Das A B C Buch

Published by Spring Prairie Printing, Spring Prairie Hutterite Colony, 1994, softcover, 82 pages

The ABC book is one of many books that the Hutterites publish each year. It shows the letters of the old German script. This book is meant to be used by children and adults alike, and is useful for genealogists, family historians, and researchers who work with old German text and script.

The introductory part briefly describes the particularities of the German alphabet. The key part of the book shows not only the capital and lower case letters but enhances them by drawings and small examples thereby making it easier for children.

The third and last segment is pure reading material in alphabetical sequence. For example, a short passage titled Fuchs is followed by Garten, Hand, etc. Finally, there are also some short but well known prayers. Examples of the prayers are:

Müde bin ich geh' zur Ruh'
schließe beide Augen zu

Komm Herr Jesu sei unser Gast
und segne was du uns bescheret hast

Review by Mary Lynn Axtman, Fargo, North Dakota

"Das ABC Buch" is printed by a local Hutterite Colony. This book is used in their schools to teach their children the German script letters, sounds and simple words.

It begins with simple German words and pictures that associate with the phonetic sound of each print letter. There is then an alphabet section of the script letters as they are printed and in cursive writing in upper and lower case along with simple sentances for each letter. Next is a section of German paragraphs and prayers for reading practice.

These are a help for any of us who might be trying to decifer records written in old German script.

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