Dwayne Janke's Korner
Dwayne Janke was born in Medicine Hat in 1959, and was raised there. Dwayne is the grandson of four Bessarabian-German grandparents—the Jankes, the Sandaus, the Stickels and the Seitzs—who immigrated to Canada before and after the turn of the 20th Century.
Dwayne’s first exposure to his family history was in a Grade 9 Western Canadian history class. The very first class assignment was for each student to draw up a family tree. Talking to his grandparents and looking through family Bibles, Dwayne discovered that his ancestors were all Germans who lived in the south Russian province of Bessarabia. He still has that small family tree pencil drawn on a piece of loose-leaf binder paper.
When Dwayne graduated from Medicine Hat High School in 1977, he went to Lethbridge to study journalism before working as a newspaper reporter at the Lethbridge Herald for eight years. It was during this time that he did extensive research into his family history, spending many hours gathering information from microfilmed church records both in Lethbridge and in Salt Lake City. He has visited the ancestral villages of his Stickel forefathers in the Black Forest region of Germany several times. He has traced this line of his family tree back to before the mid-1500s. Quite a few of his other family lines are also documented to the 1600s. All of his ancestors settled in Prussia and Poland between their time in Germany and Bessarabia.
In recent years, Dwayne has focused on researching and understanding not just genealogy but the social, political, cultural and religious history of his ancestors, right back to their origins in Germany. He has helped edit translations of Bessarabian materials from German to English, including village histories and cultural information. Dwayne enjoys helping others get started in researching their Bessarabian-German or Germans from Russia ancestry.
Dwayne currently lives in Calgary, with his wife Margaret and two sons.
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We must extend a great thanks to Dwayne for his sharing of his works he has devoted much energy and time in developing the following for your edification and use.
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Grain
Production in the Early Bessarabian Mother Colonies
[in PDF]
“You Land, of My Forefather’s Choice – History of the Bessarabian Germans”
Summary of My Genealogy
Picture Album
Interview with My Grandfather, Jacob Janke