Johannes von Trapp

Johannes von Trapp
Born (1939-01-17) January 17, 1939 (age 85)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Alma mater
OccupationSinger
Spouse
Lynne Peterson
​
(m. 1969)​
Children2
Parents

Johannes von Trapp (born January 17, 1939) is an American Austrian singer and former member of the Trapp Family Singers, whose lives were the inspiration for the musical and movie The Sound of Music.[1] He is the tenth and youngest child.[2] As of September 2023, Johannes is the last surviving sibling of the von Trapp family.[3]

Biography

Johannes von Trapp was born in 1939 in Philadelphia while the family was on a concert tour.[4] He was eight years old when his father Georg von Trapp died in 1947. His siblings are Rosmarie (1929–2022) and Eleonore (1931–2021). He graduated from prep school at the Canterbury School in Connecticut in 1956. Later that year, he, along with several other members of the extended family, went to New Guinea to do missionary work.[4] He later joined the Vermont Army National Guard as a Second Lieutenant. He attended training as a medical officer at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, in 1967.[5]

By 1969, he had graduated from Dartmouth College. He attended the Yale University's School of Forestry for his Master's degree. He returned to Stowe, Vermont, to help with the family inn's finances and then became the manager of the resort. In 1977, he moved to British Columbia and later to a ranch in Montana. He eventually returned to manage the family business in Vermont.[2]

In 1969, von Trapp married Lynne Peterson. They have two children.[2] Johannes visited the Trapp Villa in Salzburg Aigen on 28 July 2008, with his half-sister Maria Franziska, and Erika, the widow of his half-brother Werner.

References

  1. ^ "The Sound of Difference". New York Times. March 10, 1998. Retrieved January 9, 2011. He thought a moment, good taste, culture, all these wonderful upper-class standards that people make fun of in movies like Titanic. ...
  2. ^ a b c Stephanie Clifford (December 24, 2008). "Von Trapps Reunited, Without the Singing". New York Times. Retrieved December 26, 2008. Still, Johannes von Trapp, the 10th and youngest child, remembers growing up relatively anonymously in a quiet, strict home. ... By 1969, he had graduated from Dartmouth, completed a master's degree from the Yale school of forestry and was planning on an academic career in natural resources. He returned to Stowe to put the inn's finances in order, and ended up running the place. He tried to leave, moving to a ranch in British Columbia in 1977 and staying a few years, then moving to a ranch in Montana. But the professional management in Stowe kept quitting. 'Now I'm stuck here,' he said.
  3. ^ Genzlinger, Neil (May 18, 2022). "Rosmarie Trapp, of the 'Sound of Music' Family, Dies at 93". The New York Times. Retrieved November 9, 2022.
  4. ^ a b Joan Gearin. "The Real Story of the von Trapp Family". National Archives and Records Administration. Retrieved January 5, 2009. Son Johannes was born in January 1939 in Philadelphia. ... In 1956, Maria, Johannes, Rosmarie, and daughter Maria went to New Guinea to do missionary work. Later, Maria ran the Trapp Family Lodge for many years. ... As Johannes von Trapp said in a 1998 New York Times interview, 'it's not what my family was about. . . . [We were] about good taste, culture, all these wonderful upper-class standards that people make fun of in movies like 'Titanic.' We're about environmental sensitivity, artistic sensitivity. 'Sound of Music' simplifies everything. I think perhaps reality is at the same time less glamorous but more interesting than the myth.'
  5. ^ "Von Trapp's Sound of Music Now Has A Military Rhythm". Talon. February 9, 1967.