How do you think the Whiteheads felt about Maria?

I don't think Georg would cut off Agathe's parents completely, but I can see him becoming distant. After all, he held everything that reminded him of her at arm's length, even the children, so her parents would certainly count.

As for what they think of Maria, I imagine they'd probably be suspicious at first, maybe wondering if she's after his money or if Georg has lost it by marrying someone so much younger who used to be his employee. But I like to think that the children have nice, reasonable grandparents and that they would come to accept Maria after seeing that she and Georg really are a good match.

Agathe's family seems super important/noble. I was going to ask what Agathe's parents thought of Georg, though I think this wikipedia link answers that. I have read some fanfiction that paints Georg's military career as too low class for the Whiteheads. Though, in reality, it appears that they invited Georg to vacation with them. This makes me think that he was noble enough, and they approved of him or they wouldn't have invited him to spend time with their daughter. 

She had 2 babies before the war. Then during the war only saw Georg during furloughs, and in this time had 3 more kids?? That seems like a lot to manage alone..

I'm still torn on their reaction to Maria. 

Inheriting money has a funny way of making the ones giving out the money feel that they are owed something, even if there were supposedly no strings attached with the money. If Agathe's parents bought Georg's house, it would make it much harder for him to cut them off, I would think. Think of the guilt trip they could put on him. 

This feels quite complicated. I don't think we have any canon data to say that he totally cut off contact with them, I don't remember reading that in her books, but I suppose she that wasn't the concern in what she was writing. So we don't have any proper sources to inform the discussion, it is just speculation. I know he did write a memoir, but I don't have that book and the snippets I've found over the years aren't applicable to this discussion.

From my memory, it was only her mother alive at that point. Which drives home the reality that then, even though it was only a hundred years ago, there were so many easier ways to die. Like having a child die young...it's sad, but it happens. You move on a lot quicker than we do now. This is the best example I can come up with and I don't mean to make light of it at all. At this point in time, even the loss of a chemical pregnancy is mourned. Whereas, in the 1950s, my grandmother almost died of a septic miscarriage of twins between having my mother's two youngest siblings. Those babies were wanted--it took them twelve years to have their first kid in spite of enthusiastic trying. (Or so I assume based on family lore. But also, let's be honest here: unless you were adopted, you can be assured that your parents and grandparents had a lot of sex, even when thinking about it makes you cringe.) I'm sure those twins were mourned, again, they were wanted. But they died--were miscarried--and everyone had to move on. I only know about this situation in context of my grandmother's general health issues, especially those that could be inherited. (Thanks, Grandma.) Death and having to move on from that was just a much starker reality, then. My understanding is that there were no antibiotics--no penicillin for sure--so you were relying on your own immune system, and as the world has learned over the last 3.5 years, that isn't a great strategy, especially if you can improve on it.

I think there's also room for comment on how patriarchal the society was then. So even if she hated Maria, how much room was there for her to comment on his new wife? But would she? I don't think so. She's a somewhat marginalized voice as a woman in early 1900s Europe, but how much can you despite a woman who just wants to love your grandchildren? Especially when she had nothing to do with your daughter's deaht.

I think it wasn't uncommon for older women to become 'Grandes Dames', or matriarchs, especially (oddly enough) if they had been widowed...they took on the role of their dead husbands, and could become opinionated and overbearing. In this situation, they could exert a lot of influence on their daughter and husband.

It would have been interesting in this situation to see the fireworks between Georg and a domineering mother-in-law!

Money has an ugly way of turning normal people into lunatics. You see it all the time when someone passes away and then their (once close-knit) children end up not speaking to each other over inheritance debates. It's crazy!

Wikipedia doesn't tell us much. His dad was in the Navy, and was awarded the title "Ritter Von", which both of his sons then inherited. He died when Georg was four. There isn't much info on his mom. 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_von_Trapp

I liked that the naval cadets all had to learn an instrument. I am also of the opinion that encouraging young people to learn an instrument helps them in the long run.