What’s in a name? Those odd immigrant names really took a beating in the US. Our German great-grand-father’s name was “Boldewahn” But it was spelled:
Baldewan
Boldwahl
Boldean
Boltewahn
My favorites are:
Oldewahn
Bolderwack
and Baltimore
In the “The Project Gutenberg EBook of Die Deutschen Familiennamen,” published in 1903 by Albert Heintze, the name is listed as
(Baldawan): Bollwahn — Bolduan (Boldewan 17. Jh.).
which shows that in the 17th Century, one variation of the name was Boldewan.
To be fair, the name was often spelled in the German church books as Bolduan. The Nagel family think that these spelling variations are due to how cursive writing was taught in Germany before the 1940s. The script was stylized and ornate and is hard for many of us today to read. It was called the “Sütterlin Schreibschrift”. After WW2 the modern “Latin” script was taught that most of us are familiar with here in the USA.
Baltimore, 1884 Oshkosh City Directory)
Friedrich Dragorius’ name was also many variations:
Drigolias (this is the name that Erna Boldewahn said was the correct spelling)
Dragolis,
Dragorus,
Dragores,
Dragoras
and even Tragorius or Gragorius
The Greeks fared even worse. The “Kamoutsis” family name was spelled:
