Second family reunion of the Müllerleile families October 10-12, 1997 in Schuttertal
Under the auspices of Mayor Bernhard Himmelsbach, about 150 relatives and descendants of various Muellerleile families from Germany, USA and Canada from 10th to 12th October 1997 met in Schuttertal, from where the Müllerleile families started. Guest of honor at the meeting was the actress Marianne Muellerleile from Los Angeles, who four months earlier had organized the first Müllerleile meeting ever in Monticello in the state of Iowa, USA.
14 of the participants came from the US, one, Richard Slama, from Canada. Richard’s family comes from the Müllerleile, who emigrated in the 18th century in the southeast to Austria-Hungary and found a new home in Hodja in the Batschka.
Main organizers of the meeting were Christoph and Wolfgang Müllerleile. Member of the preparatory committee was also the most important family researcher of the community, Gerhard Finkbeiner. He enriched the meeting with the main lecture on "The Müllerleile family - their origin and their traces in Schuttertal and surroundings". He made it clear that the idiosyncratic surname was already formed in the 16th century and has its origins on the Kasperhof and the Wintererhof in Schuttertal.
As a prelude to the meeting, the first participants gathered for dinner on October 10 at the inn "Zum Adler". Manfred Allgaier from Schuttertal showed videos about the Schuttertal and Burg Geroldseck.
The program the next morning began with a bus tour of the guests in the area of Schuttertal. In the open-air museum Vogtsbauernhöfe in Gutach, the foreigners learned a lot about the buildings and history of the Black Forest communities. During the subsequent visit of the glassblower of the Dorotheenhütte in Wolfach offered further opportunities to buy some souvenirs.
In the meantime, the 40-meter pedigree of the Müllerleile families, created by Marianne Muellerleile for the first meeting in Monticello in June, could be seen in the gym of the Schuttertal school.
In the inn "Zur Eiche" in Schuttertal Mayor Himmelsbach welcomed the participants. He was also present during the whole meeting. The Himmelsbachs cultivate close contacts with their own relatives living abroad and he, together with Gerhard Finkbeiner, had paid a visit to some of them in the USA.
A lot of space in the program was taken up by the presentation of the individual participants, who first had to get familiar with each other. After the lecture by Finkbeiner Christoph Müllerleile showed a video with impressions from the family reunion in the USA. This was followed by excerpts from movies by Marianne Müllerleile with comments from herself. Entertainer Hermann Zehnle then made music into the night.
Especially for the participants of the meeting a service was held on Sunday morning in the Catholic St. Anthony's Church in Schuttertal, which was celebrated by the Indian parish priest Father Jose Kallupilankal. The clergyman also participated in much of the family reunion.
Then there was another opportunity to visit the Müllerleile pedigree in the gymnasium of the school of Schuttertal and to walk through the Schuttertal to the Kasperbauernhof.
The visit to the Kasperbauernhof, the brunch with the farmers Anton and Rita Müllerleile and the performance of the folk-dance group Schwaighausen were highlights of the meeting. Anton and Rita had participated in the first reunion in Monticello and were inspired accordingly. Unfortunately, it was raining. Nevertheless, a "dry" family photo of all participants came before the grandiose backdrop of the Kasperbauernhof.
The lunch in the inn "Zur Eiche" was the end of the meeting. Marianne Müllerleile presented Christoph Müllerleile with the memorial plaque of the Müllerleile meeting, which moves from one venue for the family reunion to the next. Each participant received a paper print of the family tree.
The guests from the USA mostly followed a follow-up program, which concerned places of their individual family history.
How sustainable this first meeting was shows that then-participant Rose Marie "Sue" Mullerleile hosted her seventh family reunion twenty years later, in her own home state of Washington, USA.
Participants of the 1997 reunion in Schuttertal in front of the Kasperhof in Schuttertal. Credits Petra Enghauser, Lahr