The name Lucka actually goes back to the early 16th century when part of the Lucca family escaped religious prosecution in Lucca, Italy, since they where Huguenots. Than it was a new protestant religion founded by John Calvin which flourished in France, they escaped to France to avoid prosecution in Italy.

John Calvin: No theologian's influence on Western Christian thought and culture is greater than that of John Calvin, one of the fathers of the Reformed branch of Protestant Christianity. Born to a Roman Catholic family of means, Calvin was schooled in Latin, Hebrew, Greek, philosophy, and law in Paris, Orleans and Bourges. Around 1533 he had what he later described as "conversion" and by 1534 religion had become foremost in his writing and work. He sympathized with the Protestant sentiments sweeping Europe since Martin Luther's appearance on the scene. Unlike Luther, who desired a return to primitive simplicity, Calvin accepted the newborn capitalism and encouraged trade and production, at the same time opposing the abuses of exploitation and self-indulgence.

Life in Paris didn’t last very long and they escaped the famous Staint Barthelemy massacre on August 24 1572, where thousands of Huguenots where slaughtered to preserve the Catholic religion.

They escaped with nothing but their lives and where welcomed by the King of Sweden to settle in the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania which also including Finland where than part of the Swedish Kingdom. This area was taken through the 7 year long war from Russia and Poland in the late 16th Century and The Swedish King who was a Protestant welcomed new Protestant settlers. They where given free land and became noble farmers / Freibauern, farmers that owned their land. The story goes that the original family name was Lucca and got “Germanized” to Lucka. The Swedes eventually lost this territory in the Northern War 1700-1727 with Russia. The area where the Lucka Ancestors settled into later became part of greater Poland and than became part of Germany under Frederick the Great in 1872. The birth certificate of Friedrich Wilhelm Paul Lucka, my Grandfather shows Adolf his father married to …….. born Lark shows him to be a Ackerbuerger which means a independent farmer who has his own land. Most framers at that time rented their land from counts, barons or the King. Unfortunately it doesn’t show where his parents where born, very close to where they lived in Liebemuehl, about 105km (65miles) is a small village by the name of Lucka.

My Grandfather got interest in photography with the process invented by Louis Daguerre and opened an atelier (photo studio) in Zoppot a famous sea resort town with a Casino located close to Danzig, than a free independent city state. My father Hans Lucka who was born on June 8, 1902 (died on February 3 1969 in B-Baden Germany) didn’t want to become a photographer so he became a business man. He named his photo store Casino – Foto since it was located in the lobby of the Casino in Zoppot to avoid a name conflict with his fathers Paul Lucka Atelier (studio). He later expanded to photo cinema news production, photographic wholesale and added 2 stores one in Karlsbad, where my sister and I was born, the other in Leipzig. My sister Inge von Zelberschwecht-Laszewski in 1941, myself Klaus Lucka von Zelberschwecht in 1944. Another in in Eisenach he opened after WW2 where we moved too at the end of the war in 1945. My father was married 3 times, I know almost nothing about his previous wives, Peter his first son became a WW2 Fighter pilot and was shot down (don’t know anything else), I remember that he said his first wife remarried off with a Dutch officer. His second son Gerd Hans of his second marriage who was born on June 21, 1929 (his mother was a German actress) and lived in the 70’s through the 90’s in Panama and Paraguay, he is now in an old age home in Germany. I visited him in June 2005, but he is quite incoherent. My mother, Theodora Boleslawa von Zelberschwecht – Laszewski (an old German noble family Zelberschwecht meaning Silver Sword) was born on February 22, 1911 in Zoppot and passed away 1n 1998 while being with my sister Inge in Quebec, Canada.

other potential roots from Olaf Göbeler:

Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,

ich erforsche seit einigen Jahren  die Geschichte der Familie Lucka in Haasenberg. Haasenberg liegt im Kirchspiel Kobulten/Kreis Ortelsburg/Ostpreußen. Mit Interesse habe ich Ihre Internetseite gelesen. Bisher konnte ich meine Linie namentlich bis 1621 verfolgen. Leider fehlen mir vor 1797 die Geburts- und Sterbedaten. Mein Urahne Jacob Lucka wurde 1621 vermutlich im Raum Kobulten/Mensguth geboren. Diese Schlußfolgerung begründet sich in der Tatsache, daß im Jahr 1579 ein Woyteck Luka in Rummy/Kirchspiel Mensguth erwähnt wurde. Rummy liegt etwa 6 km von Kobulten entfernt. Der Name Lucka taucht erst nach dem 2. schwedisch-polnischen Krieg in Haasenberg auf. In diesem Krieg wurde auch Haasenberg vom Tatareneinfall und Truppendurchzügen (Heerstraße Warschau-Königsberg) nicht verschont. Die Höfe in Haasenberg waren alle kölmisch mit der Pflicht zum Ritterdienst und wurden schnell neu besetzt. So kam mein Urahne zu seinen vier Hufen (ca.72 Hektar) Landbesitz um 1660. Bis 1948 lebte meine Familie in Haasenberg. Daneben gab es fünf weitere Familien Lucka in Haasenberg. Von diesem Dorf aus siedelten sich weitere Familien in den Kreisen Ortelsburg, Neidenburg, Osterode, Rößel (Bischofsburg) an. Fast alle Lucka im Raum Ortelsburg sind mit Sicherheit auf Haasenberg zurückzuführen. Die Vermutung, der Name Lucka mit seinen Schreibvarianten könnte in einem Zusammenhang mit dem Dorf Lucka (Kreis Ortelsburg) stehen, ist in keiner Weise zurtreffend, denn kein Lucka war bei der Dorfgründung beteiliegt. Der Ursprung des Namen Lucka in Ostpreußen dürfte überhaupt mit dem Vornamen Lukas oder dem polnischen Wort für Lücke – £uka – zu erklären sein. So sind auch die Gerüchte einer Abstammung von den Hugenotten oder Salzburgern absolut unzutreffend.

Über weitere Informationen zu der Familie Lucka oder dem Dorf Haasenberg wäre ich dankbar.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen

Olaf Göbeler

Westfalenstraße 6, 58256 Ennepetal

www.weber-druck.de

Tel. 02332-3767, Fax 02332-14278

email info@weber-druck.de