Kolb-Kulp-Culp Family Reunion

Kulp Reunion Newsletter 2025-11b – “The Immigrants, Part 4 of 4” 16 November 2025

Hi KKC Extended Family,

This is the last of the four-part section, “The Immigrants” written by Avery Kolb, appeared in Mary Francis Beasley’s Culp and Related Families published in 1986. The sections she used describing the background of the Kolb family were taken from first revised draft 1978 of Avery E. Kolb ‘s book: Kolb Families and Relatives in the South – Johannes Kolb and Sons Progenitors of Southern Families.

I hope you find this interesting.

Wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving!

Jack Oberholtzer
Secretary, Kolb, Kulp, Culp Family Association

P.S. Be sure to follow the website (http://kolb-kulp-culp.org) and on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/Kolb-Kulp-Culp-Family-Reunion-111440337655136 )


The Immigrants (Part 4 of 4)

It was not long, however, before the immigrant’s poverty and distress was changed into prosperity and plenty. This was especially true of the Mennonites who came when land was cheap and they were able to buy in large quantities. Later, property in the neighborhood of Philadelphia and adjacent counties became more difficult to acquire and settlers were compelled to move further out upon the frontier – beyond the Blue Mountains to the north, across the Susquehanna to the west, many finding their way into the green valleys of Virginia.

While some were handicraftsmen, by far the greater number were “bauern”, farmers. Plunging into an unbroken wilderness, often fifty or sixty miles from the nearest habitation, and with skills and industry inherited from thirty generations of land cultivators, these German settlers soon changed the forest into thriving, well-kept farms. The back woods had no terrors for them. They were not afraid of work. Trees fell to the blows of their axes. In the fertile valleys, on the green hillsides, and in the depths of the forest, wherever a spring burst from the earth, their homes appeared.

When sturdy sons and daughters came along and were married, many of them to Welch, Scotch and Irish neighbors, they too struck out for lands of their own. Turning south, they followed the Indian trails into western Maryland and down the Shanandoah Valley into Virginia and the Carolinas, into Kentucky and Tennessee. Climbing the Appalachian Mountains, they debouched into the wild regions beyond. Crossing the Creek Nation into the Mississippi Territory, they spread ever further into what was to become Arkansas and Texas. Today they are to be found in all parts of the nation – some still as farmers, some tradesmen, others as business entrepreneurs, many as professional men. Wherever the Germans went with their plows and ponderous bibles, their fervent but unobtrusive piety went with them and in their quiet way they brought credit on the country wherever they located themselves.

Plain of dress and demeanor, plain of speech, and generally free from evil habits, they practiced doctrines and habits of the primitive church, Mennonite or Evangelical Baptist like Quaker…

“Holding as in his Master’s sight,
Act and thought to the inner light
The round of his simple duties walked
And strove to live what the others talked.” 1

1 – Kolb Families and Relatives in the South – Johannes Kolb and Sons Progenitors of Southern Families. Author Avery E. Kolb

This is the end of the series.