Introduction

When I was a child to small to remember, my father brought us by steam train to California from New York. He claimed he moved us to California because he didn’t like the snow back east but we knew it was because he was a young man who was moving to where there were opportunities. Up to this moment I have never meant another person outside the six in our immediate family name Kiedaisch. Over the years, I would see someone in the newspaper or in the telephone book with the name Kiedaisch and would ask my father could this person be part of our family. My father would say something like this, “Oh, that’s Uncle John’s son”, but nothing more would come of it. Why did nothing more come of it? The truth is, our family is spread all over the world and other than all having a strange name no one can pronounce we don’t have much in common after we get outside our immediate families. We not only don’t keep in touch with each other much, we don’t even tell our children their family history. Most family members I have communicated with have no idea of our family history or even where the family originated. A hundred years ago, our family were poor simple farmers from just outside of Stuttgart, today we are successful in many fields including doctors, lawyers, engineers and leaders in business. There are many in our family who struggled so their children could have a better life and be successful. Putting these people’s names down in a family tree is fine but these people have histories and stories we should try to capture. If we can’t communicate, maybe we can get together here on this website and put our family history down for those who will come after us.

Family Source

If you want to know where our family started all you need to do is go to the German telephone book online and type in our last name. Out of the ninety-six names that appear most of the people live in small villages just outside of Stuttgart. Years ago, there were many with the name Kiedaisch in these small villages but as time passed, wars came and people move to other parts of the world the name began to disappear. There are not too many in these villages today. These villages are located just south of Stuttgart in the Lenningen Valley, some of the villages are:

Dettingen Unter Teck

Owen, Teck

Kirchheim Unter Teck

(Teck is a castle that dominates the valley)

Some of the places the family has moved over the years have been to the United States, Russia, Poland and Australia. Until Stuttgart became an industrial center, opportunities for the poor farmers living in these villages didn’t exist so they moved to other countries. This is why our name appears in different countries and areas around the world.

Brief History

Of the 51 villages around Nurtingen the Kiedaisch name was first documented in Owen in 1579, with the family coming from Kirchheim unter Teck. It appeared as Kuodaisch and appeared again in 1648 by 1808 it was Kiedaisch. In Kirchheim, Kietaisch appeared in 1671 and 1797 and was listed as coming from Owen. It first appeared in Kirchheim as Kuetaisch in 1560 again as Kiedaisch in 1648 and 1808. Other villages where the name first appeared as Kiedaisch were Frickenhausen in 1764 from Owen, Unterlenningen from Owen in 1875, Weilheim /Teck appearing as Kudaisch between 1558-1590 the Kietaisch in 1650 from Kirchheim in 1585 and Zizishausen it appeared as Kuhdaisch in 1687 from Kirchheim. The names appeared on the records when the church book was started, after the thirty year war and if the names were there in 1808. Records would also appear when there was a marriage to a husband coming from another village (source Ken Schach)

By 1850 the name was a very popular name in some cases belonging to half the people in villages such as Owen and Kirchheim unter Teck. The name had also spread as far as Switzerland. Most of the families were poor farmers who over years couldn’t maintain their farms and where forced to migrate to other places around the world.

This is all I have on the distant history of the Kiedaisch family. Please send me any information you would like to include on this page.

Alan Kiedaisch

San Jose, California

Feb.27, 2007