[PRCo] Re: Trolleys

[Donald Galt]

On 10 Mar 2005 at 17:01, Fred Schneider wrote:

> Isn't that a great little vest pocket trolley system, Harold?
> 
> When I first saw the line, it was close to the border but I thought entirely in
> Germany.  

The first stage was entirely in Germany but the plan was always to extend it 
across the border into Sarreguemines.

> That area was part of Germany, then part of France, then again after
> some point in the 1950s it reverted to Germany.  It could be anyone's guess what
> is the most common language.  I would imagine that most people are at least
> bilingual and the hotel people were certainly capable of at least three
> tongues.  

Lorraine (Ger. Lothringen, in origin the part of Charlemagne's empire awarded 
to his son Lothar) became French in the conquests of Louis XIV. It fell to 
Germany in 1871 and remained German until after WW1 - along with Alsace, which 
is why the two provinces tend to be linked in our memories. And was so again 
from 1940 to 1945.

The linguistic frontier between French and German (like that between French and 
Dutch) has long tended to press hard to the disadvantage of French, though that 
has been countered by France's long tradition of centralised education. That 
pressure, coupled with the long period of German government 1871-1918 and the 
shorter one 1940-45 aided the survival of German dialects as the local 
languages in Alsace and parts of Lorraine no matter how French the people 
considered themselves nor how fluent in French they were.

Even though nowadays you won't see Sarreguemines officially called Saargmünden, 
you can still hear that name on the street.

Don