The cycle of transformations in the houses of Schaefferstown, Pennsylvania
Abstract
The area of Schaefferstown, first settled in the early 1730's, bears the unmistakable imprint of German architectural ethnicity, though this has been little studied in a rigourous way.^ In this study, all buildings built with traditional heavy framed, log or stone construction were approached, and field notes for measured drawings of at least the ground floor plan were taken of all those I gained access to built before 1850. A brief synopsis of the findings follows: of the 39 extant 18th century houses, 30 (or 76%) were of the well known flurkuchenhaus type; three (8%) were kreuzehaus types; and another four (10.5%) were a variation of the durchgangigen (through-hallway or Baroque/Georgian) plans. Two houses (2.5%) was of a half-hallway/rear kuche type.^ Of Schaefferstown's 18th century houses, 32, or a full 82%, have undergone major alterations, including 30 chimnies removed (77%); 17 walls removed (43%, with more than one wall removed in 8 cases or 25% of those); 16 walls installed (41%), and in almost half of these (7 cases, 18% of total) said walls being moved about more than once.^ These statistics indicate two major trends in the housing of Schaefferstown and of Pennsylvania Germans in general: (1) An early acceptance of stoves for heat; (2) An initial increase in the number of rooms in the house (and a concomitantly smaller size of those rooms), followed by a return to approximately the original configuration.^ In the most recent remodelings it is the original open kitchen which has been remade, bringing these houses full cycle. Occurring chiefly in Amish and Mennonite households, these reinvented open kitchens are clearly the result of continuity in the lifestyle and the social functioning of the rooms. The privatistic (or fashionable) needs of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, when the houses were first transformed to Georgian or four-over-four plans, no longer sit well in households of strongly communal groups. The enormous family gatherings of the Mennonites and the religious gatherings of the Amish have caused the reinstitution of the flurkuchen floorplans of the forefathers. ^
Subject Area
American Studies|Folklore|Architecture
Recommended Citation
Charles Lang Bergengren,
"The cycle of transformations in the houses of Schaefferstown, Pennsylvania"
(January 1, 1988).
Dissertations available from ProQuest.
Paper AAI8824718.
http://repository.upenn.edu/dissertations/AAI8824718
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