Original at http://newsarch.rootsweb.com/th/read/BANAT/2001-11/1007093213 
   From: Dave DREYER
   Subject: [BANAT-L] Re: First Banat KB films 
   Date: 29 Nov 2001 
 
 Yes, there was an extensive discussion of this matter about the first year I joined the Banat-List. At that 
 time there was much confusion over the matter. Without going into all the back and forth which went on at the time
 I think a summary of the matter is as follows;
 I think it was Karl WALDNER (whose death I noted in a post earlier to the LIST this year) who, as part of a project
 of the old [DAI / Deutsches] Auslands Institut in Stuttgart, Germany, went to the Banat and filmed the 
 early KB's [Kirchenbuch / church registers]. The idea was to record all data in the KB's which would bear on the
 origin of the original settlers to the Banat. The books were filmed only so far as these people were still living,
 then that book was filmed to its end but no further (later) books for that locality were filmed.
 Apparently the camera was set up in Temeswar [Timisoara, Timis County, Romania] and the KB's were brought in from
 the outlying churches for filming. Tony KRAEMER tells about when he was a kid in Ulmbach [Peciul Nou in Timis
 County, Romania], and going to school in Temeswar, he was given KB's by the preacher on Monday and he brought them
 back to Ulmbach on a Friday. They were apparently brought in for the filming. This occurred probably around 
 1938-1940. This film  was then deposited in the [DAI / Deutsches] Auslands Institut in Stuttgart [Germany]. As 
 the war progressed, people began to have their minds on other matters so that no further work on the project was 
 undertaken. 

 After the war was over the entire contents of the [DAI / Deutsches] Auslands Institut was taken to the National
 Archives in Washington DC where American authorities went over all the material (although I doubt if they read 
 the film of the Banat KB's). Keep in mind the [DAI / Deutsches] Auslands Institut specialized in material from 
 Eastern Europe and the West was mining every source for information about Eastern Europe due to the Cold War. 
 Some time in the  1960's the National Archives made copies of all the material and returned the originals, along
 with a second copy to the IfA / Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen from Stuttgart, Germany which grew out of the 
 old [DAI / Deutsches] Auslands Institut. Having said all of the above I doubt if making additional copies by the 
 NA applies to the Banat KB's since they already were on microfilm.
 The Mormons then acquired copies of the Banat KB microfilm from the IfA (apparently this was in 1971). Apparently 
 it was necessary to take some of this film to [Staatsarchiv] Ludwigsburg [in Baden Wuerttemberg, Germany] to get 
 the material recopied. Not all the film has this covering page so apparently it was not necessary to take all the
 film to Ludwigsburg for coping. Apparently the Mormons set up a camera in Ludwigsburg. I think there is a major 
 Baden Wuerttemburg archives in Ludwigsburg so they were probably also filming material from this source and rather
 than move the camera to nearby Stuttgart it was easier to bring the material from the IfA. But for whatever 
 reason the film was taken to Ludwigsburg, everyone agrees that there was no filming directly from Banat KB's at 
 this time. There were, with the exception of a couple of isolated cases, no Banat KB's ever in Germany. The 
 exceptions were, so far as I  know, all cases in which people who fled before the Russians took KB's from their
 villages with them to the West. In a case or two these KB's have since been returned to the Banat. The people in
 Salt Lake City [Utah, USA] and the AKdFF [Arbeitskreis donauschwäbischer Familienforscher] have acquired all their
 film from the IfA. There is no other show in town. The above is a summary of the situation so far as I understand
 it. 

 I would like to add some speculation on a related matter. Setschan is a key locality in understanding internal 
 migration in the Banat, not only because there was extensive exchange of populations between Setschan and 
 Deutsch-Etschka, Ernsthausen, Sartscha, Lazarfeld, etc. but also because it is a parent settlement of Elisenhain 
 and Josefsdorf and thus is especially important to people researching Banaters in North Dakota, USA. There is a 
 single roll of Setschan film available from the IfA or Salt Lake City [at FHL / Family History Library of "The 
 Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints"]. Everyone who has looked at this roll comes away shaking their 
 head because it is only marriages (I have forgotten the exact dates covered) and contains only every other page 
 of the KB. So where is the film from the alternate pages and where is the film of the births and deaths? These 
 other books would have to have been filmed as well. I have discussed this matter with the librarian at the 
 library of the IfA and she just shrugs her shoulders - she doesn't know. I wonder if in the transport of the 
 contents of the IfA library to Washington DC and the subsequent return of this material to Stuttgart that these 
 "missing" Setschan microfilms were somehow lost. One wonders if these rolls could still be sitting somewhere in 
 the National Archives in Washington DC -perhaps uncatalogued- and they were overlooked when material was returned 
 to the IfA in Stuttgart.