Der Wanderer of St.Paul

An immigrant newspaper provides unique documentation of an ethnic community in formation. Der Wanderer performed this role for Minnesota's growing German-Catholic population in the latter half of the nineteenth century. This look at the paper's first decade (1867-1877) analyzes its effort to promote and preserve the Roman Catholic faith and German ethnic consciousness. Concurrently, its news reporting, political involvement, and adoption of the ways of the American press manifested an apparently contradictory Americanizing tendency. This tension between competing goals reflected a process taking place within the community itself.