Don Oberdorfer, a diplomatic...

...correspondent and author, died at age 84. From his obit in the Times: 

Donald Oberdorfer Jr. was born in Atlanta on May 28, 1931. His father was an insurance agent. His mother was the former Dorothy Bayersdorfer.

Wait a minute. A man named Oberdorfer married a woman named Bayersdorfer? What are the odds?

I asked my buddy, Kevin, who just got back from Austria and speaks fluent German, what those two names could mean. His response:

I see they are last names. The dorfer part means villager. Ober means above, so it could be a villager living up in hills or some type of town elder. Bayers is from Bavaria. A Bavarian villager.