The Sound of Music

Notes

The Nonnberg Abbey (Benedictine) in Salzburg was founded AD 714; current buildings are from the XVI century.

Maria von Trapp was born Maria Augusta von Kutschera; born January 25, 1905, in Vienna; graduated from college; presented herself at Nonnberg as a candidate for the Novitiate.
Married Baron von Trapp November 26, 1927; founded family choir in early 1930s; fled Austria in 1938, with 10 children; died March 28, 1987, Stowe, Vermont.

Baron Georg Ritter von Trapp; born April 4, 1880, in Zara (Zadar), Croatia (then part of Hungary); father a naval captain; attended naval academy at Fiume (Rijeka); married Agathe Whitehead, 1910; commanded U-boat "U6"; sank French sub "Leon Gambetta"; promoted Lt Cdr in 1918; Agathe died 1924, having borne him 7 children; left Austria 1938. died May 30, 1947, Stowe, Vermont.

Fr Wasner became family chaplain, 1935; fled Austria with them.

The Anschluss occurred March, 1938.

The original plan for this show was to use only songs sung by the Trapp family on their concert tours.  That proved unsuitable, so it was decided to write entirely new songs and use no songs from their tours.

Trapp Children

Children of Georg & Agathe

• Rupert (born in 1911) practiced as a medical doctor until the mid-80´s and died at the age of 80. He had six children.
• Agathe (born in 1913) lives near Baltimore, Maryland and is working for a kindergarten.
• Maria (born in 1914) now lives in Stowe, Vermont, after 27 years of missionary work in New Guinea. She went back Salzburg from time to time, and every time she would not miss the "Sound of the Music Tour"...
• Werner (born in 1915) became a farmer and has six children. He lives in Waitsfield, Vermont.
• Hedwig (born in 1917) worked at the lodge until her death in 1972.
• Johanna (born in 1919) married in 1948 and left America to return to her homeland Austria. She lived in Vienna until her death in 1994 and had six children.
• Martina (born in 1921) stayed with her family until she married in 1949. She died in childbirth in 1951.

Children of Georg & Maria:

• Rosemarie (born in 1929) lives in Stowe, Vermont.
• Eleonore (born in 1931) stopped singing in 1952, got married in 1954 and raised seven children.
• Johannes Georg (born in 1939) graduated from Dartmouth, has a master´s degree in forestry (Yale) and is now president of the Trapp Family Lodge. He has two children. 
• In 1941, the Trapp family bought a large farm in Vermont, in a countryside very similar to the Austrian landscape near Salzburg that they missed. The house they lived in was called "Cor Unum", which means "one heart".

More information (and the source of much of the information above)