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The Journey to Hoffungsnau

Many of the families that came to the Stony Plain area were of German/Austrian descent. The trip to the area was not an easy one, and the land that they would settle become known to them as Hoffungsnau, or the Hopeful Meadows.
There were 80 German/Austrian families that originally settled in Dunmore, Alberta, which is near Medicine Hat in 1889. Life was extremely hard and due to a drought the land was a lot less fertile and they decided to abandon the settlement.
Sending out scouts, the reports claimed that the area surrounding Edmonton was the most ideal. The train brought them as far as Red Deer the rest of the trip was up to them. Of the 80 families, half went to the Edmonton area where the other half went east to Neudorf, Saskatchewan.
Without the use of Highway 2, the journey to Edmonton was arduous to say the least. Swamps and various other problems plagued the settler's trek north. By the time they reached Edmonton, two more scouts were sent out to find the ideal area to settle.
These reports stated that the area west of Edmonton, then called the "Stoney Plain" was the most fertile. At this point the families split again, some families decided on settling to the north east of Edmonton and the others headed to Stony Plain.
By the spring of 1891, they reached their destination. The Stony Plain was a lot more fertile and when they cleared the land and seeded it the result was a bumper crop. Finally after their long and perilous journey, they had arrived, to their Hoffungsnau…the Hopeful Meadows.
Of those families, most of the names still reside in the area of Stony Plain like Armbruster, Baron, Ducholke, Enders, Litzenburger, Mayer, Miller, Mohr, Schoepp, Schramm, Schuetz, Ulmer, and Wendel.