There are coincidences that make you think.
On August 24th Ilsa Oberbauer received another letter from Richard Maurer in the USA.
He died on that very day.
Prescott / Karlsfeld - Richard Maurer was born in 1935 to Danube Swabian parents in Neuwerbass, Batschka / Yugoslavia.
In May 1945, his family was interned in the Jarek extermination camp and subjected to starvation and atrocities, as stated in the biography he wrote.
In 1950 they managed to escape from Yugoslavia and they found a new home in Karlsfeld, first on Krenmoosstraße with the Schmidt family, and later on Hochstraße with the Loibl family.
He did an apprenticeship as a carpenter in Dachau and went to America with his parents in 1955 at the age of 20.
His first wife, Käthe, died, and with her he had two daughters, Marlene and Monika.
He left friends in Karlsfeld who fondly remembered him from their youth or who only met him later.
You draw a picture of an extraordinary person.
Just imagine: A young man emigrated from Karlsfeld to America in 1955, and when he died in Arizona in 2021, stories were told about him in Bavaria as if he had never been away.
Richard Maurer was there at the last settler festival
“He was there at the last Settlers Festival in 2018.
But he didn’t get in the carriage during the parade, he didn’t want any extras, ”says Ilsa Oberbauer.
And: "He was a quaint guy, very grumpy" (for High German: cozy, cozy, very cozy).
"He was always in a good mood, we had a lot of fun together," says Marianne Ritthaler from the director of the Heimatmuseum.
It is said that he pursued his goals vigorously in America.
In the 42 years of his career, he became an excellent carpenter working for the best houses in New York.
He later lived in Prescott, Arizona.
He was a hobby painter, drew with the finest brushstrokes, was a keen fisherman and, in his retirement, volunteered at the local museum of local history, the Sharlot Mabridth Hall.
Richard Maurer was connected to Karlsfeld over the years - and vice versa.
There were phone calls, letters, and visits back and forth.
"He was very affectionate, called every three weeks," says Ilsa Oberbauer, curator of the local history museum, of which he was a member.
When the museum opened in 2003 in the house of the Freis family from 1802, there was a first special exhibition with pictures by Maurer.
And since then he sent and he sent.
"He painted everything: still life, jubilant frogs, caricatures, blossoms, the desert, the beloved cactus in front of his villa," says Oberbauer.
The museum of local history houses entire drawers of it.
There will be a special exhibition in January 2022.
But he also packed a nest of a hummingbird or tree roots and sent it to Karlsfeld.
He always kept in touch
Johanna Blümel also received regular mail from Maurer and also has many pictures of him. They hang framed in their apartment. But he also sent stones, and finally black tomato seeds: "These were splendid specimens."
She and her sister Magdalena "Leni" Wenisch were born Freis and come from the farm where "Richard" fetched the milk every day. In 1975, Blümel and her husband visited Maurer in New York. But at some point there was less correspondence. When Richard Maurer found out about the death of her husband Karl ten years ago, he got in touch with her again. “It was such a good friendship,” says Johanna Blümel. Two years ago, after going to a concert, he wrote to her: “The Strauss Waltz, they give me a swing, including Bavarian brass music. I learned to dance at the Alten Wirt from Leni. "She doesn't remember that, though:" He always says that. But I was five years older than him. ”That must have been a different dance teacher.
A year ago Richard Maurer had a leg injury and had to go to a nursing home.
In the last letter to “Hannerl” he wrote: “I'm still lively.
I won't give up. ”A few weeks later, Richard Maurer died of a heart attack.
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