My recent interest in genealogy and family history has proved very rewarding. I would encourage everyone at our age to document and preserve what they (oops, Mr. Huyler, “he/she”) can for future generations. Otherwise much will be lost.
My sister and I made a family history pilgrimage to Germany. We donated our sculptor great-grandfather’s handwritten autobiography in old German script to the Saxon State Library in Dresden, visited his grave site that we helped restore after WW II destruction, located many of his works, and found Henze Street. We then donated a portrait of his revolutionary pastor father-in-law, Johann Friedrich Baltzer, to his church in the village of Zwochau near Leipzig. Great-great-grandfather Baltzer was sentenced to prison for preaching in favor of democracy and had to flee the country. He is something of a local hero, but no other image of him seems to exist. During the service, when the crate that held the portrait was opened, the current pastor announced that the town council had decided to name the main street “Baltzerstrasse.”
Dresden has been beautifully rebuilt, but grim reminders of the Allied firebombing in 1945 of the “Florence of the North” remain. Every year at 10 p.m. on February 13, all lights go out and all church bells ring.
Happy New Year and best to all.
Christopher M. Henze CdeP 1959
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- Revolutionary pastor Johann Friedrich Baltzer, great-great-grandfather to Chris.
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- Unopened Baltzer portrait next to baptismal font in front of very old (1200 AD) and very small St. Martin’s Church.
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- Sculptor Robert Henze, great-grandfather to Chris, and his wife Anna Baltzer in his studio.
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- Chris at “Henze Street.”
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- Grave site of Robert Henze.
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- Henze Street.
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- A pilgrim knocking on a door in a cemetery.
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- Robert Henze’s golden goddess stands atop the dome of the Fine Arts Academy–a city landmark that was miraculously not destroyed during the firebombing in 1945.
