A Brief History of German Language Newspapers in Albany

The majority of newly minted German immigrants were either unable to or unwilling to read English language newspapers; therefore the immigrant press became the easiest and most important method of maintaining cultural ties with former homelands and with fellow Germans residing locally.  Foreign language organs helped preserve native languages and cultural heritage.  The German language press and literature reflected much of what was occurring in American society and served ultimately to advance the accommodation of the German-born to that society.[1] For many years the German-language press not only was the most numerous among the foreign-language papers of the United States, but the most ably edited and the most widely read.[2] In 1914 of the 1,300 foreign-language papers published in the United States, 537, or forty percent, were German.[3] The German press became interested primarily in local problems and particularly in the cultural and social activities of the German societies in their communities.[4] Thus, local social, musical, and dramatic activities were reported in detail. At the same time, German language newspapers and publications served as important sources of information about local politics; of seven thousand copies of the Albany City Record, detailing the proceedings of the Common Council and city government, published every week at the turn of the century, three thousand were printed in German.[5] This naturally occurred because German was considered a second official language in Albany.

The survival of the German press depended upon the extent that German-Americans retained their interests in the social and cultural life of their people.[6] In the beginning of the twentieth century, German immigration to America virtually ceased when compared to the number of Germans that immigrated to the United States in the 1850s and 1860s.  Earlier immigration refreshed bonds to the Vaterland on a yearly basis through the arrival of new German immigrants. Regrettably, the German language press in the United States began to falter and decline, despite its own attempts at revitalization, by reporting on national issues.  Unfortunately German immigration did not keep pace with German-American mortality.  Many second generation Germans saw themselves as American and lacked the conscious self-identity of being German.  Historian John A. Hawgood illustrated this point,

As the older German-stock died off, the younger generation of Germans discontinued the use of the German language in their own homes.  They ceased to subscribe to German language newspapers, magazines, and periodicals, and confined themselves to the English language newspapers, which had, found their way into all but the strictest German-American homes.[7]

A plan to reinvigorate the German language in Albany was suggested in early 1908.  A proposal was devised by the pastors of Albany’s German churches, who sought to promote the study of the German language by having German taught in all of the city’s schools where German children attend.  As the Times Union reports,

The pastors claim that the German language is falling into disuse among the present generation of German descended residents.  Many of the younger people, although they can understand the language when it is spoken in the home, they can neither read nor write it.[8]

A special German language teacher needed to be hired at $800 per year, who would then visit each school on different days.  The German pastors conferred with German-American Mayor Charles Henry Gaus, who approved the plan, but stated the city’s Board of Education must give authorization to finalize the proposal.  

The Board rejected the proposal as being too costly to both the school district and the students.  They held that it might hinder the pupils’ comprehension of the English language.

To keep pace with English-language news organs and to hold and attract new readers, many German-language newspapers appeared to become more American than German.  Many articles were printed in both German and English.  They began to report on national issues, the activities of Congress, as well as local news.  Another device used by the German-American press to hold its readers was the promotion of German-Americanism as a self-conscious identity among German-Americans as participants in a sub-society that was expressive of a superior culture.[9] Therefore, after the turn of the century cultural chauvinism became the norm.  Many extremely chauvinistic German ideologies resembled the beliefs of the ultra-nationalistic Pan-German League in Germany.  The practice of exaggerating the German contribution to American history became even more quixotic.  Assertions such as the Germans had nearly single-handedly saved the Revolution in 1776 and the Union in 1861 were transformed into lessons from the past to inspire and guide the present day immigrants to exercise an equally strong influence in shaping the destiny of the nation and the community.[10]

1886 Albany City Directory Advertisement

The first German language daily evening newspaper in Albany was the Albany Freie Blätter.  It was first published in June 1852 by Augustus Miggael.  

Its offices were located at 44 Beaver Street.  The Albany Common Council considered the Freie Blätter as one of the three official city newspapers.  The city allotted printing patronage to the Freie Blätter from 1874 to 1896, and in 1893 the Freie Blätter received $1,253.37 from the city.[11]  The other two newspapers were the Albany Argus and the Albany Evening Journal.  The organ had a Democratic platform from which “many a hard political battle was fought.”[12]  The paper ceased to exist in 1913 with a circulation numbering 2,480 copies when it merged with the Albany Herold.  The Freie Blätter was not published on Sundays, but the Sonntagsgast was printed between 1885 and 1897 as the Sunday edition of the Freie Blätter.  The Sonntagsgast held independent views.  Between the years 1898 and 1909 the Albany Freie Presse was printed as a supplement to the Albany Freie Blätter.  The author of this work discovered an obscure German newspaper or periodical that was also printed in Albany, the Albany Volksblatt.  It was first published in 1856 by George Herb.[13]

1889 Albany City Directory Advertisement

Albany’s second German language newspaper was founded by Jacob Heinmuller on May 1, 1868- the Albany Herold.  It was first printed on February 11, 1869.  The organ was located at 346 Broadway and was run as a daily morning paper with no Sunday printing.  The newspaper’s printing ran on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  As time passed, the circulation estimates for the Albany Herold greatly increased; (see Table IV.)  The paper had Republican views.  The Sunday edition of the Albany Herold was printed as the Sonntags Correspondent.  It was printed between 1885 and 1911.  In 1913 the Albany Herold and the Albany Freie Blätter merged, and their union produced the Herold und Freie Blätter.  In 1915 circulation numbered one thousand papers; but unfortunately the newspaper ceased to exist in 1920.  

1915 Albany City Directory Advertisement

World War I hammered the final nail into the coffin of Albany’s Deutschtum.  Another German newspaper was the Taeglicher Albany Herald.  It was first published on October 10, 1871, as a daily.[14]

Table IV: Circulation Estimates for the Albany Herold[15]

Year	Total Circulation Estimate
1875	400
1880	680
1890	1000
1900	2162
1910	2000

Yet, another German language newspaper in Albany was the Albany Sonntags Journal.  The paper was founded by Charles Hildebrandt.  It was first published on May 11, 1887, and ran weekly until 1911.  

1894 Albany City Directory Advertisement

A note in the Albany Argus congratulated the Sonntags Journal for entering its fourth year as “an able, well managed newspaper, admirably adapted for the needs of our German fellow citizens, bright and newsy and bearing all the qualities of well deserved popularity.”[16]  Between the years 1890 and 1903, the paper held Democratic views and later changed to Republican tendencies from 1904 to 1911.  Unfortunately as time passed, the Sonntags Journal did not increase its circulation; its circulation shrank; (see Table V.)

Table V: Circulation Estimates for the Sonntags Journal[17]

Year	Total Circulation Estimate
1890	2700
1900	2500
1910	1800

Regrettably, the German newspapers from Albany were not kept.  They appear to have been disposed of after reading; today only a few miscellaneous copies remain. 

German Publishing Company, 13 Beaver Street

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[1] Robert Henry Billigmeier, Americans from Germany: A Study in Cultural Diversity (Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1974), p. 121.

[2] Wittke, The German-Language Press in America, pp. 6, 209.

[3] O’Connor, German-Americans, p. 360.

[4] Wittke, The German-Language Press in America, p. 237. Rippley, The German-Americans, p. 165.

[5] Rabrenovic, Community Builders, p. 41. John McEneny, “The Melting Pot,” in Experiencing Albany: Perspectives on a Grand City’s Past, ed. Anne F. Roberts and Judith A. Van Dyk (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986), p. 34. Times Union, July 6, 1986, Supplement, 57:1.

[6] Wittke, The German-Language Press in America, p. 220.

[7] Hawgood, The Tragedy of German-America, p. 290. Wittke, The German-Language Press in America, p. 222. Guido A. Dobbert, “German-Americans Between New and Old Fatherland,” American Quarterly 19(4): 669.

[8] Times Union, March 29, 1908, 4:2.

[9] Frederick C. Luebke, “Three Centuries of Germans in America” in Germans in the New World: Essays in the History of Immigration (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1990), p. 171. Melvin G. Holli, “Teuton vs. Slav: The Great War Sinks Chicago’s German Kultur,” Ethnicity 8(4): 423.

[10] Dobbert, “The Disintegration of an Immigrant Community,” pp. 92-93.

[11] Reimer, “Ethnicity in Albany, N. Y., 1888-1908,” p. 49.

[12] Reynolds, Albany Chronicles, p. 616. Times Union, April 25, 1914, 4:1. n. a., Geschichte der Deutschen in Albany und Troy, p. 101.

[13] Howell and Tenney, eds., History of the County of Albany, N. Y., p. 377.

[14] Ibid., p. 378.

[15] Karl J. R. Arndt and May E. Olson, German-American Newspapers and Periodicals, 1732-1955: History and Bibliography (Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer Publishers, 1961), pp. 313-314.

[16] Albany Argus, May 18, 1891, 4:3.

[17] Arndt and Olson, German-American Newspapers and Periodicals, 1732-1955, pp. 313-314.