Dresden Mission: Connect and Reflect
An unofficial oral history project of the Germany Dresden Mission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. A place to hear the lived experiences of returned missionaries who served in or from the mission from 1989 to 1994, the members of the Church who they served with, converts to the Church during those years, and others with valuable perspective and insights into those historic times.
Dresden Mission: Connect and Reflect
Sister Laura Sumsion Rawlins, January 1990 - July 1991
Laura Sumsion grew up with an interest in Germany and the German language. In 1987 she was a college student living in West Germany on a summer internship. While there she had the opportunity to travel across the border into the GDR and visit East Berlin with her student group. Later that summer she was able to visit other GDR cities with her host family, including Dresden. Two and a half years after that, she returned to the GDR as one of the first sister missionaries to serve in the Dresden and East Berlin wards.
See photos Laura has shared here.
Returned Dresden missionaries, click here for more information about the Church History Library and information about sharing your documents, photos, or oral histories from your service in the Dresden Mission. The Church’s policy on public access to donated personal history items can be read here. To communicate to someone directly about donating your mission materials, contact James Miller: jamiller@churchofjesuschrist.org.
The book, Behind the Iron Curtain: Recollections of Latter-Day Saints in East Germany 1945-1989, published by Elder and Sister Davis can be found here.
If you are a returned missionary from the Germany Dresden Mission and wish to be interviewed for this project, please contact me at Dresden Mission Connect and Reflect Podcast on Facebook.
Update your contact information, find old friends and companions, and much more on the Dresden/Leipzig mission alumni page at Treffpunkt Deutschland Mission Dresden/Leipzig
Returned Dresden missionaries, click here for more information about the Church History Library and information about sharing your documents, photos, or oral histories from your service in the Dresden Mission. The Church’s policy on public access to donated personal history items can be read here. To communicate to someone directly about donating your mission materials, contact James Miller: jamiller@churchofjesuschrist.org.
