Földes

It covers an area of 65.23 km² (25 sq mi) and has a population of 3,960 people (2016). It is located next to the main road 42 between Püspökladány and Berettyóújfalu, 34 km southwest of Debrecen. The Eastern Main Channel is 5 km northeast from Földes. Directly neighboring settlements: Sáp (4 km south), Báránd (10 km southwest), Tetétlen (5 km west), Hajdúszovát (14 km northeast), Derecske (20 km east), Berettyóújfalu (16 km southeast). A bus service connects to Debrecen, Berettyóújfalu, Püspökladány, Kaba, Nagyrábé. The closest train station is located in Sáp.

Reformed Church

There are no data about Földes's ecclesiastical life in the Middle Ages. Földes, before the Reformation, belonged to the Diocese of Eger along with the neighboring villages of Szabolcs County. In the second half of the 16th century, after 1557, the inhabitants of the village converted to the Reformed faith when the Reformed Church had finally been established and consolidated in Debrecen. After the Reformation, Földes was a part of the Reformed Diocese of Debrecen. The first reliable data can be found in 1597 about the existence of the Földes Reformed Church. At that time, the Debrecen Council ruled on the divorce case of a pastor named Mihály from Földes and declared the husband guilty in the divorce lawsuit, not allowing him to divorce from his wife.[27]

Temple building and tower

Temple tower

In 1621, there was temple but there were only a small number of people of the Földes Church because it had only a pastor but not a rector or teacher. Even so, the Church of Földes was a Mother Church and Tetétlen as a Daughter Church (filialis) without temple was attached to it. In 1713, a bell tower was built, near the temple building. In 1769 the church building was enlarged and in 1770 the bell tower was raised. The church building was extended from 10 fathoms to 11 and a half fathoms and the width from 3 fathoms to 6 fathoms. The bell tower was raised from 10 fathoms to 11 fathoms and the width remained 10 fathoms. The extension of the old church building was necessary, because it had only 383 places for 1,073 believers and 690 people were left outside. In 1818, the number of believers was 3,000 and the number of places in the church building was again low. In the same year, a lightning struck the tower and the church building, and the damages had to be repaired. Between 1822 and 1828, the building of the church was extended from 11 and a half fathoms to 18 and a half fathoms. Between 1830 and 1834 the bell tower was built together with the church building and raised from 11 fathoms to 21 fathoms high. The next enlargement was taken place in 1884. At that time the number of Calvinist believers was 4,384. In 1910, the wooden beam bearing the tower ball and tower star on top of the tower had to be replaced.[28] Then the church was repaired in the 1930s, 1970s and 1990s. In 2004, the wooden beam that had been put up into the tower in 1910 and it had held the tower ball and star, it had been broken and it was exchanged. In 2010 the walking surface of the church was changed for brick coverage. During its most recent partial renovation in 2020, the tower cover was changed from red copper to zinc, the church roof from galvanized sheet-iron to red roof tiles.

Temple building

Bells

The bell tower was built in 1713. In 1770 when the bell tower was being raised, two bells were removed from the old tower and then placed in the new tower. One of the bells was made in 1744 and the other was made in 1758 and each had a weight of 3 Vienna centner (168 kilograms). These bells were replaced in 1868 with 3 new bells. The new bells were made by Ignácz Hilzer in Bécsújhely and were put up into the tower by József Pozdeck Budapest.[28] The big bell 16 Vc (907 kg) and the middle bell 9 Vc (528 kg) were taken to war in 1917. Instead them, the Church had two new bells made in 1923. The new big bell was 855 kg and the new middle bell was 517 kg and have remained until today. The 283 kg small bell made in 1868, it had been cracked and was replaced in 1998 by a 260 kg bell had been made by Lajos Gombos in Őrbottyán.

Tower Clock

The village had it made in 1778 and commissioned György Földessy, a clock master, to care for the tower clock and paid for it. In 1870, the clock machine was amended with a quarter-hour instrument by Sándor Körvélyessy clock master and Ferencz Körtvélyessy smith master. In the cost of the 450 Forints modification, the Földes Jewish residents provided 40 Forints.

Church Organ

The first donation for the building of the church organ was donated by Gábor Sápy and his wife, Eszter Szabó, in 1884, with 10 pieces of Körmöc gold. The donations were assembled by the intervention of pastor Ferenc Kiss, and in 1894 the church organ was made by József Angster a Pécs organ builder.

In 1896, after the initiation of pastor Ferenc Kiss, with the work of the village residents, the memorial garden[28] before the temple was formed for the memory of the Hungarians incoming a thousand years before. Memorials are in the Temple Garden evoking the past.

• 
  Memorial 1848–49
• 
  World War I Memorial 1914–18
• 
  World War II Memorial 1939–45
• 
  Kopjafa Memorial 1956
• 
  Temple Garden

Jewish cemetery south

Jakab Herskowicz was the first Jew who temporarily lived in Földes. His name was among the tenants in Nagykálló in 1734, as a resident of Földes. Some years later he was a resident in Nagykálló according to the documents. During the reign Emperor József II (1780–1790) at a census Jews were not found in the village. No Jewish residents paying tolerance tax can be found in 1798, in the documents on Tolerance Taxes of the Council of Lieutenancy. In the first third of the 19th century there were sporadic, inaccurate figures about the number of Jews. In the censuses of Szabolcs County can be found some data. Out of the records of religious affiliation of the Diocese of Eger, most of the Jewish data from the 19th century have remained chiefly.

According to old documents,[30][31] the Orthodox community was founded in the early 1800s. In 1820, they had a prayer house and a ritual bath. The Orthodox community founded Talmud Torah school and yeshiva (Talmud school) at the beginning. In 1820 they paid 160 forints tolerance tax. In 1821 Áron Schwarz was the teacher. In 1825 the Földes Council punished the Jewish teacher (preceptor) because of the complaint of Ábrahám Vidszik tailor. On Sunday, July 12, 1835, noble György Gáll had gone into the Jewish temple[32] and drove out the believers, the teacher, and the students. The noble Council had noble György Gáll made into shackles after the complaint of József Weinberger the representative of the Jewish community. In 1844, noble Sándor Ványi rented 1,400 morgens of land with a Jew. In 1845, a new temple had been built[30][31] from the voluntary donations of the community members, which was in later times enlarged. In 1848, Bertalan Szemere, the Interior Minister of the Revolutionary Hungarian Government, ordered a national Jewish census. At that time Mózes Epstein was the teacher. During the 1848–49 War of Independence the Jewish community had to send 3 soldiers to the army. In January, 1849, when weapons were being gathered, from 191 weapons, seven were handed in by Jews. After the fall of the War of Independence, during the Austrian absolutism, the number of Jews fell to 78 in 1853, rising to 156 by 1861. In 1851 the rabbi Mihály Csillag (1811–1891) had lived on a plot where in 1857, according to the Cadastral Record, the Synagogue of the Földes Israelis was. At that time the Jewish community's 750 square fathoms cemetery was on the part of the border called Sziget, where it is still today. In 1867 the National Assembly adopted the Jewish emancipation law.

Jewish cemetery north

In 1871, after the Orthodox Judaism had been separated, Földes remained an Orthodox community. In 1873, Mór Fischer had a licensed Jewish private school, while at the same time József Goldstein and Jacob Glück were not allowed the teaching in their schools with Jewish religion. In 1876 the community founded elementary school with 1 teacher and 80 students. The teacher had not had a qualification from the National Israelite Teachers College[33] and the school had to be closed. In 1883, the school had been re-opened with the certified Ferenc Fischer teacher who remained in Földes until 1901. In the elementary school, cheder (religion teaching) was held in a separate room that the melamed (religion tutor) taught. In 1903, 60 Jewish traders and craftsmen were registered in the Debrecen Chamber of Commerce and Industry.[34] In 1913 the elementary school moved to a new, hygienic building.[30][31] In 1914 it had 60 students. In the World War I (1914–18), 50 members of the community participated and six lost their lives. In the 1920s Jewish youth played an active and prominent role in the local sport life. Football (soccer) was built primarily on them. The Nyúl brothers had played in the MTK[35] and they also got to the Hungarian national team. In 1929[30][31] the members of the community were 253 people, the number of families was 60, and the tax was paid by 55 people. By occupation: 1 teacher, 34 merchants, 15 artisans, 1 entrepreneur. The Talmud Torah and the yeshiva religious schools were active, the elementary school had 35 students. The rules of operation of Chevra Kadisa[36] were approved by the Interior Ministry in 1898. They spent 9% of the budget of the community for charitable purposes. Sáp and Tetétlen also belonged to Földes's register. After the outbreak of the World War II, 65 men had been called in a labor service that 33 survived. In 1944, after the occupation of Germans, 214 Jews were included in the list. Földes Jews had been transported to the Püspökladány ghetto on 19 May 1944 and by the end of June they were transported to Debrecen. The train fittings were launched in Auschwitz on the 25th from the Debrecen brick factory.

World War II Memorial 1939–45[37]

In 1990, the names of 193 Jewish residents were written on the Memorial of World War II, who had lost their lives in the war. After the war, the survivors returned to the village for more or less time. According to the World Jewish Congress, the members of the Orthodox Jewish community at this time were 50, and its chairman was Ernő Lefkovits. There were regular church worships in the temple, there was a permanent kosher butcher, ritual bath, Talmud Torah teaching. Subsequently, as a result of the emigrations, in 1957 there were only 10 Jewish residents in the village. In 1958 the temple was broken down, and the purchase price of the demolition material was written, according to the disposition of the MIOK,[38] to the account of the expired community. Today, some pictures, commemorative writings in local history books, the cemetery in the old Sziget area and the names on the memorials in the Templomkert (Temple Garden) are the reminders of the former Jewish population of Földes.[39]

The population of the settlement increased steadily from 1880 to 1949, and gradually decreased from 1949 to the present day.[40] In 2011 there were 3,623 Hungarians, 45 Gypsies, 12 Germans, 9 Bulgarians, 5 Romanians and 23 other nationalities in the population of the settlement.[41]

The major part of Földes's border is good quality plough-land suitable for agricultural cultivation. In the eastern and southeastern parts of the border, pastures and saline areas are parts of the Bihar Plane Landscape Protection District. In the border, there are mounds remained from the past which are called Kunhaloms.

• Kunhalom is the name of artificially created land hills in the Great Hungarian Plain of the Carpathian Basin. These mounds were created in different eras. The collecting word of Kunhalom includes the burial-mounds (kurgans), the dwelling-mounds, the lookout-mounds and the border-mounds. The name Kunhalom (Cuman Mound) in the literature was first used by István Horvát historian at the beginning of the 19th century, because he attributed these formations to the work of the settlers of the Cuman people. From the point of view of cultural heritage, landscapes, flora and fauna, Kunhaloms represent considerable values. In the border of Földes the following Kunhaloms were in 1890: Inacs, Csőre, Szil, Szél, Ritó, Veres, Mogyorósi, Small Gyepáros, Gyepáros, Telek, Csoma, Kettős, Páka, Small Gyilkos, Gyilkos, Dinnyás, Small Nyáros and Great Nyáros Mounds.[42] Today only the Inacs, Gyepáros, Telek, and the Gyilkos Mounds are not under agricultural cultivation.[43]

• 
  Inacs Mound
• 
  Gyepáros Mound
• 
  Telek Mound or Temple Hill[17]
• 
  Gyilkos Mound
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  Mogyorósi Mound
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  Csoma Mound
• 
  Kettős (Double) Mounds

Kocsordos pasture

• The Bihar Plane Teaching Nature Path is located in the Földes border, and it is the part of the Bihar Plane Landscape Protection District, in the northern part of the Great Sárrét, once rich in marshes. Various scapes and habitats, typical of the Bihar Plane can be found on the marked route. Smaller and bigger mowings, pastures, forest patches and shrubs change each other. A glimpse can be gained at the Andaháza habitat reconstruction to the wildlife of wetlands, swamps, marshes and canals. In addition to many common species, there are few, highly protected living creatures along the way. A grazing buffalo herd have a big role in maintaining the habitats here. Two observation towers and presentation boards help the visitor's discovery. There are more than 100 species on the twenty boards, with brief description.[44][45]
• Anglers' pond. The bed of the anglers' pond was created in 1992 with the help of the Rákóczi Agricultural Cooperative. The cooperative gave the 10 hectares of land next to the Eastern Main Channel that was inadequate for the growing of agricultural crops and an old reedy area was there.

• 
  Eastern Main Channel
• 
  Anglers' pond

• Reformed Church
• Village House built 1924–27
• Memorial 1848–49
• World War I Memorial 1914–18
• Trianon Memorial 1920
• World War II Memorial 1939–45
• Kopjafa Memorial 1956

Village House

• Memorial exhibition of Sándor Karácsony in the Village Library
• Memorial Wall of Sándor Karácsony
• Kállay Country House and community space
• Székely Gate of the Carpathian Basin Bridesmen
• Kopjafa of the Carpathian Basin Bridesmen
• Memorial Fountain
• Memorial Tablets
  • Lajos Zoltai
  • János Balásházy
  • István Jámbor
  • László Kállay
• Bihar Plane Teaching Nature Path

• 
  Székely Gate
• 
  Bridesmen Kopjafa
• 
  Memorial Fountain
• 
  Trianon Memorial 1920

Svimming pool

The thermal water comes from the nearby well which was drilled in 1967. It comes up from 1,344 meters deep and the outlet temperature is 64 °C. It has salinity, alkali chloride, iodine and bromine. It is for the treatment of rheumatic diseases. Thermal water will not only be used for bathing. It is be used to heat the kindergarten and nursery, the school and community center, and the Village House.

• Sándor Karácsony (1891–1952) He was born in Földes. He was a pedagogical, philosophical writer, university professor. In the place of his birth house there is today one of the two buildings of the primary school of Földes. The school and the cultural center took up the name of Sándor Karácsony.[46][47]
• János Balásházy (1797–1857) He died in Földes. He was a regular member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (before it was formed he had been a member in the Society of Hungarian Scientists), county judge, a landowner farmer, an agricultural writer. He had sold his estate in Debrecen and moved to Földes in 1854, where he rented a plot next to his grandson. His last writings include the agricultural experiences gained in Földes.[48]
• Géza Csáth (1887–1919) He was a writer, physician, psychiatrist and music critic. His writings belonged to the generation of the Nyugat (West). From October 1915 to August 1916, he was working as an assistant regional physician in Földes.[49]
• Lajos Zoltai (1861–1939) He was born in Földes. He was a museologist, archivist, archaeologist, ethnographer, journalist, editor. He was firmly advocating the founding of the city museum of Debrecen, and was appointed to honorary director in 1916. In 1926 the István Tisza University of Debrecen received him as an honorary doctor.[50]
• Lajos Erőss (1857–1911) He was the bishop of the Tiszántúl Reformed Church District, the professor of the Debrecen Reformed Theological Academy and honorary doctor at the University of Geneva. In Földes he had been first, between September 1883 and April 1884, as an assistant pastor beside Gábor Bakoss, then between 1886 and 1893 he was a pastor. During his stay, he was dealing with the history of the village and the church.[51]
• Ferenc Kiss (1862–1948) He was the first rector of the István Tisza University of Debrecen, the teacher of Debrecen Reformed Theological Academy, the founder of the National Reformed Love Association. From 1893 to 1899 he was a pastor in Földes. At the time of his pastor's service, in 1894, the organ of the church was made by József Angster. On his initiative, the village created a memorial garden[28] in front of the church to commemorate the 1896 millennium and this garden is traditionally called the Temple Garden.[52]
• Imre Karacs (1860–1914) He was born in Földes. He learned to sing in Vienna where as a student he sang at the Musikverein and Ehrbar Concert Halls. Between 1886 and 1891 he was an actor in Debrecen. Subsequently, Szabadka and Miskolc followed, then followed by Pozsony, Buda and Temesvár and in 1897, he was again in Debrecen. In the spring of 1907 he left his homeland and went to New York. There he was soon asked to direct the American Hungarian Theater. In the rapidly changing circumstances of Hungarian Theater in New York, Imre Karacs, Árpád Heltai and Lajos Serly were elected most of the times as directors of the theater company. Imre Karacs died on November 29, 1914 in a car accident.[53]
• Lajos Pércsi (1911–1958). He was born in Földes. After finishing elementary school, he learned blacksmithing. In 1933 he was called in as a soldier. He remained in the army as a soldier and then as a professional, and was sent to Kiskunhalas in 1939 as a sergeant. He also served briefly in the Southland of Hungary, avoiding war captivity in the war. After 1945 he was called back to Kiskunhalas and soon sent to Pest where he graduated from the Kossuth Academy. In the autumn of 1946 he was moved to Pécs, where he graduated from a one-year infantry school. In 1951 he was appointed to the training group leadership of the Ministry of Defense, where he achieved the rank of major. In 1955–1956 he graduated from the Zrínyi Academy. In November 1956, he participated in the revolution with the armed resistance of Schmidt Castle in Óbuda. He became the victim of retribution after the revolution.[54]
• László Kállay (1818–1901) He was a landowner in Földes. His will had been written in 1896 and came into force in 1901. He left almost all of his lands and agricultural buildings to Földes, worth 150,000 Koronas, with the condition that the village was obliged to have a kindergarten operated with a name of Kállay, a refuge house for aged ones, and a foundation. The will was fulfilled conscientiously by the former representative bodies of Földes until 1945.[55]
• Henrik Gál wrestler (1947–) He was born in Földes. He was wrestling between 1960 and 1980. At European Championships in Leningrad (1976) he won gold, in Berlin (1970) silver and in Lausanne bronze medal. He won fourth place in the 1972 Munich, 1976 Montreal Olympics and four World Championships. He won first place in ten national championships. After he had been wrestling for 16 years, he had a successful trainer in his club at the Ferencváros.[56]
• József Pércsi (1942–) He was born in Földes. In wrestling, he won individual championship six times in the Hungarian championship. His nickname was Betyár. In 1971, he won the fifth place in the Sochi World Cup in the 90 kg weight group. He was fourth-placed competitor in the 1976 Montreal Olympics. He was in the team of Budapest Honvéd when the team won the Hungarian championship 11 times.[56]
• Mihály Dresch (1955–) Liszt Ferenc Award Hungarian musician. A saxophone player who based his own music world on the combination of Hungarian folk music and jazz. He was raised in Földes during her childhood.[57]

• Marossárpatak (Transylvania)
• Gościeradów (Poland)

• 
  Reformed Church
• 
  Village House
• 
  School and community center
• 
  School
• 
  Kindergarten and nursery
• 
  House of meetings
• 
  Ornamental garden

Media related to Földes at Wikimedia Commons

• Official website