Loehe selected Pastor August Craemer, a graduate of Erlangen University who was, in 1844, teaching German at Oxford, England, to train to be the mission colony’s pastor and leader. Fifteen people, mostly farmers from the area around Neuendettelsau (eight were from Rosstal) volunteered to form the colony. The German word “Franken” represents the Province of Franconia in the Kingdom of Bavaria, and the German word “Muth” means courage, thus the city name Frankenmuth means “courage of the Franconians”. He approved the location along the Cass River in Michigan, naming it “Frankenmuth”. Loehe wrote the pastor of a Swabian settlement in Michigan to recommend a site for his mission colony. His idea, formulated in 1844, was an experiment to send a mission congregation with a dual purpose: to give spiritual comfort to the German pioneers in the Midwest, specifically the Saginaw Valley, and to show the native Indians in the area “Wie gut und schön es ist bei Jesu zu sein” (How wonderful it is to live with Jesus). He organized a mission society, still operating today, and began training teachers and pastors for work in the United States. Loehe was a popular and influential preacher in his time because of his strict adherence to church doctrines at a time when rationalism was more commonly preached. This appeal struck the heart of Wilhelm Loehe, pastor of the country church in Neuendettelsau, Mittelfranken, Kingdom of Bavaria.
In 1840, he wrote an appeal to all the Lutherans in Germany for help, telling them of the hardships of the German pioneers in his region and of their lack of pastors, churches, and schools. The idea of founding Frankenmuth was first fostered due to a German missionary named Frederick Wyneken working in the states of Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan.
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