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Honestly I think America has a lot of German Catholics. Germany itself is more Protesant leaning I know, like 66-33% but America must be at least equal there.
Lots of ideas about pockets of Catholic Germans but I don't know of any state where the immigration/settlement patterns of same have so heavily influenced the culture of the entire state like it has in Wisconsin.
Prior to WW I there was a large German-speaking Catholic community (of mixed southern German and Swiss heritage) in Louisville centered on Bardstown Road, complete with German language newspapers in addition to churches and businesses. My mother's grandfather came to Louisville around 1850 and opened a beer garden. When that didn't work out, he switched to running a dairy. The farm, complete with the original log cabin my great grandfather built when he first arrived, was still in the family until about 20 years ago. I cried and cried when we had to let it go.
The onset of anti-German sentiment at the start of WW I was the beginning of the end for that community. My grandfather grew up speaking German at home, but had to give up speaking it in public during the war years for safety's sake, and by the time I was born he'd all but forgotten it. (He remembered how to yodel, though!)
German Catholics were likely most prevalent in the big Catholic cities of the Midwest, such Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis, Cincinnati, etc. Coastal cities like NYC, Baltimore, or Boston likely saw a high concentration as well.
From what I've heard, and from people I talked to, the German population of the NYC area was more Lutheran than Catholic. There must have been some Catholics though:
One question is why German settlement tends to be so much heavier in the Midwest (PA excluded). The Chicago MSA has more Germans than the NYC MSA despite being about half the size.
I know part of the reason is the coastal Northeastern cities attracted immigrants who couldn't afford to go further west nor buy any land for farming. Being the first destination for immigrants meant they had a labor glut (wages declined in NYC at the end of the 19th century even though the city got wealthier). So those with means might be encouraged to go elsewhere. Western cities, such as San Francisco, were in the opposite situation. Compared to the Irish, Italians or Eastern European Jews, Germans were on average a bit better off. Also, since more Germans came to farm, and the best farmland opening up in the 19th century was in the Midwest, when the Midwest urbanized, more of those flocking to the cities from rural areas were German. New England had few farming areas for settlers to move to, though oddly the farming areas in western Massachusetts are heavily Polish.
I wonder if the Germans moving to the Chicago area came more from Germany directly or from rural Midwest to Chicago.
Prior to WW I there was a large German-speaking Catholic community (of mixed southern German and Swiss heritage) in Louisville centered on Bardstown Road, complete with German language newspapers in addition to churches and businesses. My mother's grandfather came to Louisville around 1850 and opened a beer garden. When that didn't work out, he switched to running a dairy. The farm, complete with the original log cabin my great grandfather built when he first arrived, was still in the family until about 20 years ago. I cried and cried when we had to let it go.
The onset of anti-German sentiment at the start of WW I was the beginning of the end for that community. My grandfather grew up speaking German at home, but had to give up speaking it in public during the war years for safety's sake, and by the time I was born he'd all but forgotten it. (He remembered how to yodel, though!)
I am also descended from German-Catholics that immigrated to the Louisville area around the year 1850. I only recently found out they were catholic actually. I learned from my grandmother who divorced from that side of my family decades ago. From the stories my family tells their religion was beer and cigars. Lol.
WW1 must have been a hard time for the community. It is so funny but also so sad tracing my ancestors through the censuses with them all saying their parents were born in Germany and then in the 1920 census all of them state their parents were born in America. Trying to hide from discrimination no doubt.
From what I've heard, and from people I talked to, the German population of the NYC area was more Lutheran than Catholic. There must have been some Catholics though:
My fathers family is Catholic and from NYC. They are Czech and German. The Catholicism could come from the Czech side or both sides. We don't speak to each other so not sure.
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