We ran across this old picture from our photo morgue at the museum and figured it was worth a blog post.

There is evidence in the photograph above that it was taken inside the home of Vernon Meyr, the long-time president of the Perry County Lutheran Historical Society.  Gerard Fiehler has a piece of Vernon’s piano at his house and it is also labeled as being from a Logonda piano, just as we see in this picture.  The photo on top of the piano is probably that of Hattie Meyr, Vernon’s mother.

One of the most convincing proofs that this is Vernon’s house comes from the item in the lower right portion of the photograph.

This is an artifact that we have at the Lutheran Heritage Center & Museum which came from Vernon Meyr.  Gerard managed to locate it, and it is now a part of our Christmas exhibit for this season.

It is a paper Christmas tree that is very likely to be over a century old.  It is a beautiful piece.  For some reason, it no longer has the angel topper on it that you see in the black and white photo.

There is also evidence in this photo of a Christmas decorating tradition that is no longer commonly found today.  Most people nowadays will put a tree skirt around the bottom of their Christmas tree.  In this photo you see a fence around the bottom of the tree.

This was commonly done as part of an old German Christmas tradition.  We have several of these fence enclosures in the museum’s Christmas exhibit this year.

This is an example of an old wooden fence which is at the bottom of our “Down on the Farm” tree in our museum lobby.

This is an antique metal fence which is found below our Feather Tree.  As you can see here, it was common to find animal figurines inside such a fence.  Animal figures can also be seen in the Vernon Meyr photo.

I find it fascinating to learn about old German traditions, and there are plenty of such traditions surrounding the Christmas season.