FILM DIGITISATION APPEAL

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COMMEMORATING LUTHER

This year is the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. Discover how Lutherans have commemorated significant milestones since Luther nailed his '95 Theses' to the church door at Wittenberg.

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Become our friend!

Interested in history? Enjoy a good story? Want to learn more? Join our enthusiastic group of supporters by becoming a Friend of Lutheran Archives (FoLA). We encourage the collection and preservation of archival material and to promote the work of the Lutheran Archives.

MORE ABOUT FoLA

LCA Ministry Support

Lutheran Archives is a department of the Executive Office of the Church, also known as Ministry Support. It is one of five departments exercising the 'enabling' functions outlined in our Lutheran Church of Australia (LCA) Strategic Direction 2015–2018. Working with us are:

Together we provide the support services for LCA and Lutheran Church of New Zealand (LCNZ) agencies and congregations that enable them to focus on their mission and ministry activities (the 'go' and 'grow' priorities in our LCA Strategic Direction).

Please support us

This link takes you to our LCA online donation site, where you can pay securely via credit card.

Lutheran Archives

About us

Lutheran Archives holds a harvest of stories that show God’s love coming to life – the stories of the congregations, departments and the people of the church. Lutheran Archives gathers and preserves these stories from all over Australia and the Pacific – wherever the church is involved. We share the stories of the LCA/NZ across the church and in the wider public. We enable others to encounter these stories through research, so they can share their stories and experiences of love coming to life.

A wide variety of people access these records: congregations, family historians, academic researchers, creative artists and filmmakers. These records help people to write congregation histories, fill gaps in family trees, understand our cultural diversity, further Aboriginal language research, and restore identity. The power of these records cannot be overestimated.

By depositing records at Lutheran Archives, the stories of your ministries can be encountered by members of the church and public, told and disseminated to a myriad of audiences. We are able to turn your records deposited at Lutheran Archives into new ministries by providing and enabling access to them.

How we serve

As a ministry support department, Lutheran Archives is here to support you in your ministries. We can assist you with:

advice on managing your records
caring for your permanent records that you no longer regularly access.

Managing your records appropriately enables you to focus on carrying out your current ministries – beginning with records in your possession and continuing into the future when they are deposited at Lutheran Archives.

Lutheran Archives identifies records to be deposited. We make those records accessible through arrangement and description, indexing, translation and digitisation, and we provide contextual understanding for researchers to interpret those records.

Through presentations, exhibitions, publications, seminars and events, we disseminate the harvest of stories throughout the Lutheran community and beyond. Join Friends of Lutheran Archives to feast on these stories.

Partner with us

You and your ministries are the foundation of our ministry.

1. Ensure you create records within your congregation, mission, auxiliary
or department, and of your personal experiences in the church.

2. Manage those records appropriately while you are using them.

3. Deposit those records (minutes, correspondence, artefacts, films, photographs) when they are no longer being regularly used.

The fact that people in the past took the trouble to preserve their story means that we are blessed today with their harvest. Take the time today to preserve this generation’s fruit, so that there will be a harvest of stories for our children and grandchildren.

Events

29 APRIL – FoLA talk: In search of Anna

Speaker: Dr Valerie Volk

Monday 29 April at 7.30pm

Bethlehem House, Sudholz Pl, Adelaide

Dr Valerie Volk will talk about her latest novel - In search of Anna.

She is the one I really want; that wandering spirit, the woman who gave birth to my grandfather and could not let him go, even when he had separated himself from her, from the land of his birth, and from all that he had known.

It’s a long way from a small southern German village to a farm in New South Wales, but in 1889 Anna Werner sets off alone on a foolish mission, to search for her son who has disappeared in Australia. From Hamburg to the exuberance of the Marvellous Melbourne of the 1800s and the immigrant life of the Riverina German farming community of Jindera, Anna discovers as much about herself as she does about the thriving country she encounters.

In Search of Anna is fiction, based on the true story of one woman’s long and perilous journey from the small German village of Lewin, to the farms of Jindera in Australia. It has been extensively researched and is full of vivid detail about life in Germany and Australia during the 1800s and is a sensitive exploration of the relationship between mothers and sons, and tells of a woman’s search for herself.

11 MAY – German Heritage Research Group seminar: Cradle of the community - Childhood in SA German families

HISTORY FESTIVAL EVENT

German Heritage Research Group (GHRG) seminar

Theme: Cradle of the community - Childhood in SA German families

Saturday 11 May from 9.30am to 4.30pm

Ira Raymond Room, Barr Smith Library, University of Adelaide, North Terrace, Adelaide

Registration fee $45 includes lunch and refreshments

Bookings essential by 3 May - contact Lutheran Archives for a registration form and further details: 08 8340 4009 or lutheran.archives@lca.org.au

This seminar, the tenth in a series on the German presence in SA, documents the child's place in family and community: birth, baptism and naming, celebrations and tragedies, duties, pastimes, and the transition to adulthood. Short papers drawing on diaries, memoirs and family records present migration, settlement and daily life in city and country from the child’s perspective, as well as showing how families and communities coped with the death of an infant or parent. The culture of childhood is presented in talks, displays and films of picnics, toys and leisure activities, as well as in the image of childhood in Colin Thiele’s novels.

15 MAY – Finding German forebears in present-day Poland workshop

HISTORY FESTIVAL EVENT

Workshop: Finding German forebears in present-day Poland workshop

Speaker: Janette Lange

Wednesday 15 May from 1.30pm to 4.30pm

Lutheran Archives, 27 Fourth St, Bowden SA

Want to research your German family history in present day Poland? Planning a trip to your ancestors’ homelands in the former Pomerania, Posen, Brandenburg or Silesia? Come and hear the latest information about researching and travelling in the former Prussian provinces.

Workshop $30 (includes Finding Forebears in Poland guide and refreshments)

Bookings essential: Lutheran Archives 08 8340 4009 lutheran.archives@lca.org.au

22 MAY – Learn to read you German family records workshop

HISTORY FESTIVAL EVENT

Workshop: Learn to read your German family records (reading German cursive)

Speaker: Lois Zweck

Wednesday 22 May from 1.30pm to 4.30pm

Lutheran Archives, 27 Fourth St, Bowden SA

Using examples from Australian Lutheran church records (baptisms, marriages and deaths), participants will be guided through the alphabet, core vocabulary and formats of church registers to acquire a basic familiarity with the old German handwriting (Kurrentschrift) and techniques for deciphering common terms. A basic knowledge of German is necessary.

Workshop $30 (includes German handwriting and family records guide)

Bookings essential - contact Lutheran Archives 8340 4009 or lutheran.archives@lca.org.au to book.

26 MAY – FoLA talk (Sunday 2.00 pm): German cabinetmakers and their Australian heritage

Speaker: Dr Jim Bertouch

Sunday 26 May at 2.00pm

Bethlehem House, Sudholz Pl, Adelaide

Jim Bertouch lives in Sydney and is president of the Australiana Society and a consultant rheumatologist.

He became interested in German furniture and Germanic cabinetmakers when he lived in Adelaide in the early 1980s. He and his wife had exclusively collected Australian colonial furniture and decorative arts for their home, but had never seen pieces made in the Germanic style from Australian native timbers, until they moved to South Australia.

They met many of the local dealers and collectors and managed to acquire a small number for their collection. Their interest in these items relates to the style and construction methods, the timbers utilised, the traditional finishes and the makers and their history. They have become aware of pieces made by German-born cabinetmakers from other Australian states as well.

Jim’s presentation will cover all of these areas and will be illustrated with many examples and photos including objects made by some well known Barossa Valley makers e.g. Launer, Gluepot Graetz and the Schaedel family. In his view there needs to be a museum or similar space in South Australia to house a dedicated collection of Germanic furniture and decorative arts, to acknowledge their unique contribution and heritage.

29 MAY – Guided 'behind the scenes' tour of Lutheran Archives

HISTORY FESTIVAL EVENT

Tour: Guided behind the scenes tour of Lutheran Archives

Guides: Archivists at Lutheran Archives

Wednesday 29 May from 10.00 am to 12 noon

Lutheran Archives, 27 Fourth St, Bowden SA

Join us on a behind the scenes tour and discover the hidden workings and treasures of our archives. See how records are stored and preserved, and some of the unique items not on display. Hear why we do what we do and the impact archives have on a community.

Cost $10.

Bookings essential - contact Lutheran Archives at 08 8340 4009 or lutheran.archives@lca.org.au to book.

Congregation records – guidelines

This document provides information on what records congregations should keep and how to protect them. Click here to download.

'Stepping Stones'

Read the stories from one of The Lutheran's most popular columns.

Services

RESEARCH OPPORTUNITIES

Our records cover significant themes in the history of Australia, including:

CHURCH HISTORY congregations, church ministries, departments and organisations
FAMILY HISTORY through parish registers of baptisms, confirmations, marriages and burials
ABORIGINAL languages, culture and history in comprehensive and detailed mission records
REFUGEE AND MIGRATION HISTORY 19^th century and post-WWII
SETTLEMENT AND LOCAL HISTORY through congregation records and registers which document the settlement of Lutherans in newly opened rural areas
LUTHERAN SCHOOLING in history of education
GERMAN-AUSTRALIAN language, traditions, media and cultural life – ‘Deutschtum’.

You can carry out research in person at our archives, or contact our staff by phone or email with your research inquiries.

GENEALOGY AND FAMILY HISTORY RESEARCH

The parish registers contain information on births, baptisms, confirmations, marriages, deaths and burials of people who were associated with the Lutheran Church. These are extremely valuable for family history research. To assist researchers a Church Records Computer Database Index has been prepared. A printout of the surname provides the researcher with an index to entries with that surname in the parish registers. This enables the researcher to quickly locate those records which may be useful. There is an additional charge for this service.

GERMAN LANGUAGE AND TRANSLATION

BOOK SALES

PHOTO REPRODUCTIONS

PHOTOCOPYING

TOURS

FEES

Scope of collection

RECORDS FROM LUTHERAN SYNODS

Kavel-Fritzsche Synod (1838–1846)
Langmeil-Light Pass Synod (1846–1874)
Bethany-Lobethal Synod (1846–1863)
Victoria Synod (1856–1921)
Tanunda-Light Pass Synod (1860–1874)
Evangelical Lutheran Synod in Australia (ELSA) (1863–1944)
Immanuel Synod (1874–1921)
General Synod (1876–1921)
Immanuel Synod a.a.G. (1884–1921)
Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Queensland (ELSQ) (1885–1921)
United German & Scandinavian Lutheran Synod of Qld (1885–1921)
ELSA a.a.G (1904–1926)
United Evangelical Lutheran Church in Australia (UELCA) (1921–1966)
Evangelical Lutheran Church of Australia (ELCA) (1944–1966)
Lutheran Church of Australia (LCA) (1966–)

TYPES OF RECORDS

Official histories of the Lutheran churches in Australia
Church departmental records
Church convention reports
Church almanacs and yearbooks
Church statistical records
Church periodicals (Australian, US, German etc)
Congregation histories and records
Parish registers
Parish papers
Biographical records of pastors and Lutheran teachers
Family history books
Mission magazines
Some shipping lists (SA, 1837–1870)
Special collections (Bibles, hymnbooks, catechisms, sermon books, devotion books, theology)
Photographs (churches, schools, missions, pastors, teachers)
Artefacts
Maps and atlases

Where to find us

Lutheran Archives
27 Fourth Street, Bowden SA 5007

TRAM

RAIL

BUS

CAR

TRAM

In King William Street or North Terrace, catch the tram to the Entertainment Centre at Hindmarsh. Cross Port Road (walking away from the Entertainment Centre) and walk south to Gibson Street and then north-east to Fourth Street. Note: this is a free service.

RAIL

BUS

CAR

Usual hours of business

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday 9.30 am – 4.30 pm
Closed Wednesdays, weekends and public holidays

Closures: 21-25 October 2019; 1 December 2019 - 3 January 2020; closed annually throughout December

NOTE: Fourth Street is closed for building works. Enter car park from Drayton Street and continue around to Fourth Street side. Pedestrian access also available from Gibson Street.