Institute in Kutztown.
