Diane Smith and Edward Quinter will discuss the recently completed project to digitize and translate letters written by the pastors of the Hopedale Moravian Church in Newfoundland to their Bishop in Bethlehem. The letters date from 1837 to 1878 and are the only known first-person accounts of life in the tiny settlement in its early years. The two-year project encompassed scanning 700 fragile pages and translating their contents, thereby preserving the accounts of German immigrants’ struggles to survive in the wilderness and create a thriving community.
Edward Quinter will discuss the art and skill of translating Old German Script within the context of the early Moravian Church. Diane Smith will describe the Newfoundland settlement and the pastors’ role in guiding the community through those first perilous years.
The work was funded by a Historical & Archival Records Care [HARC] grant, awarded to the Historical Society in 2022. As required by the grant, the digital files have been uploaded to the PA Power Library where they are available for educational and research purposes.
Refreshments will follow the talk, which is free and open to the public. This program was sponsored by Business Partner, McLain’s Auto Service.
