Hi Mike
Yes, you are right --- "Zimmer" means "room [of a house, etc.]".
"Zimmermann"
does mean carpenter, so I suppose the exact meaning is "person who constructs
rooms".
Through very quick use of the delete key, I erased your message of a few days
ago in which you mentioned the exact title of your gate-keeper ancestor in
Minden. I remember, though, that the title said exactly WHICH gate he was the
keeper of. Minden presumably had more than one gate, and he was the keeper of
the ___-Tor. (Michelstor or Steintor or whatever). If you ever ran across a
map of the old walled city, you could find where that particular gate is.
Maybe you could send a letter to "Stadtarchiv, Minden, Germany" and see if
they have any information. They would almost certainly understand English.
I see there are two Mindens in Germany, one in the so-called Sauerland, and
the other in Westfalen. (Must be pretty close to each other.) The one in the
Sauerland seems to be pretty small; almost certainly would not have an Archiv,
and is most probably not a Stadt. Its zipcode is 54310.
Minden i. Westfalen IS a Stadt and must also have an Archiv, so the address
would probably work. (Whether they answer or not is another question.) They
have several zipcodes there; I would try this address:
Stadtarchiv
D-32423 Minden i. Westfalen
Germany.
Worth a try, maybe?
Best wishes,
Alan Leighton