VGI Updates

Ronald Richard Schueler, son of William Conrad Schueler & Anne Schmidt, was born 18 April 1948 in Catherine, Kansas. He played baseball for Hays High School (Hays, Kansas) and Fort Hays State University before signing as a pitcher with the Atlanta Braves in 1967. He was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies in 1973. He played one season with the Minnesota Twins (1977) and then went to the Chicago White Sox where he was relief pitcher for a season and a half before becoming pitching coach. He also was pitching coach with the Oakland Athletics and the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Pastor Johann Conrad Schwabenland, son of Friederich and Maria Christina (Kinzel) Schwabenland, was born 11 November 1871 in Straub, Russia. In December 1891, he immigrated to the United States and settled in Fresno, California. Following seminary study in Chicago, he was ordained on 16 August 1898 in Glen Ullin, North Dakota. He married Dorothea Miller of Portland, Oregon, on 27 May 1903.

Pastor Schwabenland served the following congregations:

Pastor Schwartz was born 10 November 1867 in Pölwe/Livland and died 19 March 1935 in Krassnyi-Kut.

He was ordained on 4 September 1894.

He served as associate pastor in Beideck in 1895. From 1901-1906, he was pastor in Weimar, from 1906-1912 in Hoffental, and beginning in 1914 in Schöntal.

Father Sebastiani served the Kamenka Parish from 1788 to 1792.

Pastor Seib was born 26 December 1872 in Bergdorf (Odessa District) and died 12 January 1940. He was ordained 31 May 1898. He served the congregations in Messer from 1899-1909, in Beideck from 1900-1903, in Warenburg from 1909-1918, in Saratov from 1918-1924, and in Taganrog from 1925-1931. In 1931, he was banned to the Aural Sea. He was free in 1934-1935 in Taganrog. In 1936, he went to Siberia and returned to Taganrog in 1937. In 1938, he went missing in Kazakhstan.

Pastor Seib Johann Caspar Seiffert was from Waltershausen b. Gotha. He served the congregation in Grimm from 1786 until his death in 1804.

The Rev. Johann Heinrich Seydlitz was born 16 August 1889 in Schaffhausen. He served in Paulskaya from 1918-1927. He served in Zürichtal (Crimea) from 14 August 1927 to 1933. He was arrested in 1934. In 1937 he was in Feodosia.

The Rev. Georg Christian Seyer served in Beideck 1767-1770.

The Rev. Woldemar Emil Arthur Sibbul, son of merchant Georg S. Sibbul and Elisabeth Makkar, was born in Dorpat, Estonia, on 25 August 1869 and died 16 February 1947 in Berlin. He was married in Saratov on 10 January 1901 to Olga Kindsvater, daughter of Alexander K. Kindsvater and Natalie Müller. She was born in Saratov on 26 October 1878 and died in Hamburg, West Germany, on 14 December 1972.

The Rev. Michael Somelt was born 31 August 1868 in Palamuse parish (today located in Jõgeva County) in Estonia. He entered the University of Tartu in the fall of 1888 to study medicine, but changed to study theology.

He was ordained on 15 December 1896 and accepted a call to serve the Volga German parishes of Frank and Hussenbach from 1901-1914.

In 1914, he went to Siberia to found a new congregation.  He contracted tuberculosis there and died on 15/16 July 1915.