Local Historian visits NB-NK Rotary Club

Myron Fledderjohann, Trustee and Past President of the New Knoxville Historical Society visited the New Bremen-New Knoxville Rotary Club to share the history of New Knoxville.  His visit is a timely one as 2011 marks the 175^th anniversary of the founding of the village of New Knoxville.  “Our mother town of Ladbergen, Germany was founded in the year 950,” said Fledderjohann.  “Ladbergen was a rural community where an important Protestant church was established during the Reformation.  There is a building there that still stands today, where talks were held in an effort to end the Thirty Years War,” said Fledderjohann.  “Four families came to Cincinnati and eventually ended up in what is now New Knoxville: Kuckhermann, Lutterbeck, Fledderjohann, and Meckstroth.  The Kuckhermann family missed their boat to Missouri, so they took up with a family headed to Stallostown (Minster) in 1834.  When they discovered that Stallostown was a Catholic community, the family went on to New Bremen to live in the Protestant community there.”  H.H. Fledderjohann purchased 260 acres in 1836 from the State of Ohio Canal Lands, between what is now Lock Two and present-day New Knoxville.  Members of the four families began moving into the area that is present-day New Knoxville.

The Village of Knoxville was surveyed and established in 1836 by an Irish-American named James Knox Lytle.  Lytle and his brother Edmund owned large tracts of land in southern Washington Township.  Lytle had platted the town to include 102 lots including one lot reserved for a school and one lot reserved for a church.  The Lytle brothers sold this land to the German families as the arrived in the area.  “The very first business was a sawmill operation located on the site of the present-day American Legion where two creeks meet,” said Fledderjohann.  “The residents didn’t want to name the town “New Ladbergen” for fear of inviting back luck,” said Fledderjohann.  “The cousin of James Knox Lytle was U.S. President James Knox Polk, and so they decided to name the town Knoxville.  There was already a Knoxville, Ohio and the name was changed to New Knoxville, in 1858.”  For over 100 years, the Village of New Knoxville was tri-lingual, speaking “Low German, (Plattdeutsch),” “High German” (for local church services and school), and English for all official communications with government, schools, and outsiders.”  As a result of the strength of the German Reformation Church founded in New Knoxville, over 100 people went into ministry from New Knoxville.  In the 1950s, the German Reformation Church in New Knoxville was named by the Protestant magazine “The Christian Century” as one of the 12 great churches in the United States.  New Knoxville is recognized as one of the smallest schools in Ohio, with about 450 students in 13 grades.

“One of the best things I’ve ever gotten to do is to help a German author, Anne Aengenvoort, who studied and wrote a book about New Knoxville, New Bremen and Minster,” said Fledderjohann.  “The book, “Migration- Siedlungsbildung-Akkultruation (Die Auswanderung Nordwestdeustcher nach Ohio, 1830-1914” is written in German, and was used extensively by Dean Hoge when he wrote his book “From Ladbergen to America.”  Hoge’s book describes in detail the chain migration of German settlers from Ladbergen to New Knoxville.  It is important to note that not only did the early founders of New Knoxville come from the same community of Ladbergen, but they all came from the same church in Ladbergen.  “We may be a real speck on the map, but we do have amazing businesses in town,” said Fledderjohann.  “Brookside Laboratories, The Hoge Lumber Company and The Way International each do business and communicate extensively all over the world.  We’ve definitely done our part to help make the world better.”

Hosting Rotarian: Scott Frey