[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] sugar beet connections

[Dave Obee]

It should be noted, in al of this,  the Volhynia is a large area. Sugar
beets may have been grown in one part of it, but that doesn't mean that all
of Volhynia was covered with them.

I have asked many former residents about the crops that were grown in the
Pulin area, near Zhitomir. Hops (for making beer) are mentioned all of the
time. Sugar beets have never been mentioned.

That doesn't mean I don't think they could have been grown somewhere else,
though!

Dave Obee

----- Original Message -----
From: "Guenther Boehm" <GHBoehm at ish.de>
Cc: <ger-poland-volhynia at eclipse.sggee.org>
Sent: Friday, October 22, 2004 1:18 AM
Subject: Re: [Ger-Poland-Volhynia] sugar beet connections


> Royal Natzke schrieb:
>
> >My question: did the Germans from Russia/Volhynia raise sugar beets in
the old
> >country, or did they just pick that up as entrance level employment when
they
> >came here? I don't recall if we saw sugar beet fields when we were in
western
> >Volhynia in '01. We did see them in western Pomerania in Kreis
Greifenberg
> >(Trieglaf - where my people came from).
> >
>
> Hello Royal,
> the sugar beet is an old European economically useful and garden plant
> and was first mentioned in the Greek literature by 420 B.C. It was
> introduced as a substitute of sugar cane during the anti-napoleonic
> continetal embargo led by Great Britain. In advance, the German
> scientist Andreas MARGGRAF showed in 1747, that the white crystals made
> of sugar beet syrup, are of the same nature like those of suger cane. In
> 1801, the first European sugar factory was built in Cunern, Lower
> Silesia (Prussia). Napoleon tried the beet sugar in 1811 and immediately
> ordered to grow sugar beets on 11,000 hectares (110 square kilometers).
> Within a few years, sugar factories were built in northeastern France,
> Germany, Austria, Russia and Denmark. In Russia, the production of beet
> sugar was introduced by D.W. KANSHIN and promoted by Count BOBRINSKI, a
> son of empress Catharina II and her lover Grigorij ORLOV, in early 19th
> century. In Russia, sugar cane was not grown before and the predecessor
> of beet sugar was good old honey. So it is quite sure that the Germans
> in Volhynia knew and grew sugar beet because they knew and loved sugar
> much more than their Russian or Ukrainian neighbours.
>
> Guenther
> of Hilden, Germany
>
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