With the warm weather of the California summer, many people are making their way to Sacramento to see its many attractive sites such as the State Capitol, the California State Railroad Museum and of course, Sutter’s Fort, where the roots of the city lie.

Among the city’s most recent visitors was a Swiss journalist and photographer named Lorenz Degen.

But what makes Degen different than most any other summertime overseas visitor is that he has made his way to Sacramento as much more than a casual sightseer.

Arriving on the ANL Esprit cargo ship, together with three other passengers, a crew of 19 sailors and 800 shipping containers from Rotterdam to New York, Degen eventually made his way to Sacramento via the railroad through Charlottesville, Va., Atlanta, New Orleans and Los Angeles.

Swiss Sister City
As a correspondent for the Swiss newspaper, Oberbaselbieter Zeitung, Degen was inspired to write an article regarding Sacramento and its position as a sister city of Liestal.

“The idea of my article is to remind people of the relationship between these two cities,” Degen said.

In preparing this report, Degen, upon his arrival in Sacramento, contacted Marianne Richardson, the Sister Cities Council of Sacramento’s Liestal-Sacramento representative.

Meeting with Degen in person, Richardson shared information about Sacramento and even paid a visit to City Hall with him.

Degen said that although he was disappointed to be informed that Mayor Heather Fargo was unavailable to meet him, he was nonetheless impressed to see City Hall’s Sister Cities exhibit with its bells, keys, plaques and other items from Sacramento’s sister cities.

While with Degen, Richardson also shared photos from a trip that she took to Liestal and provided Degen with information about Sacramento’s other sister cities.

Liestal Living
In regard to Liestal, a few of its basic statistics can be found through the Web link www.cityofsacramento.org/sistercities/liestal.htm. Among these statistics, Liestal is shown as the capital of the canton of Basel-Land in northwestern Switzerland, not far from Germany and France and five miles from the Rhine River.

Liestal, which became a sister city to Sacramento on March 21, 1989, is also described on the site as a place noted for its dairy and agriculture.

The mission of the Sister Cities Council of Sacramento, according to the site, is to “develop mutually beneficial cultural, educational, social and/or economic relationships between the citizens of Sacramento and its sister cities.”

Degen said that Liestal, which is about a 20-minute drive from the birthplace of John Sutter, is governmentally equal with Sacramento in its position as a state capital.

He added that he finds it interesting that there are currently no special advantages for Liestal natives or citizens who visit Sacramento.

“Marianne Richardson told me that [this sisterhood] is a confirmation that we know each other, but nothing more than that,” Degen said. “You have no practical advantage in the form of free access to the university or whatever. What is the purpose of being a sister city, if there is nothing? I think that it should be different, like we are sister cities, so now you have this and this and this. For me, I think it’s good to be a sister city to have connections with each other, to know each other, but you have to keep this contact working.”

Degen added that Sacramento has a definite advantage over Liestal, in that Liestal does not currently have a sister cities council or someone like Richardson, who Degen says visits Liestal about once every year.

Captured by Sacto Photographer
As a fan of the work of Sacramento photographer, Richard Steinheimer, Degen was excited to be making the trip to California’s capital city.

Having discovered Steinheimer’s photography through Steinheimer’s book, “Passion for Trains,” Degen was inspired to make a trip to Sacramento to meet Steinheimer.

“As I saw his book, I had the desire, if possible, I would like to meet this master of photography,” Degen said.

After writing a letter to Steinheimer, Degen was soon contacted by Steinheimer’s wife, Shirley [Burman], who responded with an invitation for Degen to come to Sacramento, meet her husband and view more of his work.

“After coming to Sacramento [in 2006] and seeing more of Richard’s pictures, I became a lot more impressed with his work,” Degen said. “Richard has a wonderful eye. As I could see in his pictures, he waited for just the right moment.”

A Wealth of Knowledge
In gathering additional information about Sacramento, Degen credits the Sacramento Central Library’s Sacramento Room for providing him with many details about the city’s history and in particular, John Sutter.

“The Sacramento Room is a wonderful place,” Degen said. “I found it by accident when I went to the city library. I was looking under books about John Sutter and found that most of these books were located in the Sacramento Room. I went there and they had so much [information] about John Sutter and I was there for the afternoon just reading and reading and reading. I was also surprised that there were Swiss books about John Sutter written in German, even one in dialect. That was so great and I like this room. The Sacramento Room is architecturally so great with its [historic] design and it’s very friendly with a good atmosphere.”

Degen, who also spent a second afternoon at the Sacramento Room, added that he was very impressed with its several large, John Sutter-related ink drawings by local artist Ted Baggelmann.

In regard to John Sutter, Degen said, “John Sutter is unforgotten. For us [the Swiss], even though he lived most of his lifetime outside of Switzerland, we feel that he is still one of ours. And to imagine that [Sacramento] grew up from nothing and from there they built a whole city, and at the beginning was John Sutter, is very impressive.”

To enhance his research about John Sutter, Degen also paid a visit to the Old City Cemetery to see the gravesite of Sacramento’s founder, John Sutter, Jr.

“I’m very impressed to see that John Sutter, Jr. [who was originally buried in Mexico] is here [in Sacramento] now,” Degen said. “And he is buried in a very nice place [near the front gates of the cemetery].  And for me, [the cemetery] is like a memorial also to the earlier days of the city. And when we walk here among all the people who have died 100 years ago or more, but the stones are still here, their names are still here, it shows they are not forgotten. And so, we will not forget also the sister city and its relationship with Liestal.”

In reflecting upon his recent visit in Sacramento, Degen said that he had a very enjoyable and educational time in Liestal’s sister city.

“I am going back with a head full of new ideas and impressions,” Degen said. “I think that it’s good that we have this relationship [as sister cities] with each other and that we will take care of it.”

Degen added that he plans to keep in touch with The Union and that once his article about Sacramento is published, he plans to send a copy that can be translated from German and then shared with Union readers.

“This won’t be the last that you will hear from me,” Degen said with a smile.