Annotated Bibliography of Volga German Literature
Aberle, George P. From the Steppes to the Prairies: The Story of the Germans Settling in Russia on the Volga and Ukraine, also, the Germans Settling in the Banat, and the Bohemians in Crimea, Their Resettlement in the Americas - North and South America and in Canada. Bismarck, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Society , 1993 (5th ed.).
Alexeyeva, Ludmila. Soviet Dissent: Contemporary Movements for National, Religious and Human Rights. Middleton, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1985.
Al-Salem, Gabriel. Invitation to Interfere: The Russia-Germans in German-Russian Foreign Relations. M.A. Thesis, Georgetown University, 1993.
Ananyan, Elena V. The German Emigration from the Volga Region to America in the Nineteenth Century to the 1970's: Preconditions, Reasons and Results. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2007.
The history of the Russian Germans’ emigration is divided into the following periods: the first period covers the 1870s up to 1914, the second is concerned with the years of 1917 to 1928, and the third period began at the end of the 1980s to 1990s.
Bachmann, Berta. Memories of Kazakhstan: A Report on the Life Experience of a German Woman in Russia. Translated by Edgar Duin. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans for Russia, 1983.
A report on the life experiences of a German woman in Russia. The memoirs reveal many facets of life in the Soviet Union during war years, including a description of the dejection of the German Russians when they were not immediately freed as they expected following the end of the war, but instead were required to remain for another ten years.
Baltensperger, Bradley H. "Agricultural Change among Great Plains Russian Germans." Annals of the Association of American Geographers 73:1 (March 1983): 75-88.
Russian German farmers who concentrated on the Great Plains in the late nineteenth century brought with them agricultural experience in a subhumid environment. Their diversified operations and use of small grains contrasted sharply with the humid-land agricultural system, emphasizing corn and livestock, dominant among settlers from the Midwest. The need to adopt strategies appropriate to the climate of the Great Plains conflicted with the pressures of acculturation. The immigrants quickly accepted some of the components of the Midwestern system in order to compete in the marketplace, but they also retained a number of elements from their Russian experience. In their continued use of certain adaptive practices, particularly a highly diversified cropping system, the Russian Germans remained unique among immigrant groups and distinctive among Great Plains farmers.
Bartholomew, Mary A. Sabina’s Dream: A Story of a Girl with Volga-German Heritage. Bisbee, AZ: Bandera Pub., 1986.
Bartlett, Roger. "Foreign Settlement in Russia under Catherine II." The New Zealand Slavonic Journal 38 (1974): 1-22.
Bartlett, Roger P. Human Capital: The Settlement of Foreigners in Russia, 1762-1804. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980.
Bartlett, Roger P. and Schönwälder, Karen. The German Lands and Eastern Europe : Essays on the History of their Social, Cultural and Political Relations. New York: Saint Martin’s Press, 1999.
Bastian, Dawn E. "The Germans from Russia: Documenting the Immigrant Experience in Northern Colorado" (Online).
This article is based on a presentation given at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archivists in Boston, Massachusetts.
Becker, C.H. A Historical Study of the Social Background of German-Russians from the Volga District in Russia Living in Colorado. B.D. Thesis, Wartburg Theological Seminary, 1941.
Becker, Conrad H. A Historical Study of the Social Background of the German Russians from the Volga District in Russia Living in Northern Colorado. M.S. Thesis, Colorado State College of Agriculture and Mechanical Arts, 1938.
Beckman, Peter. The Catholic Church on the Kansas Frontier: 1850-1877. Doctoral Thesis, The Catholic University of America, 1943.
There is only brief mention of the arrival of Volga German colonists to Topeka in 1875 and their subsequent migration to Ellis County in 1876 (pp. 137-138).
Belk, Fred Richard. The Great Trek of the Russian Mennonites to Central Asia, 1880-1884. Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1976.
Bender, Ida. The Dark Abyss of Exile: The Story of Survival. Translated by Laurel Anderson, Carl Anderson and William Wiest. Fargo, ND: Germans from Russian Heritage Collection, North Dakota State University Libraries, 2000.
Beratz, Gottieb. The German colonies on the Lower Volga, their origin and early development: a memorial for the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first German settlers on the Volga, 29 June 1764. Translated by Adam Giesinger. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991.
Translated from Russian into English, this book is often described as the most reliable work on the early years of the German Volga Colonies, based on materials in the Archives at Saratov and in the colonies.
Bocharova, Svetlana. "Germans Leave Saratov without Saying Goodbye." Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press 56:23 (7 July 2004): 22.
Reports on the closure of German offices in Saratov, Russia. Factors prompting the withdrawal of Russian Germans from the country; Number of Russian Germans who migrated in Germany since 1989; Impact of such scenario on Russia's economy.
Brown, Andrew J. "The Germans of Germany and the Germans of Kazakhstan: A Eurasian Volk in the Twilight of Diaspora." Europe-Asia Studies 57:4 (June 2005): 625-634.
Brown, Sara A. Children Working in the Sugar Beet Fields of Certain Districts of the South Platte Valley, Colorado. New York, NY: National Child Labor Committee, 1925.
Brown, Sara A. and Robie O. Sargent. "Children in the Sugar Beet Fields of the North Platte Valley of Nebraska, 1923." Nebraska History 67 (1986): 256-303.
Brucks, Jacob H. and Henry P. Hooge. Neu-Samara: a Mennonite Settlement East of the Volga. Edmonton, AB: Jackpine House, 2002.
Buchsweiler, Meir, ed. A Collection of Soviet Documents Concerning Germans in the USSR. Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Majorie Mayrock Center for Soviet and East European Research, 1991.
Buchsweiler, Meir. German Raiony and their Newspapers, 1927-1941. Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1984.
Casteel, James E. "The Russian Germans in the Interwar German National Imaginary." Central European History 40:3 (September 2007): 429-466.
The article discusses the origin and the conditions of the Russian Germans in the interwar German national imaginary. The German fascination with the Russian Germans was the product of transnational interactions between Germans in the Reich and ethnic Germans in the Soviet Union which took on a new significance after World War I. German aid and assistance to the Russian Germans was viewed as a means of expanding German power and influence in the new world of the east. The author also discusses the role of the situation of the Russian Germans in the anti-Bolshevik campaign and in Nazi propaganda throughout the 1930.
Chrystal, William G. "German Congregationalism on the American Frontier" in Hidden Histories in the United Church of Christ (New York, NY: United Church Press, 1984): ch. 5.
Clopper, Edward N. and Lewis W. Hine. Child Labor in the Sugarbeet Fields of Colorado. New York, NY: Nathional Child Labor Committee, 1914.
Cole, Sandra. "German-Russian Heritage in Lodi, California." In A Study of History, Stockton, CA: San Joaquin Delta College, 1982.
Critchlow, James. Punished Peoples of the Soviet Union: The Continuing Legacy of Stalin’s Deportations. Washington, DC: Human Rights Watch, September 1991.
Conquest, Robert. The Nation Killers: The Soviet Deportation of Nationalities. New York: Macmillan, 1970.
Conquest, Robert. The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.
Crawford, Deanne. The Volga Germans before World War I. M.A. Thesis. University of Idaho, 1972.
Däs, Nelly, ed. Gone without a Trace: German-Russian Women in Exile. Translated by Nancy Bernhardt Holland. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2001.
A compilation of memoirs and memorials based on the recollections of German-Russian women who experienced the terrors of Stalinism first hand—from the “dekulakization” of 1929 through the years of Siberian exile. The volume traces the horrific consequences for ethnic Germans—even those who had been living in Russia for generations—after the outbreak of war between Germany and Russia. Condemned to forced labor in the snow, ice, and bitter cold of Siberia without adequate clothing, always at the brink of starvation, and subject to the brutalities of sadistic overseers, German-Russian women describe their valiant efforts to survive. The shattering scenes are recreated in highly detailed prose that reads like fiction and in several examples of vivid verse.
Deganhart, Mary E. Children without a Fatherland: The Volga Germans in Russia and America. B.A. Thesis, Lake Forest College, 1982.
Denning, Gerald L. "A Linguistic Identification for Kansas Volga German." Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics 2 (1977): 165-192.
Dietz, Barbara. "German and Jewish migration from the former Soviet Union to Germany: Background, Trends and Implications." Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 26:4 (October 2000): 635-652.
Dietz, Barbara. "Germans in the Former Soviet Union: Situation and Prospects." Current Politics and Economics of Russia 3:4 (1994): 243-254.
Dietz, Jacob E. History of the Volga German Colonists. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2005.
Originally written in Russian, it has been translated into German and English. The author, a German-Russian himself from the colony of Kratzke, gives the reader an insight into how the colonists lived and the many challenges they faced. This book is a fascinating documentation of the history, lives, economics and politics of their times.
Doeppers, Daniel F. "The Globeville Neighborhood in Denver." Geographical Review 57:4 (October 1967): 506-522.
Covers the changing ethnic make-up of this historically Volga German neighborhood in Denver from 1950 to 1965.
Downey, Sabine. "Homeless Lutherans." Christian Century 110:30 (27 October 1993): 1038-1039.
Dreiling, B.M. Golden Jubilee of the German-Russian Settlements of Ellis and Rush Counties, Kansas. Hays, KS: Ellis County News, 1926.
Dreiling, Norbert R. Official Centennial History of the Volga-German Settlements in Ellis and Rush Counties in Kansas, 1876-1976. Hays, KS: Volga-German Centennial Association, 1976.
Dupper, Alexander, trans. "The Desperate Struggle of the Soviet Germans for their Human Rights and for Permission to Emigrate to Germany." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 6:1 (Spring, 1983).
Dyck, Johannes. "Revival as Church Restoration: Patterns of a Revival among Ethnic Germans in Central Asia after World War II." Transformation, 21:3 (July, 2004).
Dyck, Johannes J. Am Trakt: A Mennonite Settlement in the Central Volga Region. Hermina Joldersma and Peter J. Dyck, trans. (Echo Historical Series; 6) Winnipeg: CMBC Publications and Manitoba Mennonite Historical Society, 1995.
Edlund, Thomas Kent. Parish Index to the Church Books of the Evangelical-Lutheran Consistory at St. Petersburg, 1833-1885. St. Paul, MN: Germanic Genealogy Society, 1994.
Eisenach, George. "The Volga Germans." The American German Review (April-May, 1944): 4-7, 24-26.
Eisenach, George J. A History of the German Congregational Churches in the United States. Yankton, SD: Pioneer Press, 1938.
Eisenach, George J. Pietism and the Russian Germans in the United States. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Chicago, 1945.
Elliot, Mark. Pawns of Yalta: Soviet Refugees and America’s Role in their Repatriation. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1982.
Ellis, William T. "Voyaging on the Volga Amid War and Revolution: War-time Sketches on Russia's Great Waterway." National Geographic Magazine 33 (Jan-June 1918, Index): 245-265.
Article makes passing references to the German settlers living along the Volga River near Saratov.
Erlanger, Steven. "Germany pays to keep ethnic Germans in Russia." New York Times142:49326 (9 May 1993): 1.
Discusses an agreement signed in July 1993 between Germany and Russia through which the German Government is financing a magnet settlement in Russia to discourage ethnic Germans from leaving the former Soviet Union. The history of the Volga Germans; Ethnic Germans seeking emigration; Numbers of ethnic Germans in former Soviet Union; Desire to return to Germany.
Everett, Dianna and Cathey Kelly. "First, You Work: Germans from Russia to Texas." Panhandle-Plains Historical Review 56 (1983): 65-83.
Discusses settlement patterns that brought the German Russians to Texas, mostly through earlier settlements in Oklahoma and Kansas. Treatment differentiates the Volga Germans from the Black Sea Germans both in how they got to Texas as well as where they settled.
Figes, Orlando. Peasant Russia, Civil War: The Volga Countryside in Revolution (1917-1921). New York: Oxford University Press, 1989.
Discusses the general situation surrounding the political, economic, and environmental build up to the 1921 Famine. Mentions specifically the massacre that occurred in the colony of Balzer on 15 March 1921 when Red Army soldiers in the Balzer church tower mowed down hundreds who had stormed the colony in search of food.
Fleischhauer, Ingeborg and Pinkus, Benjamin. The Soviet Germans: Past and Present. New York: Saint Martin’s Press, 1986.
Forsythe, James L. "Environmental Considerations in the Settlement of Ellis County, Kansas." Agricultural History 51:1 (January, 1977), 38-50.
Frank, J.W. A Brief History of the Russian-Germans in the Evangelical and Reformed Church. B.D. Thesis, Eden Theological Seminary, 1945.
Giesinger, Adam. From Catherine to Khrushchev: The Story of Russia’s Germans. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1981.
Professor Giesinger’s book is the most complete, authoritative, and well-written history of the Germans from Russia to have appeared in English. He deals in detail with all German settlements in Russia and all religious groups among them from 1553 to the present. The final chapter covers emigrants from Russia to the Americas. The book includes a useful chapter locating individual colonies within their geographical and governmental districts, twenty-seven pages of maps, and a bibliography of nearly 200 items.
Gilbert, Glenn G. "The German Language in Ellis County, Kansas." Heritage of Kansas 9 (1976): 8-16.
Gingerich, Mark Phillip. Toward a Brotherhood of Arms : Waffen-SS Recruitment of Germanic Volunteers, 1940-1945. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1991.
Goldenstein, Kurt. Colorado Dutch Hop Music. Lincoln, Nebraska, 2000.
More than 100 music transcription of Dutch Hop and German Russian Songs arranged for the accordion. Includes a brief history of the Germans from Russia, history of German Russians in the Midwest and Colorado, songs from Germany and Russia (including sheet music), features on German Russian Wedding Customs, German Russian Recipes, photographs of dances and musicians, extensive bibliography, discography, original sheet music by Paul Weingardt, German-Russian Folklore, and an explanation about how to play and dance a Dutch Hop.
Gregory, James S. Russian Land, Soviet People: A Geographical Approach to the U.S.S.R. New York: Pegasus, 1968.
Briefly mentions the rehabilitation of the Volga Germans.
Griess, James Ruben. The German-Russians, Those Who Came to Sutton. M.A. Thesis, Nebraska State Teachers College, Kearney, 1968.
Hale, Douglas. The Germans from Russia in Oklahoma. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1980.
Halverson, Carol. Volga German-Russians in Minnesota. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1991.
Hamilton, Candy. Footprints in the Sugar : A History of the Great Western Sugar Company. Ontario, OR: Hamilton Bates Publishers, 2009.
Chapter 5 (pp. 212-253) entitled "German-Russians: Their Journey to America" provides a history of the German-Russians and their immigration along with their involvement in the development of the sugar beet industry in various parts of the U.S. There are many pictures of individual families.
Haury, David A. "German-Russian Immigrants to Kansas and American Politics." Kansas History3:4 (Winter, 1980): 227-238.
Haynes, Emma S. German-Russians on the Volga and in the United States. M.A. Thesis, University of Colorado, 1985.
Haynes, Emma S. A History of the Volga Relief Society. Portland, OR: A.E. Kern & Co., 1941. Reprinted as a revised edition by the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia in 1982.
This is an important work on the famine in Russia during the 1920s and the help extended to their families and friends by relatives in the United States. It describes how money and goods were collected in the United States and distributed among the German colonies along the Volga. The time span covered is from August 1921 until November 1922.
Heitman, Sidney. Germans from Russia on the Trail to Colorado. Fort Collins, CO: Colorado State University Libraries, 2003.
Hill, Alton D. Volga German Occupance in the Windsor Area, Colorado. M.A. Thesis, University of Colorado, 1959.
Hoffmann, C. "Language Loss and Language Recovery: The Case of the Russlanddeutsche." In Changing Voices of Europe: Social and Political Changes and Their Linguistic Repercussions, Past, Present and Future. Gregynog: University of Wales Press, 1994.
Hoffman, Stephanie. Experiences of Soviet Citizens of German Ethnicity During and After the Second World War. Senior Thesis, Claremont McKenna College, 2002.
Iseminger, Gordon L. "The Americanization of Christina Hillius: German-Russian Emigrant to North Dakota." In North Dakota Mini-Biography Series, Bismarck, ND: State Historical Society of North Dakota, 1986.
Iseminger, Gordon L. "'Hunhuskers,' 'Red Cross Roosters,' and 'Uncle Sam Whiskers': The McIntosh County German-Russians in World War I." Midwest Review 14 (1992): 23-46.
Iseminger, Gordon L. "Are We Germans, or Russians, or Americans?" North Dakota History 59:2 (Spring, 1992).
Jahraus, William L. The Relationship between Ethnic Traditions and Officeholding of the Early German-Russians of McIntosh County, North Dakota, 1889-1915. M.A. Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1978.
Johannes, Mary Eloise. A Study of the Russian-German Settlements in Ellis County, Kansas.Ph.D. Thesis, Catholic University of America, 1946.
Johnson, Christopher. "Russian Loan Words in Ellis County Volga German Dialects." Heritage of the Great Plains 27:2 (Winter, 1993).
Johnson, David Christopher. The Volga German Dialect of Schoenchen, Kansas. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Kansas, 1994.
Jones, Nathan Paul. The Emergence of German Influences in Kaliningrad through Traces of East Prussian History. M.A. Thesis, LaSalle University, 2001.
Jordan, Terry G. "The German Settlement of Texas after 1865." The Southwestern Historical Quarterly 73:2 (October 1969): 193-212.
Kachurovskaya, Anna. "Germans Are in Moscow." Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press 53:35 (26 September 2001): 14.
Reports on the congress of Russian Germans held on August 28, 2001, in Moscow, Russia. Theme of the conference; Discussions on the social conditions of Russian Germans.
Karklins, Rasma. "A Note on 'Nationality' and 'Native Toung' as Census Categories in 1979." Soviet Studies 32:3 (July 1980): 415-422.
Keck, Leander E. German-Russians in Europe and America. M.A. Thesis, Linfield College, 1949.
Keel, William, ed. The Volga Germans of West Central Kansas: Aspects of Their History, Politics, Culture and Language. Lawrence, KS: Max Kade Center for German-American Studies, 2005.
Keel, William D. "Aspects of the Verb Morphology of the Volga-German Dialect Spoken in Victoria, Kansas." In Semper Idem et Novus: Festschrift for Frank G. Banta (Göppingen: Kümmerle Verlag, 1988): 411-32.
Keel, William D. "Deitsch, Däätsch, Düütsch and Dietsch: The Varieties of Kansas German Dialects after 150 Years of German Group Settlement in Kansas." In Festschrift for C. Richard Beam, ed. Joshua R. Brown and Leroy T. Hopkins, Jr. Yearbook of German-American StudiesSupplemental Issues, v. 2 (Lawrence, KS: Society for German-American Studies, 2006): 27-48.
Keel, William D. "On Dialect Mixture: The Case of Ellis County (Kansas) Volga-German." In Proceedings of the Mid-America Linguistics Conference, 1981 (Wichita: Department of English, Wichita State University, 1981): 320-35.
Keel, William D. "On the Heimatbestimmung of the Ellis County (Kansas) Volga-German Dialects." Yearbook of German-American Studies 17 (1982): 99-109.
Keel, William D. On the Heimatbestimmung of the Ellis County (Kansas) Volga-German Dialects. Lawrence, KS: Society for German-American Studies, 1982.
Keel, William D. "A Russian-German Settlement Dialect in Kansas: Plautdietsch in South Central Kansas." In The German Language in America 1683-1991 (Madison, WI: Max Kade Institute for German-American Studies, 1993): 138-57.
Keel, William D. Unsere Leute : The Volga Germans of West Central Kansas : Aspects of Their History, Politics, Culture and Language. Lawrence, KS: Max Kade Center for German-American Studies, University of Kansas, 2004.
Keller, Richard. Heritage of Kansas Special Issue: The Volga Germans 9:2&3 Emporia Kansas State College, 1976.
This 93 page History of the Volga Germans in Ellis and Rush Counties, Kansas is a collection of history, songs, customs, and food.
Kinbacher, Kurt E. Immigration, the American West, and the Twentieth Century: German from Russia, Omaha Indian, and Vietnamese-Urban Villagers in Lincoln, Nebraska. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Nebraska, 2006.
Kinbacher, Kurt E. Urban Villages and Local Identities: Germans from Russia, Omaha Indians, and Vietnamese in Lincoln, Nebraska. Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech University Press, 2015. [Comparative study of three ethnic communities in this Midwestern city, including Volga Germans.]
Kinbacher, Kurt E. "Life in the Russian Bottoms: Community Building and Identity Transformation among Germans from Russia in Lincoln, Nebraska, 1876 to 1926." Journal of American Ethnic History 26:2 (January 2007): 27-57.
The article traces the social history of Russian Germans in Lincoln, Nebraska during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. According to the author, the few early settlers from the Volga region of Russia faced discrimination from the native-born Americans. The author believes that defining an ethnic identity had been a complicated process that continued through the first 50 years of their settlement. Toward the mid-1920s, improved economic conditions helped relieve the social tensions.
Kiselyov, Vladimer. "From Frankfurt to Lotoshino." Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press 54:40 (30 October 2002): 18-20.
Reports on the increase in the number of Russians returning to Russia after failing to make a living in Germany. Housing projects for Russian Germans in Lotoshino; Changes in immigration patterns between the two countries.
Khramova, Maria. The Volga German Dialect of Milberger, Kansas. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Kansas, 2011.
Klassen, John N. Groups of German Christians Move to Russia, 1763-1862, What Happened to Them? Th.M. Thesis, Fuller Theological Seminary, 1983.
Kloberdanz, Rosalinda. Women Alone: Separation as a Traditional Theme in Volga German Family Life and Culture. M.S. Thesis, North Dakota State University, 1992.
Kloberdanz, Timothy and Rosalinda. Thunder on the Steppe: Volga German Folklife in a Changing Russia. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans form Russia, 1993.
The authors collected numerous examples of modern Volga German folk traditions in Russia, and many of these are described in Thunder on the Steppe folksongs, folk medicine, proverbs, nicknames, poetry, dialect stories, drinking toasts, and food ways including recipes for Volga style vegetable soup, Gatletta (meat patties), Grebbel, Trockne Nudel, Riwwelkuche, Petschenya (cookies), and other dishes. Shortly after their arrival in Russia, the Kloberdanzes witnessed a country undergoing rapid political and social changes, culminating in a frightening military coup and thunderous collapse of Soviet Communism. A vivid description of the events surrounding the Second Russian Revolution as personally experienced by the two authors in a Volga German village also is included in the book.
Kloberdanz, Timothy. "Plainsmen of Three Continents: Volga German Adaptation to Steppe, Prairie, and Pampa." In Frederick C. Luebke, ed. Ethnicity on the Great Plains. Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press, 1980.
Article focuses on the manner in which German immigrants altered their culture in relation to new physical and social environments.
Kloberdanz, Timothy J. "The Daughters of Shiphrah: Folk Healers and Midwives of the Great Plains." Great Plains Quarterly 9 (Winter 1989): 3-12.
Kloberdanz, Timothy J. "German-Russian Studies at Emmons Central High School." In Folklife Annual 1987. Washington, DC: American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, 1988.
Kloberdanz, Timothy John. The Volga German Catholic Life Cycle: An Ethnographic Reconstruction. M.A. Thesis, Colorado State University, 1974.
Kloberdanz, Timothy J., "The Volga Germans in Old Russia and in North America: Their Changing World View." Anthropological Quarterly 48:4 (October, 1975): 209-222.
Dr. Kloberdanz documents the historical and cultural background of the Volga Germans and the changes that their values and attitudes have undergone in the New World.
Koch, Fred. The Volga Germans: In Russia and the Americas, from 1763 to the Present. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977.
Kohls, W. A. "German Settlement on the Lower Volga; A Case Study: The Moravian Community at Sarepta, 1763-1892." Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society 22:2 (1971): 47-99.
Koop, Michael H. An Analysis of German-Russian Houses in South Dakota Based on Their Origin, Form and Materials. M.A. Thesis, University of Wisconsin – Madison, 1989.
Kreindler, Isabelle. "The Soviet Deported Nationalities: A Summary and an Update." Soviet Studies 38:3 (July 1986): 387-405.
Krieger, Viktor. "Patriots or Traitors? – The Soviet Government and the 'German Russians' After the Attack on the USSR by National Socialist German." In Russian-German Special Relations in the Twentieth Century: A Closed Chapter? ed. Karl Shlogel. New York: Berg Publishers, 2006.
Krieger, Viktor. Secret Criminal Proceedings Against the Last Volga German Government During the Years 1944-46. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2005.
Kulischer, Eugene M. The Displacement of Population in Europe. Montreal: International Labour Office, 1943.
The deportation of the Volga Germans in 1941 is briefly mentioned.
Laing, Francis S. "German-Russian Settlements in Ellis County, Kansas." Kansas Historical Collections 11 (1910), 489-528. [Online]
Lautenschlager, Peggy A. The West Siders: The Development and Disintegration of the Volga German Community in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. B.A. Thesis, Lake Forest College, 1977.
Legg, Kathleen. "That young girl should be in school, not out drilling wheat!" The Germans from Russia, Race, and Americanization in Northeastern Colorado. Research Seminar Report, Colorado State University - Department of History, 2005.
Loewen, Royden. Family, Church and Market: A History of a Mennonite Community Transplanted from Russia to Canada and the United States, 1850-1930. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Manitoba, 1990.
Loewen, Royden. Family, Church and Market: A History of a Mennonite Community Transplanted from Russia to Canada and the United States, 1850-1930. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993.
Lohr, Eric. Nationalizing the Russian Empire: The Campaign against Enemy Aliens During World War I. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.
Long, James W. From Privileged to Dispossessed: The Volga Germans, 1860-1917. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1988.
Long, James W. The German-Russians: A Bibliography of Russian Materials. Santa Barbara, CA: CLIO, 1979.
Long, James W. "The Volga Germans and the Zemstvos, 1965-1917." Wiesbaden, Germany: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1982.
Long, James W. “The Volga Germans and the Zemstvos 1865-1917.” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, Neue Folge, Bd. 30, H. 3 (1982): pp. 336-361.
Long, James W. "The Volga Germans and the Famine of 1921." Russian Review 51:4 (October 1992): 510-526.
Suggests that Moscow politics, rather than climate or environment, was the primary contributory factor in the Volga Germany famine of 1921. Reasons famines occur and why peasant societies are more prone to experience famine than industrial societies; The Civil War which cut Volga Germany off from Moscow; The Bolshevik policy of unrestricted grain requisitioning in 1920-21; Merciless tactics of the 'Iron Broom'.
Mai, Brent Alan. 1798 Census of the German Colonies along the Volga: Economy, Population, and Agriculture. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1999.
Translation into English of the 1798 Census, including narrative of economic, religious, educational and structural makeup, colony movement, agricultural information. Lists 38,800 individuals by name (including maiden), age, colony of original settlement, and household. This 2-volume set is complete with indexes, including surname, colony, movement by surname and movement by colony.
Mai, Brent Alan. Transport of the Volga Germans from Oranienbaum to the Colonies on the Volga 1766-1767. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1998.
Translation into English of nine early transport lists, with information on German families traveling to the Volga in 1766 and 1767, although exact dates of transport are not indicated. Includes information on the number of people traveling within groups to new villages, as well as surname and religious affiliation.
Mai, Brent Alan and Marquardt, Dona Reeves. German Migration to the Russian Volga (1764-1767): Origins and Destinations. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2003.
The corpus of this book consists of listings of the marriages of colonists before they left Germany for Russia. These marriages are noted in the records of nine Protestant parishes for which original manuscripts were available for review by the authors. Also contains a brief gazetteer of the German colonies along the Volga as of 1798.
Martin, Terry. An Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939. London: Cornell University Press, 2001.
Martin, Terry. "An Affirmative Action Empire: The Soviet Union as the Highest Form of Imperialism." In A State of Nations: Empire and Nation-Making in the Age of Lenin and Stalin, eds. Ronald Grigor Suny and Tarry Martin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.
Marzolf, Arnold H. Let’s Talk German-Russian with Ernschtina un Hanswurscht. Bismarck, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Society, 1990.
Merten, Ulrich. Voices from the Gulag: The Oppression of the German Minority in the Soviet Union. Foreword by Eric J. Schmaltz. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2015.
McCagg, William O. Jr. Stalin Embattled, 1943-1948. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1978.
McGill, Nettie P. Children in Agriculture. Bureau Publication No. 187. Washington, DC: US Department of Labor-Government Printing Office, 1929.
Report on the use of child labor in agriculture with data from the 1920 Federal Census. Includes statistics and commentary on the role of German-Russian children in the sugar beet industry, particularly in Northern Colorado (pp. 10-13).
Miller, Mark J. "Dual Citizenship: A European Norm?" International Migration Review 23:4 (Winter, 1989), 945-950.
The Volga Germans are cited as an example of the difficulties of integration among immigrant populations.
Miller, Michael M. Researching the Germans from Russia: Annotated Bibliography of the Germans from Russia Heritage Collection at the North Dakota Institute for Regional Studies, North Dakota State University Library, with a Listing of the Library Materials at the Germans from Russia Heritage Society. Fargo, ND: North Dakota Institute for Regional Studies, 1987.
Mrdjenovic, Aleksandr. "The Genesis of Volga German Political Autonomy, 1917-1918." In Germans from Russia in Colorado, ed. Sidney Heitman. Fort Collins, CO: The Western Social Science Association, 1978.
Mrdjenovic, Aleksandr. The Volga-German Gemeindeschaft and Political Autonomy Amidst Domestic Turmoil, 1914-1922. M.A. Thesis, University of Kansas, 1976.
Mukhina, Irina. "'The Forgotten History': Ethnic German Women in Soviet Exile, 1941-1955." Europe-Asia Studies 57:5 (July 2005): 729-752.
Mukhina, Irina. "Gendered Division of Labor and Concepts of 'Feminine' and 'Masculine' Among Special Settlers in the Soviet Union, 1941-1956." Paper presented at the XIV International Economic History Congress, Helsinki, Finland. 21-25 August 2006. Session 14: Technology, Gender and the Division of Labor.
Nielsen, Ruth A. The Volga Germans: A Continuing Saga. D.Litt. Thesis, Drew University, 2005.
Oltmer, Jochen. "'The Unspoilt Nature of German Ethnicity': Immigration and Integration of 'Ethnic Germans' in the German Empire and the Weimar Republic." Nationalities Papers 34:4 (September 2006): 429-446.
Panarelli, Madeleine F. Influences on Early Twentieth-Century Bungalow Housing in Lincoln, Nebraska. M.A. Thesis, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 1981.
Paull, Ruby. Erna’s Medley. Edmonton, AB: Brightest Pebble, 1998.
A biography of German-Russian farm life in Alberta.
Peterson, Albert J. "The German-Russian House in Kansas: A Study in Persistence of Form." Pioneer America 8 (1976): 19-27.
Peterson, Albert J. "The German-Russian Settlement Patterns in Ellis County, Kansas." Rocky Mountain Social Science Journal 5 (April, 1968): 52-62.
Peterson, Albert Jepmond, Jr. German-Russian Catholic Colonization in Western Kansas: A Settlement Geography. Ph.D. Thesis, Louisiana State University, 1970.
Pfeiffer, John Edward. "The German-Russians and Their Immigration to South Dakota." Report and Historical Collections 35 (1970): 303-321.
Pfeiffer, John B. Soviet Nationalities Policy and the Struggle for Ethnic Identity: The Case of the Soviet Germans. B.A. Thesis, Bucknell University, 1992.
Philipps, John and Herzog, Stephen M. The Germans under the Tsars, Lenin and Stalin. Fargo, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Collection, 2006.
Pike, David. German Writers in Soviet Exile, 1933-1945. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982.
Pike, David. Prolegomena to the Study of German Writers in Soviet Exile, 1929-1945. Ph.D. Thesis, Stanford University, 1978.
Pleve, Igor R. The German Colonies on the Volga: The Second Half of the Eighteenth Century. Translated by Richard Rye. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2001.
This book traces the history of the Germans on the Volga in the second half of the eighteenth century, and it presents a rich source of archival material.. Special attention is paid to the development of the mechanism of inviting and settling foreign colonist on the Volga. The economic situation of the colonist is examined in detail. The causes of the initial situation of the immigrants in their first years of residence in the Saratov region and their successful economic activities during this time are revealed. The system of government in the colonies is also researched in detail. One section of one of the so-called “Kuhlberg Lists” (for the ship Anna Catharina) is included which lists passengers arriving in May, June, and August of 1766. Also included are lists of first settlers of ten German colonies on the Volga: Sewald, Kautz, Schuck, Leichtling, Kamenka, Vollmer, Preuss, Merkel, Rothammel, and Kratzke.
Pohl, J. Otto. Ethnic Cleansing in the USSR, 1937-1949. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1999.
Pohl, J. Otto. The Stalinist Penal System. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1997.
Pohl, J. Otto. "Volk auf dem Weg: Transnational Migration of the Russian-Germans from 1763 to the Present Day." Studies in Ethnicity and Nationalism 9:2 (2009): 267-286.
This article traces the migration patterns of the Russian-Germans across international borders from their initial settlement in the Russian Empire starting in 1763 up to the present day. In particular it analyses the reasons behind these migration flows. Both push and pull factors motivated the immigration of ethnic Germans to the Russian Empire in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. A similarly complex combination of such factors spurred the various waves of emigration by Russian-Germans out of this territory during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This article seeks to illuminate the primary causes of these migrant flows. It covers the main waves of German immigration into the Russian Empire including the initial settlement in the Volga region from 1763 to 1769, the establishment of the Mennonite colonies in Ukraine from 1789 to 1809 and the migration of German speakers to the Black Sea area from 1804 to 1856. It examines the various waves of emigration out of the territory of the former Russian Empire starting in the 1870s and continuing until today. The article goes on to analyse the immigration of Russian-Germans to the Americas from Tsarist Russia from the 1870s until the First World War. Then it deals with the various waves of Russian-German emigration under the Soviet regime starting in 1917–21 and reoccurring later in the 1920s, 1940s, 1970s and finally from 1987 to the collapse of the USSR. Finally, it examines the emigration of Russian-Germans from Russia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia and their settlement in Germany until 2006. Special attention is given to the history of Stalinist repression and later discrimination against the Russian-Germans as factors in their desire to emigrate.
Pohl, J. Otto. “A Caste of Helot Labourers: Special Settlers and the Cultivation of Cotton in Soviet Central Asia: 1944-1956.” In Deniz Kandiyoti, ed. The Cotton Sector in Central Asia: Economic Policy and Development Challenges. London: School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 2007), pp. 20-35. [Also covers the ethnic German experience in Soviet lands of exile during this period.]
Pohl, J. Otto. Catherine’s Grandchildren: A Short History of Russian-Germans under Soviet Rule. Monograph 2009-01. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2009.
Pohl, J. Otto . “Deportation and Destruction of the German Minority in the USSR,” 24 pp.
Pohl, J. Otto. “Hewers of Wood and Drawers of Water: The Russian-Germans in the Labour Army.” The Eurasia Studies Society Journal of Great Britain and Europe, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Feb. 2013), 17 pp.
Pohl, J. Otto. “The Loss, Retention, and Reacquisition of Social Capital by Special Settlers in the USSR, 1941–1960.” In Cynthia Buckley, Blair Ruble, and Erin Trouth Hofmann, eds. Migration, Homeland and Belonging in Eurasia. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center and Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2008, pp. 203-222. [Also treats ethnic German experience in Soviet Central Asia after mass deportations and exile in special settlements during this period.]
Pohl, J. Otto. “Soviet Apartheid: Stalin’s Ethnic Deportations, Special Settlement Restrictions, and the Labor Army: The Case of the Ethnic Germans in the USSR.” Human Rights Review, Vol. 13, Issue 2 (June 2012): pp. 205-224. [Examines the Stalin regime’s treatment of the ethnic Germans in the USSR during the 1940s as a case study in racial discrimination].
Pohl, J. Otto. “Suffering in a Province of Asia: The Russian-German Diaspora in Kazakhstan.” In Mathias Schulze, James M. Skidmore, David G. John, Grit Liebscher, and Sebastian Siebel-Achenbach, eds. Germanic Diasporic Experiences: Identity, Migration, and Loss. Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2008, pp. 405-417.
Pohl, J. Otto, Eric J. Schmaltz, and Ronald J. Vossler. “‘In Our Hearts We Felt the Sentence of Death’: Ethnic German Recollections of Mass Violence in the USSR, 1928-1948.” Journal of Genocide Research, Vol. 11, Nos. 2-3 (June-Sept. 2009): pp. 323-354. Part of special topic issue: “New Perspectives on Soviet Mass Violence.”
Polian, Pavel. Against Their Will: The History and Geography of Forced Migrations in the USSR. Budapest: Central European University Press, 2004.
Quiring, Walter and Bartel, Helen. In the Fullness of Time: 150 Years of Mennonite Sojourn in Russia. Kitchener, ON: A. Klassen, 1974.
Ransome, Arthur. "Famine on the Volga." Guardian Newspaper (11 October 1921).
Reeves-Marquardt, Dona B. and Lewis R. Marquardt. "Catholic Germans from Russia in Texas." Journal of Texas Catholic History and Culture 4 (1993): 25-43.
Reisdorph, F.S. A History of the German People in the Panhandle of Texas and Ellis County, Oklahoma M.A. Thesis. West Texas State Teachers College, 1942.
Richmond, Robert W. Kansas: A Land of Contrasts. Saint Charles, MO: Forum Press, 1974.
Rife, Janet Warkentin. Germans and German-Russians in Nebraska: A Research Guide to Nebraska Ethnic Studies. Lincoln, NE: Center for Great Plains Studies, 1980.
Rock, Kenneth W. "The Colorado Germans from Russia Study Project." Social Science Journal13 (April, 1976): 119-126.
Rock, Kenneth W. Germans from Russia in America: the First Hundred Years. Fort Collins, CO: Germans from Russia in Colorado Study Project, Dept. of History, Colorado State University, 1976.
Rock, Kenneth W. "Unsere Leute: The Germans from Russia in Colorado." Colorado Magazine51:2 (Spring 1977): 155-183.
Roemmich, Heinrich and Sommerfeld, Oscar. The Rose and the Sickle: Survival of the Lutheran Church in Russia. Saskatoon, SK: Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada, 1983.
Ropes-Gale, R. Heather. Immigration of Germans from Russia to Lincoln, Nebraska. Senior Honors Thesis, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 1989.
Ruppenthal, Jacob C. "The German Element in Central Kansas." Collections of the Kansas State Historical Society, 1913-1914 13 (1915): 513-534.
Saal, Leo R. and Heilprin, Marilyn H. Crossings: A Life in Russia & Germany in the First Half of the 20th Century. Washington, DC: Chronos Press, 1996.
Sallet, Richard. Russian-German Settlement in the United States. Fargo, ND: North Dakota Institute for Regional Studies, 1974.
Sapiets, Marite. "One Hundred Years of Adventism in Russia and the Soviet Union." Religion, State and Society 12:3 (Winter 1984): 256-273.
The author discusses the history and development of the Adventist movement in Russia identifying key figures and events involved in the Volga German area.
Saul, Norman. "Documenting Non-Russian Immigrants from Russia." Slavic & East European Information Resources 7:2/3 (2006): 139-151.
This article describes materials relating to the history of German settlers in the United States who arrived by way of Russia, sometimes having lived in that country for generations. They had left the German territories primarily for religious reasons, though some came to Russia for the land. Later, discrimination policies by the Russian and Soviet governments and tales of opportunity in the United States drew many to leave Russia for the New World. Most of them settled in the Midwest (Nebraska, Kansas), founding Mennonite, Catholic, and Lutheran colonies, and in some cases, colleges and historical societies, where a good deal of information on their migrations has been preserved.
Saul, Norman E. "The Migration of the Russian-Germans to Kansas." Kansas Historical Quarterly 40:1 (Spring, 1974). (Online)
Sawatsky, Walter. Soviet Evangelicals Since World War II. Kitchner, ON: Herald Press, 1981.
Scheuerman, Richard D. Pilgrims on the Earth: A German-Russian Chronicle. Fairfield, WA: Ye Galleon Press, 1974.
Scheuerman, Richard D. Return to Berry Meadow and Other Stories of Our People. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1995.
A colorful collection of stories about the dramatic experiences of the Germans from Russia, gleaned from the writings of the author and other historians. Contains the account of Scheuerman’s remarkable journey to the Volga region in the fall of 1990 as the first westerner since the 1920s allowed to visit the old German colonies.
Scheuerman, Richard D. and Trafzer, Clifford E. The Volga Germans: Pioneers of the Northwest. Moscow, ID: University Press of Idaho, 1980.
Scheuerman, Richard D. and Trafzer, Clifford E. Hardship to Homeland Pacific Northwest Volga Germans. Pullman, WA: Washington State UP, 2018. Print.
Schmaltz, Eric J. Our Memory Is the Future: The Soviet Experience and Remembrance of the August 1941 Deportation of Volga Germans. Presented at the Commemoration of the German-Russian Holocaust on October 25, 2008, at St. Michael's Lutheran Church, Portland, Oregon.
Schmaltz, Eric J. Reform, "Rebirth," and Regret: The Early Autonomy Movement of Ethnic Germans in the USSR, 1955-1989. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Nebraska, 2002.
Schmaltz, Eric J. An Expanded Bibliography and Reference Guide for the Former Soviet Union’s Ethnic Germans. Fargo, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Collection, North Dakota State University Libraries, 2003.
Schmaltz, Eric J. and Sinner, Samuel D. "'You Will Die Under Ruins and Snow': The Soviet Repression of Russian Germans as a Case Study of Successful Genocide." Journal of Genocide Research 4:3 (September 2002): 327-356.
Studies the Soviet repression of Russian Germans as an example of genocide. Contradictions and fluctuations of Soviet nationalities policies; Recurrent historical patterns for Russian Germans; Soviet amnesty and partial rehabilitation of ethnic Germans; Cultural and linguistic death.
Schmaltz, Eric J. "Carrots and Sticks . . . and Demonstrations: Yuri Andropov's Failed Autonomy Plan for Soviet Kazakhstan's Germans, 1976-1980." Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Lincoln, NE) 39:3 (Fall 2016): pp. 1-21.
Schmaltz, Eric J. “Carrots and Sticks . . . and Demonstrations: Yuri Andropov’s Failed Autonomy Plan for Soviet Kazakhstan’s Germans, 1976-1980.” The Eurasia Studies Society Journal of Great Britain and Europe, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Jan. 2014), 36 pp.: https://eurasiahistory.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/eric-schmaltz-tess-eurasia-studies-soc-journal-vol-3-no1-jan-20141.pdf
Schmaltz, Eric J. “Germans in the Russian Empire, Soviet Union and Their Successor States, and Their Descendants’ Subsequent Life in Germany and the Western Hemisphere: A Historical Timeline, 1549-Present.” Posted on the Website of the Germans from Russia Heritage Collection, the North Dakota State University Libraries, Fargo. 31 pp.
Schmaltz, Eric J. “The ‘Long Trek’: SS Population Transfer of Ukrainian Germans to the Polish Warthegau and Its Consequences, 1943-1944.” Heritage Review 44:1 (Mar. 2014): pp. 7-25; Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia 31:3 (Fall 2008): pp. 1-23. [Covers Nazi occupation policy toward ethnic Germans in Eastern Europe, as well as Nazi mass population transfer and Soviet repatriation topics].
Schmaltz, Eric J. “Other Immigrant Destinies: An Overview of South America’s Germans from Russia.” Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia (Lincoln, NE) 39:1 (Spring 2016): pp. 1-13.
Schmaltz, Eric J. “Reform, ‘Rebirth’ and Regret: The Rise and Decline of the Ethnic-German Nationalist Wiedergeburt Movement in the USSR and CIS, 1987-1993.” Nationalities Papers, Vol. 26, No. 2 (June 1998): pp. 215-247. [Examines the ethnic group’s reemergent autonomy movement and its various problems during the critical final years of the Soviet Union.]
Schmaltz, Eric J. “Soviet ‘Paradise’ Revisited: Genocide, Dissent, Memory and Denial (Parts I and II).” Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia: Vol. 38, No. 1 (Spring 2015): pp. 1-11; Vol. 38, No. 3 (Fall 2015): pp. 22-31. [Historical reflections on the modern phenomenon of mass repression and ethnic German experiences under Soviet Communism].
Schock, Dawn. The German-Russian Brauche. Senior Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1979.
Scholz, Harry G. The German Colonists of Russia: The Repeal of Russia's Law of the Colonists in 1871 and Its Effects on the German Colonist Population. M.A. Thesis, Chapman University, 1969.
Schrib, June McIntire. A German-Russian Immigrant’s Story. Bismarck, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Society, 1984.
Seibert, Doris Isaak. German-Russian Immigrants: Pioneers on the Dakota Frontier. M.A. Paper, Reed College, 1964.
Sharma, Yojana. "Alarm Signals Ignored." Times Educational Supplement 4297 (6 November 1998): 20.
Focuses on education in Germany in the late 1990s. Realschule or Haptschule which provides basic academic education while focusing on vocational skills; Unemployment in Germany; The high rate of school dropouts; Schools reactions to students who skip classes; Balkans refugees and Russian-Germans as contributing to a rising number of dropouts.
Sheehy, Ann and Nahaylo, Bohdan. The Crimean Tatars, Volga Germans and Meskhetians: Soviet Treatment of Some National Minorities. London: Minority Rights Group, 1986.
Sherman, William C. Assimilation in a North Dakota German-Russian Community. M.A. Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1965.
Shiro, Hanya. "Nationalities Policy in the Brezhnev Era: The Case of Deported Nations." In Empire, Islam and Politics in Central Asia, ed. Uyama Tomohiko. Sapporro: Slavic Research Center, 2007.
Sinner, Peter. Germans in the Land of the Volga. Translated by Dona Reeves-Marquardt. Lincoln, NE. American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1989.
The Volga German schoolteacher, Peter Sinner, published this collection of short articles, personal reflections, and poems about the history and development of the German colonies in the Volga Region in 1927. It was created expressly for the young people and introduces them to their heritage from the first arrival of Germans on the vast steppe to the establishment of the Autonomous Volga German Republic. The book includes an autobiography of Peter Sinner, translated by Adam Giesinger, and a bibliography of Sinner’s writings.
Sinner, Samuel D. Letters from Hell. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2000.
Sinner, Samuel D. The Open Wound: The Genocide of German Ethnic Minorities in Russia and the Soviet Union, 1915-1949 and Beyond. Fargo, ND: Germans from Russia Heritage Collection, North Dakota State University Libraries, 2000.
Sinner, Samuel D. “A Bibliographical Survey of German-Russian Women Writers of the Midwest and Texas, 1900-1950.” Heritage Review, Vol. 41, No. 3 (September 2011): pp. 12-18. [Review of women writers, including those of Volga German heritage, in the American heartland during the first half of the twentieth century. An extensive bibliography appears at the end.]
Sinner, Samuel D. “The Cryptogram ‘Stalin’ in Three Poems of 1926 by Volga German Author and Stalin Victim Peter Sinner (Petr Ivanovič Zinner).” Heritage Review, Vol. 43, No. 1 (March 2013): pp. 26-33. [An interesting, provocative investigation into the mindset of one of the great Volga German intellectuals during the tense New Economic Policy era of early Soviet power.]
Sinner, Samuel D. “Famine in the Volga Basin, 1920-1924, and the American Volga Relief Society Records.” Nebraska History, Vol. 78, No. 3 (Fall 1997): pp. 134-138. [Excellent overview of archival records available the Nebraska State Historical Society (NSHS) in Lincoln.]
Sinner, Samuel D. “An Open Wound.” Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Summer 2000): pp. 35-40. [Comparative reflections on Stalinist mass repression on Soviet Germans and other groups.]
Sinner, Samuel D. “Recent Research on Peter Sinner, Volga-German Poet and Stalin Victim.” Journal of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Summer 2000): pp. 47-54.
Sinner, Samuel D. “Volga German Pipe Smoking: Folklore and Traditions.” Heritage Review, Vol. 41: no. 2 (June 2011): pp. 12, 34-35.
Sirks, Aina. A Study of a Nebraska German Dialect. M.A. thesis, University of Nebraska, 1956.
Socolofsky, Homer E. "Success and Failure in Nebraska homesteading." Agricultural History 42 (April, 1968): 103-107.
Socolofsky, Homer E. and Huber Self. Historical Atlas of Kansas. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1972.
Page 42 deals with the settlement of the German-Russians.
Somerholter, Kerstin. Language Contact and Shift in the Soviet German Speech Community. Dissertation, University of Texas at Austin, 1999.
Spengla, Vidas. "Acts of the Apostles: The Unwritten Part." Translated by Gintautas Kaminskas. Lithuanian Papers. No. 15 (2001).
Spiker, Allen L. A Survey of English Loanword Usage in the Spoken German Language of German-Russians in North Dakota. M.A. Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1978.
Stadling, Jonas. "The Famine in Russia." The Century 46:4 (August 1893) 560-571. Online
The mortality rate in the Volga German colonies was about five times the normal rate or 200 in 1,000.
Stadling, Jonas Jonsson and Will Reason. In the Land of Tolstoi: Experiences of Famine and Misrule in Russia. London: James Clarke & Co., 1897.
Chapter X : Among German Colonists (pp. 151-158) discusses the impact of the famine of 1892-93 on the Volga German colonies.
"Starvation Is Worse Further Into Provinces: Death List in Communities Greater as One Proceeds Up Volga River." Mandan (ND) Daily Pioneer (9 November 1921).
Steinbach, Anja. "Intergenerational Transmission and Integration of Repatriate Families from the Former Soviet Union in Germany." Journal of Comparative Family Studies 32:4 (Autumn 2001): 505-515.
The article focuses on an empirical research, which aims at analyzing the intergenerational transmission and integration of repatriate families from the former Soviet Union to Germany. The analysis of intergenerational transmission in migrant families concerns the actual influence of the parent-generation. This analysis allows more accurate statements about what is transferred from one generation to the other and how this interfamilial transmission influences intergenerational behavior. The investigated group of migrants enjoys a special status in Germany since they are of German origin. There are many Russian-Germans who would prefer to go back to the homeland of their ancestors as they could not see any prospects for themselves and their families as Germans in Russia.
Stremel, Alex G. Religious and Educational Contributions of German-Russians to the Development of Rush and Ellis Counties, Kansas. M.S. Thesis, Fort Hays Kansas State College, 1948.
Stricker, Gerd. "Ethnic Germans in Russia and the Former Soviet Union." In German Minorities in Europe: Identity and Cultural Belonging. ed. Stefan Wolff. NY: Berghahn Books, 2000.
Stroh, Norman A. The German-Russians in Weld County, Colorado. M.A. Thesis, Colorado State College of Education, Division of the Social Studies, 1941.
Struck-Soboleva, Julia. "Controversies Surrounding Language Policy and the Integration Process of Russian Germans in Germany." Language & Intercultural Communication 6:1 (2006): 57-75.
This paper is concerned with the impact that public and political discourses on the issues of language and ethnicity in Germany have on integration. It suggests that a combined effect of factors such as the traditional concept of 'Germanness', peculiarities of Russian Germans' 'cultural identity' and certain aspects of German language policy with respect to resettlement have prompted the emergence and development of discourses that are linked to the deficiency of social contacts between Russian Germans and native Germans. This paper focuses on the Russian German-native German discourse that is an intrinsic part of such contacts. It argues that broad political and social contexts influence the process of interaction indirectly by becoming part of the interlocutors' knowledge. Fieldwork provides empirical evidence for such an influence. A number of communicative settings are analyzed in depth, using results of in-depth interviews, observations and authentic conversations. On the basis of this analysis, the current paper demonstrates how the discourses that stem from controversies in the language policy can interfere with face-to-face interactions between Russian Germans and native Germans in various social settings at the microlevel and therefore have an impact on the way Russian German-native German discourse is shaped.
Stumpp, Karl. The Emigration from Germany to Russia in the Years 1763 to 1862. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1973.
Professor Stumpp’s monumental work is the fruition of forty years of research. It contains alphabetical lists of thousands of names of German immigrants to Russia, many with vital statistics, place of origin in Germany, and locality of settlement in Russia. Included is a list of mother colonies of the Volga Germans, giving both the German and Russian name of each village, its governmental district, religious denomination, year of founding, and population statistics.
Stumpp, Karl. The German-Russians: Two Centuries of Pioneering. New York, NY: Edition Atlantic-Forum, 1978.
Swan, Robert A., Jr. The Ethnic Heritage of Topeka, Kansas: Immigrant Beginnings. Lawrence, Kansas: Institute of Comparative Ethnic Studies, 1974.
Includes a section on the German-Russian, predominently Volga German, community in Topeka.
Tabbert, Jon Charles, ed. People of the Prairies: A Norwegian and German-Russian Curriculum Guide. Grand Forks, ND: Center for Teaching and Learning, University of North Dakota, 1978.
Teeuween, Randall C. "Public Rural Education and the Americanization of the Germans from Russia in Colorado: 1900-1930." M.A. Thesis, Colorado State University, 1993.
Thomas, Adam. Work Renders Life Sweet: Germans from Russia in Fort Collins, 1900-2000. Fort Collins, CO: City of Fort Collins, 2003.
Thomas, Adam and Timothy Smith. The Sugar Factory Neighborhoods: Buckingham, Andersonville, Alta Vista. Fort Collins, CO: City of Fort Collins, 2004.
Thomas, Richard J. The German-Russian Experience in Southeastern South Dakota. M.A. Thesis, University of South Dakota, 1980.
Toews, John B. Journeys: Mennonites Stories of Faith and Survival in Stalin’s Russia. Winnepeg, MB: Kindred Publications, 1998.
Persecution of the Mennonites in 20th Century Russia.
Toepfer, Amy Brungardt and Agnes C. Dreiling. Conquering the Wind. Garwood, NJ: Victor C. Leiker, 1966. Revised edition published in 1982 by the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia.
This book deals with the development of the early Volga colonies, particularly with life in the Catholic villages. It also follows some of the families from these villages to the plains of Kansas where they settled in Ellis County.
Toews, John B. Lost Fatherland: The Story of the Mennonite Emigration from Soviet Russia, 1921-1927. Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1967.
Towers of Faith and Courage: A Pictorial History of Saint Fidelis Parish, Victoria, Kansas, Saint Ann's Parish, Walker, Kansas, Sacred Heart Parish, Emmeram, Kansas, Published on the Occasion of the Centennial Celebration Marking the Arrival of the First Volga-German Immigrants in Ellis County, Kansas. Dallas: Taylor Pub., 1976.
Turk, Eleanor L. "Germans in Kansas." Kansas History 28 (Spring 2005): 44-71.
This article covers all of the German groups that settled in Kansas. There are a number of photos of the Volga German settlers along with descriptions of how they have contributed to the history and culture of Kansas.
Twitty, Eric. Silver Wedge: The Sugar Beet Industry in Fort Collins. Fort Collins, CO: City of Fort Collins, 2003.
Urbach, William. "Our Parents Were Russian German." Nebraska History 48:1 (Spring 1967): 1-26.
Valdés, Dennis Nodín. "Settlers, Sojourners, and Proletarians: Social Formation in The Great Plains Sugar Beet Industry, 1890-1940." Great Plains Quarterly 10 (Spring 1990): 110-123.
Vasilenko, Kirill. "Atlantis on the Volga." Current Digest of the Post-Soviet Press 54:35 (25 September 2002): 11.
Reports on the willingness of Germans to abandon the idea of reestablishing a territorial autonomous entity in Russia. Statement of the Federal Ethnocultural Autonomous Organization president; Repression victimization of Russian Germans; political rehabilitations for Russian Germans.
Voeller, Joseph B. The Origin of the German-Russian People and their Role in North Dakota. M.A. Thesis, University of North Dakota, 1940.
Waag, Moonyean Anne. The Dream, the Promise, and Beyond: The Building and Transformation of One Volga German Legacy. M.A. Thesis, Colorado State University, 1994.
Walters, George J. Wir wollen deutsche bleiben = We Want to Remain German: The Story of the Volga Germans. Kansas City, MO: Halcyon House, 1982.
Walth, Richard H. Flotsam of World History: the Germans from Russia between Stalin and Hitler. Essen: Klartext-Verlag, 1996.
Waters, Tony. "Towards a Theory of Ethnic Identity and Migration: The Formation of Ethnic Enclaves by Migrant Germans in Russia and North America." International Migration Review29:2 (Summer 1995): 515-544.
This article explores the determinants for the maintenance of ethnic identity by comparing six groups of migrant Germans. The groups are eighteenth century German peasants migrating to Volga Russia, thirteenth century migrants to Latvia, seventeenth century bureaucrats and traders migrating to Moscow/St. Petersburg, eighteenth century peasant migrants to Pennsylvania, nineteenth century Hutterite migrants to the North American Midwest, and eighteenth century Volga German migrants to the American Midwest. Notably, three of these groups assimilated into the host society, while three of them formed ethnic enclaves. Comparison of the six cases indicated that what determined whether a group would maintain its identity or not depended on whether individuals could move their inheritable economic base. This is because in the immigrant situation it is the inheritable economic base which determines who the primary reference group will be.
Watson, Shayne. "Kontor-Style Churches." Architecture, Ethnicity and Historic Landscapes of California's San Joaquin Valley, 2008.
Wieler, Henry P. The Quiet in the Land: A Volga-German’s Christian Journals: Russian Revolution years, 1916-18. Victoria, BC: Trafford, 2005.
Werner, Hans. The Constructed Mennonite: History, Memory and the Second World War. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 2013. [Considers the transnational character of memory and identity.]
Werner, Hans. “‘Germans Only in Their Hearts’: Making and Breaking the Ethnic German Diaspora in the Twentieth Century.” In Alexander Freund, ed. Beyond the Nation?: Immigrants’ Local Lives in Transnational Cultures. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012, pp. 211-226. [A study in transnational memory and identity.]
Werner, Hans. Imagined Homes: Soviet German Immigrants in Two Cities. Studies in Immigration and Culture Series. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 2007. [A comparative study of the migration experiences of ethnic Germans from the USSR to Bielefeld, West Germany, and Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, during the Cold War era.]
Werth, Nicolas. "The Mechanism of a Mass Crime: The Great Terror in the Soviet Union." In The Specter of Genocide: Mass Murder in Historical Perspective. eds. Robert Gellatey and Ben Kiernan. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
Wilbanks, Elsie Montgomery and Austin H. Montgomery, Jr. "The Other Germans." Texana 3 (1971): 230-248.
Following a general history of how the Germans came to be in Russia, this article deals more specifically with developments in Russia that had an impact on these immigrants. The authors then cover the subsequent settlement of Germans from Russia in Beaver, Ellis, and Texas Counties in Oklahoma and Lipscomb County in Texas.
Willems, Joachim. "Russian German Lutheran 'Brotherhoods' in the Soviet Union and in the CIS: Comments on their Confessional Identity and the Position in ELCROS." Religion, State & Society30:3 (2002).
Williams, Hattie Plum. The Czar’s Germans: A Study of an Immigrant Group in the Midwest. Ph.D. Thesis, University of Nebraska, 1915.
Williams, Hattie Plum. The Czar’s Germans: With Particular Reference to the Volga Germans. Edited by Emma S. Haynes, et al. Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1975 & 1984.
This history of the Germans from Russia (begun about seventy years ago and left incomplete at her death in 1963) by Professor Williams concentrates on the Volga Germans, gives scrupulously researched and highly detailed descriptions of conditions in Germany during the 18th century that made emigration so attractive. Also discussed are the activities of the Russian immigration agents, the trek of the immigrants to the interior of Russia, the difficult early years, eventual prosperity, and final decline following outbreak of hostility against the colonist, their immigration to America, and the difficult pioneer years.
Williams, Hattie Plum. The History of the German-Russian Colony in Lincoln. M.A. Thesis, University of Nebraska, 1909.
Williams, Hattie Plum. A Social Study of the Russian German. University Studies of the University of Nebraska 16:3 (1916).
A sociological study of the Volga German settlements in Lincoln through July of 1916. Mrs. Williams surveys the makeup of the German-Russian population and discusses birth and death rates, marriages and divorce among these people.
Wolf, Markus and Alexander Frank. "No Future for the Ethnic Germans in Kazakhstan?" Aussenpolitik 44:2 (1993): 153-162.
Wolff, Stefan, ed. German Minorities in Europe: Identity and Cultural Belonging. NY: Berghahn Books, 2000.