Voluntary local chronicles: Prices for Vaethen and more in Salzwedel!

Voluntary local chronicles: Prices for Vaethen and more in Salzwedel!

On Sunday afternoon, a special highlight was celebrated as part of the 21st Altmärkisches Heimatfest on the town hall tower square in Salzwedel: the award ceremony of the Dr. Fritz Milkowski Foundation. Since 1988, this foundation has been dedicated to honoring exemplary local chronicles and contributions to village history in the Stendal district and thus contributes to promoting voluntary commitment to local research. How landkreis-stendal.de reported, four outstanding works were recognized on this day. The chairman of the foundation advisory board, André Benthien, presented the prizes and praised the high quality of the work submitted.

A total of eleven contributions were submitted this summer, presenting the diversity and depth of local research. The four best works were awarded as follows:

• Erster Preis: Albrecht Will für „Handel und Gewerbe in Vaethen – Tangerhütte“. Diese Chronik besticht durch ihre klare Gliederung und den wissenschaftlichen Anspruch.
• Zweiter Preis: Gottfried Bauch für „Die Schönhauser Flurnamen“, eine umfangreiche Forschung über die Flurnamen der Region.
• Dritter Preis: Sieglinde Lühe für „Erinnerungen an Chausseehaus-Hassel“; eine detailreiche Chronik über die Geschichte der kleinen Siedlung.
• Dritter Preis: Reinhold Lau für den ersten Band seiner „Bismarker Geschichte(n)“, welcher sich mit der städtischen Identität auseinandersetzt.

Commitment to local history

The Milkowski Foundation is not only dedicated to the award, but also actively promotes the research, documentation and sharing of regional history. This important work is also reflected in the new statutes, which provide for some changes to improve the foundation, including adjusting the conditions for competition and promoting projects that deal with the history of the original Stendal district. They want the quality of the local chronicles submitted to remain high in the future and are therefore planning to no longer hold the competition annually, but rather every two years in order to solve financial bottlenecks, as can be seen from the planned changes sessionsdienst.landkreis-stendal.de emerges.

The volunteer local researchers who make this important contribution to cultural history work under the umbrella of the State Homeland Association of Saxony-Anhalt e.V.. Its goal is to preserve knowledge about local and regional heritage and to attract interested young researchers. Work is underway to improve the working conditions of local researchers and to bring their individual interests together in campaigns and projects.

In a special environment characterized by natural and cultural sciences, research deals with topics such as botany, genealogy and folklore. The results are often published in the form of local chronicles and local magazines, making the knowledge gained accessible to the entire community.

Such events and initiatives are of great value because they keep historical memory alive and ensure that local history reaches future generations. The Dr. Fritz Milkowski Foundation is thus setting an important example for valuable local research, which would not be possible without the commitment of the many volunteers.