family holiday

Every picture tells a story, season 3, picture 1:

In August 1953, Ruth, Richard and their children took their second ever (and last) whole-family holiday trip to Kiefersfelden, Allgäu. They travelled there by train (a special holiday train, so there wouldn't have been much hassle with connections), as they still lived in Idar-Oberstein and didn't have a car.

Richard obviously took this photo of the other three on the summit of one of the surrounding mountains. I think this may be one of the many peaks of the Kaiser Mountains, but I have no idea which one. I recognise the "Wilder Kaiser" (wild emperor) as a term that was used in the family, but even that covers several peaks. And now I learned that there is also a tame emperor, which may be more accessible for a family group, but that term also covers several peaks.

... and then this one on the way down:

Should anybody have any answers to some of the many questions I am raising in this series, please leave a comment here (I'll need to vet it, so it may take a few days before it goes public) or contact me at michaelgrr [at] yahoo [dot] co [dot] uk

Navigation tools:

With this post I'm starting season 3 so nothing to navigate yet, but here this is the table of contents of the entire second season:

1. could be a cousin
2. two weddings in Silesia
3. off to Canada
4. off to Australia
5. a very romantic poet
6. fireman August
7. 50 hundredweight of coffee
8. mysterious Minden people
9. horses for Hedwig
10. guessing the great-grandmothers
11. cousin Charlotte
12. three sisters from East Prussia
13. travelling saleswoman
14. family portrait
15. dancing chemist
16. games time
17. desperately searching Wilhelm
18. the third Hedwig
19. patchwork portraits
20. missing brothers
21. the oberlehrer's family
22. a double wedding
23. mystery solved
24. young Frieda
25. old aunts and young children
26. a semi-mysterious aunt
27. a gathering at Gellrichs
28. farm work at Bad Landeck
29. meet the Weitze family
30. a post-war wedding
31. the joy of chemistry
32. the joy of botany
33. becoming Frieda
34. becoming Peter
35. bakery kids united
36. the four from the farm
37. neighbours at Hamborn
38. family with fowl
39. the elusive Nagel clan
40. the house Johanna built

I have now given up on bird site, and switched to logging the entries in a thread on Mastodon (season 2 link) instead. The thread for season 3 starts here.

The twitter thread for season 1 is still here. Alternatively, visit the last instalment and find the numbered list of entries at the bottom.

I'm also adding all photos from this series to my family history album on flickr.

I also should mention from time to time that this whole thing with old photos has been influenced by all the orphaned photos I see on flea markets, and by this little book I found at Oxfam 14 years ago.