Federal Writers' Project – Life Histories/2020/Spring/Section24/Fritz Schmidt

Overview
Fritz Schmidt was a German-American immigrant and vineyard owner in Valhalla, North Carolina. He originally moved to the United States with his wife and son due to financial hardship caused by the end of World War I.

Biography
Schmidt was born in Wurzburg, Germany in 1884. His father, also named Fritz Schmidt, was a successful merchant. He married his wife, Frieda Schmidt, and they had one son, Friedrich Schmidt, in 1914. Shortly after, Schmidt left his family to fight in World War I. After the war, the family had little money and decided to move to the United States to find work. Schmidt and his family arrived in Valhalla, North Carolina in 1924. Schmidt had heard from friends of the fertile soil in the region and worked under vineyard owner Dr. Johannes von Hoff in order to learn the trade. After a few years, Schmidt had saved enough money to buy a five-acre property for growing grapes. The vineyard was established, but soon after a fire started in Schmidt’s cottage and the house had to be rebuilt.

Post-War Prejudice
After arriving in the United States, Schmidt and his family did not know any English. Children would pick on his son, forcing him to speak German in order to shame him. This was part of an attitude of anti-German sentiment after the first World War. Before the war, the United States established internment camps to house prisoners of war. German men and women in cruise liners or cargo ships docked at American ports were often taken to work in these camps, establishing prejudice towards the entire group. Following the war, German culture was often oppressed by the surrounding American social institutions, as it was feared that anyone who expressed German cultural practices was doing so in rebellion of American interests. The Metropolitan Opera House would not show Germanic operas and fired German employees from its staff. German children were not allowed to speak German in schools and were scolded by teachers and peers if they were caught, as witnessed in the case of Schmidt’s son until he learned to speak English. There were also instances in which German citizens could not get money to their relatives in their home country because of restrictions by the U.S. government, as this money would be spent in Germany. Fears of German culture spread through the United States commonly through the image of the “Hun”, painting German-Americans as harboring barbarian, savage belief systems and speaking a foreign language. President Woodrow Wilson spread the sentiment that any group of people who hyphenated another country or culture to the word “American” was an enemy worthy of suspicion. In 1914, a German-American man was kidnapped and forced down the main street of Collinsville, Illinois naked with a noose around his neck. He was prodded onto broken glass to cut his feet and made to confess love for America. He was then hanged. Such a climate persuaded many Germans to give up their traditions quickly and adopt English as their sole language. Though many white Americans have some form of German ancestry, few are likely to still carry German cultural practices because of this post-war erasure.

Vineyards During Prohibition
When Prohibition was established by the United States Congress in 1919, vineyard owners had to find new ways to collect income from grapes. Some were able to stay in business by obtaining permission from the government to produce wine for medicinal or religious purposes. Grapes could also be sold directly, as grapes could be fermented by private households as a process to preserve the fruits. This loophole caused a surge in grape sales into the mid-1920s. The market later crashed, putting pressure on legislators to repeal the Prohibition Act, eventually succeeding in 1933. Most vineyards were not able to survive the decade, leading to many vineyards going out of business.