Dr. Richard Trost

Richard Trost Teaching Pastor

Rev. Richard Trost, 1996-1997 (interim)

DR. RICHARD TROST, who lived here as a child but now lives in Des Moines, Iowa, wrote recently to tell us that he will be in Our Fair City next weekend ... In case you're wondering why Dr. Trost, an Evangelical Lutheran Church of America pastor who retied in 1996, is in print, it's because he currently is active in German American affairs to some extent ...He reports that he will be at St. Paul Lutheran Church on Sunday evening, Oct. 29, with a presentation that centers on his translation of a book titled "Jurnjaak Swehn Travels to America," in German and "Letters of a German American Farmer," in his English translation ...He adds that he'll also talk on his own story, "Growing Up German," in an assembly in St. Paul school on Monday ...His trip also includes an appearance at St. John's Church in New Buffalo, Mich., on Sunday morning ... "Some of my grandparents - the Kruegers and the Sahls went there," he explained, "while the Trosts and the Rabes went to St. Paul in Michigan City ...Dr. Trost is descended from Mecklenburg immigrants who settled in LaPorte County and Berrien County, Mich. ...He was born here in 1930 and graduated from high school in 1948 ...He was employed at Continental Bank in Chicago, 1948-1952 ...Then he served in the Armed Forces during the Korean Police Action, 1952-1954 ... Back from the Army, he attended Capital University and graduated from there with honors in 1957 ...He then did graduate work at the University of Chicago in 1957-1958 and graduated from Wartburg Theological Seminary with honors in 1962 ... While there, he taught Greek and Systematic Theology ...

DR. TROST spent 1964 at the University of Erlangen, Germany, summa cum laude, and came back to serve as pastor of St. John Lutheran Church, Charles City, Iowa, 1964-1969; Zion Lutheran Church, Iowa City, 1969-1980, and Central Lutheran Church, Eugene, Ore., 1980-1987 ...He then became a student starting in June, 1986, at the Delitzsch Institute in Munster, Germany, and ending in September ...He came home again then to become pastor of Faith Lutheran Church, Des Moines, Iowa, 1987-1996, when he retired ...Dr. Trost was growing up here when his family read him a book about immigrants who came from Mecklenburg, Germany, to this area decades earlier ...The stories written in German - of young farmers who brought their traditions and faith to the new land stuck with Dr. Trost ...
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When Dr. Trost decided to translate the book, he worked on the manuscript for 18 years ....Once it was done, he had no idea that the University of Iowa Press would want to publish his version, and he was stunned when the Culture Society of Mecklenburg, Inc., awarded him the Gilloff Prize for his translation of "Jurnjakob Swehn Travels to America," and invited him to come to Mecklenburg to accept the honor ...An article in the Lutheran magazine stated that only 1,000 copies were published in 1917 but that today more than one million copied are in circulation.

Richard Trost, Lutheran Pastor