Klaus Wust

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Klaus Wust in 1990 in his hometown Bielefeld

Klaus German Wust (born December 5, 1925 in Bielefeld ; † May 6, 2003 in Woodstock (Virginia) ) was an American author and historian of German origin who dealt in particular with the culture and history of immigration among German-Americans .

Life

Klaus Wust was the youngest son of the businessman Otto Heinrich Wust (1882–1957) and the only child of his second wife, Elfriede, nee Grützner (1895–1986), who came from Dresden . During the Second World War he was used in the Navy on a transport ship for the transport of wounded and refugees across the Baltic Sea . After returning from British captivity , Wust first worked as a news editor for the social democratic daily Freie Presse (Bielefeld) . In 1949 he went for a year to study at Bridgewater College in Shenandoah Valley .

His Paris- born wife Monique Fong (* 1926), who grew up bilingual thanks to her Chinese father, has worked as a simultaneous interpreter for the Council of Europe and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development since 1953 . Together with their first daughter, born in Paris in 1955, the Wusts went to the USA in the same year. Monique Fong Wust worked there for a long time as a freelance simultaneous interpreter for the United Nations , but also translated literature such as works by the Mexican writer Octavio Paz . In 1960 the second daughter of the Wust family was born.

From 1957 to 1967 Klaus Wust was editor-in-chief of the weekly German-language Washington Journal , the oldest continuously publishing newspaper in Washington, under the editor Carl H. Winkler . From 1957 to 1992 Wust was also editor of the Report of Society for the History of the Germans in Maryland, founded in 1886 .

German farm in the Frontier Culture Museum of Virginia

Wust was a founding member of the American Frontier Culture Foundation in 1975 , which opened the Frontier Culture Museum of Virginia as an open-air museum in Staunton in 1988 . Wust ensured that an original farm from Germany was built there. In 2002, Wust was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit for his contribution to relations between Germany and the United States . The ceremonial handover took place in the Belle Grove Plantation in Middletown, which was built by German-American pioneers in 1797 .

Wust lived in New York City and in his farmhouse in Edinburgh, Virginia for many years . He stayed in Edinburgh for the last few years. He died in Woodstock. According to his wishes, he was cremated and the ashes scattered in the Baltic Sea .

Works (selection)

Klaus Wust was the author and co-author of over twenty books and more than 100 magazine articles in English and German.

  • Klaus G. Wust: Zion in Baltimore 1755–1955: the bicentennial history of the earliest German-American Church in Baltimore, Maryland. Zion Church, Baltimore MD 1955
  • Klaus G. Wust: Pioneers in service: the German Society of Maryland, 1783-1958. German Society of Maryland, Baltimore MD 1958
  • Klaus Wust: The Virginia Germans. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, Charlottesville 1969 (and further editions 1975; 1989: ISBN 978-08139-1214-1 )
  • Klaus Wust: Virginia fracture; penmanship as folk art. Shenandoah History Publishers, Edinburgh VA 1972
  • Klaus Wust & Norbert Mühlen : Span 200: a companion piece to the Span 200 exhibit, the story of German-American involvement in the founding and development of America. Who they were, where they came from, why they came, what they accomplished. Published on behalf of the Institute for Foreign Relations Stuttgart, National Carl Schurz Association, Philadelphia 1976
  • Klaus German Wust: The saint-adventurers of the Virginia frontier: Southern outposts of Ephrata . Shenandoah History Publishers, Edinburg VA 1977. ISBN 978-09179-6804-4
  • Klaus Wust & Heinz Moos (eds.): Three hundred years of German immigrants in North America: 1683–1983; their contributions to the creation of the New World; an image documentation. 2nd improved edition, 300-Jahre-Deutsche-in-Amerika-Verlags-GmbH, Graefelfing 1983. ISBN 978-3-7879-0206-4

Web links

Commons : Klaus Wust  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Klaus Wust in findagrave.com (accessed September 1, 2019)
  2. ^ Bielefeld City Archives; Registration files in inventory 104.3 / residents' registration office; Extract from the Otto Wust index card
  3. ^ Social Security Applications and Claims 1936-2007 in Ancestry.com [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015 (accessed September 10, 2019)
  4. ^ Address book for the city and district of Bielefeld with the latest map of the city. 33rd year. F. Eilers, Bielefeld 1950.
  5. ^ A b c d e f g h Gary C. Grassl (2004): Klaus Wust (1925-2003): Foremost German-American historian dies at age 77. The Report of Society for the History of the Germans in Maryland 45: pages XI-XII. pdf
  6. ↑ Monique Fong Wust Collection of Octavio Paz in the Philadelphia Area Archives Research Portal (PAARP) (accessed September 5, 2019)
  7. ↑ a b Katrin Rumprecht: The Nuremberg Trials and its importance for the development of modern conference interpreting. In: Hartwig Kalverkämper & Larisa Schippel (Hrsgb.): Simultaneous interpreting in first probation: the Nuremberg Trial 1945 (Volume 17, TransÜD series). Frank & Timme, Berlin 2008. Page 254. ISBN 978-3-86596-161-7 (there is obviously a mix-up in this source: according to other sources, the father was Chinese and the mother was French)
  8. ↑ Former Washington Journal Office on the website of the Goethe-Institut USA (accessed September 4, 2019)
  9. ↑ Gerald R. Kainz: Bridge to the New World: The German-language "Washington Journal". epubli GmbH, Berlin 2012, page 40. ISBN 978-3-8442-3140-3
personal data
SURNAME Wust, Klaus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Wust, Klaus German
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American author and historian
DATE OF BIRTH December 5, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Bielefeld
DATE OF DEATH May 6, 2003
Place of death Woodstock, Virginia