tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31063963627158186072024-03-05T07:04:57.677-06:00Spittin' GritsEstablished April 2009.
Thoughts and essays on various topics from a senior freelance writer and Southern woman living in Alabama.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.comBlogger183125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-15007947446646015972015-09-22T14:27:00.000-05:002015-09-22T14:27:45.795-05:00Summer is Falling: What We Know and How We Know It<div class="MsoNormal">
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Can it be? Is summer 2015 really over? You promise?</div>
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A smorgasbord of ways to know if it’s really over muddles the
real answer. There’s the Unofficial end of summer, the Fashion end of summer,
the Astrological end of summer, the Meteorological end of summer, the Astronomical
end of summer, and the Temperature end of summer. These are probably only a
short list of the possibilities. </div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qHxIS64XfXs/VgGoIFmHx3I/AAAAAAAAJYE/O1pC6_FWPb4/s1600/tomatoes-closeup.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qHxIS64XfXs/VgGoIFmHx3I/AAAAAAAAJYE/O1pC6_FWPb4/s320/tomatoes-closeup.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">How you know summer is here -- ripe tomatoes. . .</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Right now in Alaska, autumn is morphing, or already has
morphed, into winter. I think Anchorage has already had snow. </div>
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At the other end of the Northern Hemisphere, many, many
people in the American South pine for summer to end, for the obnoxious Dog Days
to end, for the triple-digit temperatures to end. By the time it really ends,
we are hot and sticky and the ants are too hot and sticky to show up at picnics and
backyard cookouts. The pool and lake waters no longer refresh, since they are
as hot as the outside air. The sugary white sand on our Gulf Coast is as hot as
hot tar on a roof. And air conditioning units fall victim to the hot and sticky
monster’s final insult.</div>
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In my childhood, we had window and attic fans running in
summer. Soon enough all they did was suck in hot and sticky, thick air. </div>
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People who spend their summers in Alaska are really tired by
the onset of fall, because the summer days stay light all night. People in the
South, especially those with broken or no air conditioning, are exhausted by
summer’s end because no one can sleep in molasses-thick air.</div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XkHfjFnjf0k/VgGouZcoSLI/AAAAAAAAJYM/6yjMTb7YBZQ/s1600/Peaches-1%255B3%255D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XkHfjFnjf0k/VgGouZcoSLI/AAAAAAAAJYM/6yjMTb7YBZQ/s320/Peaches-1%255B3%255D.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">. . .and peaches</td></tr>
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About the time the Dog Days arrive, one of the best parts of
a Southern summer are over – when all the fabulous fresh vegetables and fruits
that the sun and heat and rain and humidity have offered up are gone. Gone. You
go to the farmer’s market and ride all over town looking for the fresh food
stands in trucks and shaky wooden huts and you find nothing, so you throw your
head onto the steering wheel and weep. Tomatoes gone, peaches gone. Lady- and
black-eyed peas, Silver Queen corn, butter beans, limas, blackberries, figs,
watermelon, cantaloupe – everything – poof – gone. Disappeared into thin. . .
.no, thick, hot air. No more BLTs, no more peach cobbler, no more blackberry
pie.</div>
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Then you go home only to find the kids moaning and whining
about how bored they are and how they don’t want to go swimming because it’s
too hot. In your emotional mind you’re screaming, “SHUT UP!”</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-I7EL_oQgJdA/VgGpH-NCvoI/AAAAAAAAJYU/s2W4hmGnxRg/s1600/tomatoes-1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-I7EL_oQgJdA/VgGpH-NCvoI/AAAAAAAAJYU/s2W4hmGnxRg/s320/tomatoes-1.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just add bread slathered with mayo and you've got BLTs</td></tr>
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Then, finally, the end-of-summer signals start beeping: School
starts. College and NFL football games replace baseball. Labor Day, the
unofficial end of summer, demands you put up your white patent leather shoes,
white cotton gloves, and light linen clothes. OMG, some relief is in sight.</div>
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(An aside: I wouldn’t wear white patent leather shoes or
white cotton gloves for all the jobs in China. Furthermore, neither Alabama’s second-ranked
Crimson Tide nor Auburn’s Tigers are doing very well on the gridiron. I think
we’re both all in for a long season.) </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tTRyFSp5clk/VgGpkfiwy0I/AAAAAAAAJYc/FzeSxDfeDLA/s1600/cobbler-1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tTRyFSp5clk/VgGpkfiwy0I/AAAAAAAAJYc/FzeSxDfeDLA/s320/cobbler-1.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cobbler in an iron skillet</td></tr>
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But the most definitive signal of all is tomorrow,
Wednesday, September 23, at 3-something a.m.Central Time. There is a moment, an almost
magical moment, an astrological moment, when our sun shines all the way across the Earth’s equator, giving both hemispheres equal amounts of day and night
before slipping downward to the Southern Hemisphere – the Autumnal Equinox. You’ll
find much more about it here: <a href="http://spaceweather.com/">http://spaceweather.com/</a>
gives you information about the aurora watch and autumn equinox. This site also
tells you about near-encounters, geomagnetic storms, and much more happenings
in space. Also see <a href="http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast22sep_1/">http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2000/ast22sep_1/</a>
for exciting visits into space.</div>
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Autumn is as slow getting to Alabama as a Southern drawl.
But a couple of weeks ago we had a rare weather event – a late summer “cool”
front slid all the way to the coast. Nighttime temps fell into the upper 50s,
which we haven’t seen in a coon’s age. Three or four leaves fell onto my patio,
heralding the avalanche of leaves to fall. The “cold” tap water coming out of
my faucets got cooler; soon it will run cold again.</div>
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But summer is not lost. Before you know it, Halloween,
Thanksgiving, and Christmas will be over, thank goodness. Soon after, crocus
and daffodils will pop up like Jack-in-the-boxes. The spring equinox will
happen, somewhere around March 22, and summer will return with all its bounty. </div>
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It is sort of magical: It’s always summer somewhere.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-47430204053880235462015-04-12T13:18:00.002-05:002015-04-12T16:25:02.632-05:00Paul McCartney, Elton John, and Rod Stewart Rumored to be Teaming Up for a Mega-Concert in London<br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The ultimate concert in 70 years is barely a month away,
unless that is, you think you might be around for the one in 2045. Rumor has it
that the 70<sup>th</sup> anniversary of VE Day Concert will headline Paul
McCartney, Elton John, and Rod Stewart. If true, they will perform May 9 at the
Horse Guards Parade in London. The 100<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the event in
2045 might outdo this one, but I wouldn’t bet a concert ticket on it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In fact, good luck on tickets of any kind.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Y3f3z_z14Pw/VSqxtAlqxuI/AAAAAAAAHg0/uP_eS_JgKCs/s1600/70thStewart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Y3f3z_z14Pw/VSqxtAlqxuI/AAAAAAAAHg0/uP_eS_JgKCs/s1600/70thStewart.jpg" height="267" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #3d85c6; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Could it be? All three at one concert?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In the U.S. a huge <a href="http://www.warbirdsnews.com/uncategorized/honoring-nations-greatest-generation-arsenal-democracy-aircraft-flight-dc-70th-anniversary-ve-day.html">flyover
of World War II aircraft</a> is planned in Washington D.C. Free. No tickets to
worry about, except maybe your airline ticket. According to that Warbirds.com announcement,
the three-day events include a gala dinner at the Smithsonian on the Mall and
lots more activities. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Events for this Anniversary will likely be held all over the
U.S. and the world, including in your hometown. Watch for announcements in
local news outlets in your area.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">On May 7, 1945, two events happened: one event impacted me,
the world, and probably you, somehow. The second was a revelation that occurred
at my house in 1990. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-oUZK0yUyArw/VSqyVlLU-QI/AAAAAAAAHg8/HgQVgP_JInU/s1600/German_instrument_of_surrender2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-oUZK0yUyArw/VSqyVlLU-QI/AAAAAAAAHg8/HgQVgP_JInU/s1600/German_instrument_of_surrender2.jpg" height="303" width="400" /></a></div>
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<o:p><span style="color: #0b5394; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The original of this historic document of Germany's unconditional surrender is in our National Archives in Washington D.C.</span></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">First, the unconditional surrender of the German Third Reich
was signed before dawn on a rainy Monday, May 7, 1945 at “The Little Red
Schoolhouse,” location of the Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force
(SHAEF) at Reims, about 90 miles north of Paris. Present were representatives
of the four Allied Powers—France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and the
United States—and the three Germany officers delegated by German President Karl
Doenitz—Gen. Alfred Jodl, who had alone been authorized to sign the surrender
document; Maj. Wilhelm Oxenius, an aide to Jodl; and Adm. Hans-Georg von
Friedeburg, one of the German chief negotiators. Lt. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith,
SHAEF chief of staff, led the Allied delegation as the representative of
General Eisenhower, who had refused to meet with the Germans until the
surrender had been accomplished. Other American officers present were Maj. Gen.
Harold R. Bull and Gen. Carl Spaatz.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwYk0BaI5COsoy2TX0IGGxOF-PGWYhOtCzC4kDW9jh-sBV4tlmgZoQkf_uoTn3lXgf-7YwZCyqISX6e1ichw95MzxY97xu0kuWvMpJIqkKQzk_2lHQmzUltZb99YEmMF9rK5l8m83X8cA4/s1600/surrendertable.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwYk0BaI5COsoy2TX0IGGxOF-PGWYhOtCzC4kDW9jh-sBV4tlmgZoQkf_uoTn3lXgf-7YwZCyqISX6e1ichw95MzxY97xu0kuWvMpJIqkKQzk_2lHQmzUltZb99YEmMF9rK5l8m83X8cA4/s1600/surrendertable.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #0b5394; font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">In The Little Red Schoolhouse at Reims, May 7, 1945</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Alfred Jodl was notoriously arrogant. A year after surrender,
he was tried in Nuremberg, found guilty, and hanged for war crimes against
humanity. Adolf Hitler was unable to be at the table in the Little Red
Schoolhouse; he committed suicide in Berlin and had ordered his body to be
burned. No trace has ever been found. A shame.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And second, that same day was my father’s 30<sup>th</sup>
birthday. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">At my house in 1990, we celebrated his 70<sup>th</sup>
birthday. It was a beautiful May day and I had made his favorite: a homemade
coconut cake. We were outside on the patio to east dessert. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I noticed he had become quiet and was staring out into
space. Then he said it, out of nowhere. Or so it seemed that day, which today
feels like all of my life ago.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">“Forty-five years ago, on my 30th birthday, a friend and I
were wandering around a town outside the POW camp begging for food.” Then his
consciousness brought him back.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It was jarring. I
said, “Oh my God, dad.” I hoped he would continue. He didn’t. The memory of
that birthday lunch stayed tucked away in my brain’s ridges, valleys, and synapses,
as a stray piece, until it became part of a whole picture that I would never have known had it not been for a strange, wholly unlikely, improbable event in
September 2012, well after dad’s death in 1995. He died in February 1995,
missing the 50<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the end of World War II, as well as his 80<sup>th</sup> birthday,
by fewer than three months. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">He had been liberated from Stalag VII, Moosburg, by General
Patton’s army on April 29, but he wasn’t yet released to be taken to a camp in
France to wait his turn to be shipped back home. The neediest prisoners had to
be taken first. He arrived in New York in early June, skinny and glad to be heading
to Atlanta to rendezvous with mom, who had no idea he had lived to make it back
to U.S. soil, let alone to be on his way south.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">While I can’t make to the London event, I am going to find
something special to do this May 7.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Today, April 12, is also the 70th anniversary of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's death in Warm Springs, Georgia. He was 63. A few hours later, Vice President Harry S. Truman became the 33rd President of the United States.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Other blog posts detailing dad’s World War II ordeal:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">June 22, 2009, Father’s Day<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/06/real-fathers-day-part-ii-destiny.html"><span style="color: blue; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/06/real-fathers-day-part-ii-destiny.html</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">February 20, 2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/wont-you-please-come-home-for-reasons.html"><span style="color: blue; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/wont-you-please-come-home-for-reasons.html</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Feb. 21, 2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/mission-78822february45-on-february-22.html"><span style="color: blue; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/mission-78822february45-on-february-22.html</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Nov. 9, 2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A Cold Day in Italy<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-28-1945-cold-day-in-italy.html">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-28-1945-cold-day-in-italy.html</a></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-56639897125814948342015-03-14T22:43:00.003-05:002015-03-17T11:37:07.767-05:00In Memoriam: Keith Bullock<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in; text-align: center;">
IN MEMORIAM<o:p></o:p></div>
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Keith M. Bullock<o:p></o:p></div>
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Mils bei Imst, Austria<o:p></o:p></div>
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d. 11 March 2015<o:p></o:p><br />
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Although I never met <a href="http://www.bullock.at/index.php/about-keith.html">Keith Bullock</a>,
either in person or by correspondence, I owe him a debt of gratitude, albeit
indirectly. An unexpected request and photograph that he received in 1992
propelled him into a determined and dedicated pursuit to uncover the facts and
historical data surrounding crash sites of U.S. Army Air Forces air craft
downed in his area, any eye witnesses, and any survivors or family members of
airmen attached to the aircraft. In the years of his aircraft archaeology and
research of details, he became a mentor to others who continue his work in the
same relentless, selfless, and exacting manner.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Because of Keith Bullock, I now know precise
details of my father’s downed P-51 and his unlikely survival. One of Bullock’s
students, Roland Domanig, of Lienz, Austria, became aware of the crash site of
the P-51 on Ubetal Glacier in the South Tirol, did extensive research, and
pursued the story for nearly a decade until he found me on the Internet. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This past summer, I, my sister, Susan Cravey, and
my granddaughter, Joanna Leigh Hutt traveled by way of Munich and Innsbruck to
meet Roland and travel on to the village where my father emerged after
descending the mountain where he landed with his parachute. Many times Roland
has named Keith Bullock as his mentor and inspiration.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Indeed all of us who have benefited from the
precise research and determination of those whom Bullock mentored ultimately
owe Keith Bullock. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so, I thank him; and I thank those who
followed him, including Roland Domanig, Jakob Mayer, and many others who
learned from him. Bullock did not feel his task was finished until he made
every effort humanly possible to find survivors or family members of those
airmen who were MIA or KIA. One of those stories is <a href="http://www.bullock.at/index.php/story-sullivan.html">STORY SULLIVAN CREW
#49 - RICHARD SULLIVAN</a>, told by the airman’s son, who went to visit Bullock
and his father’s crash site. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After serving in the British RAF during World War II,
Bullock eventually decided to live in Mils bei Imst, Austria, where he met and
married his wife, Helene. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the early 1990s he was asked about a bomber crash site
near the village where he lived: would he try to find out how many of the
airmen had been killed, how many had survived, and were any of them alive, This
project and the research it would require so intrigued him that he spent all
the rest of his years before his debilitating stroke in 2002 in search of
answers. The fruits of his labors are recorded on his web site: <a href="http://www.bullock.at/tl_files/texu748.pdf">http://www.bullock.at/tl_files/texu748.pdf</a>.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
His research took him to every Veterans
organizations in America, numerous government departments, including the
Secretary of the Air force, the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis,
The Maxwell Air Force Base Military Records Office, Veterans Administration for
the Records of living and deceased Veterans and other branches of government. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
He compiled records containing many Missing
Aircrew Reports (MACRs) and a listing of more than seven thousand heavy bombers
shot down over Europe during WW II; he visited many crash sites and was
instrumental in determining the names of the men KIA or survived, and those who
were POWs in Germany. He recorded eyewitness accounts of downed bombers; he has
traveled to many church cemeteries to try to find any record of the airmen KIA.
And he contributed closure and peace to many American families. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EfiUV3o5mQ4/VQhXcKLDRCI/AAAAAAAAHgY/ZeQAd9aIIeU/s1600/BullockAward.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EfiUV3o5mQ4/VQhXcKLDRCI/AAAAAAAAHgY/ZeQAd9aIIeU/s1600/BullockAward.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so, Keith Bullock, may you rest in peace.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
NOTE: Chrome's Translator app does a passable job in translating Bullock's web site pages.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-44265293880850917572015-02-25T21:40:00.000-06:002015-02-25T21:40:14.918-06:00ALERT: Superfish is on the Prowl<br /><div class="MsoNormal">
Yep, the hijacking crapware Superfish is after us. It is
relentless. So I went to the Microsoft Store.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wait, there’s more. I rarely tackle technology on Spittin’
Grits, but Superfish and hijacking crapware must be outed. This grotesque piece
of work called Superfish is boring its way deep into your computer, and the
consequences include your on-line identity and safety. I’ve spent several days
reading about this menace because it is that serious a threat. So here goes.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Like most of you, I am an ultra-ordinary computer user, so I
subscribe to a readable techy site, <a href="http://www.howtogeek.com/">How to
Geek</a>; I owe those geeks a serious Thank You. It began for me with the most
horrible-est piece of junk that I was aware of: The ethically challenged <b>Ask
toolbar</b>. You’d better see if you have it. Look at the toolbar of your browser,
located just under the URL line. If you have it, go <a href="http://www.howtogeek.com/189176/why-we-hate-recommending-software-downloads-to-our-readers/">here</a>
to read about it on How to Geek. That step led to reading several articles on
horrible add-ons and adware. That led to an article that really caught my eye: it
contained words like “Windows,” “Lenovo” (an up-to-now maker of highly rated
computers), “hijacking” adware, “browsers,” “https,” “SSL” (which I had never
heard of), “root certificate” (which I had never heard of), “scary,” “fake,”
and “hacker.” The headline read <a href="http://www.howtogeek.com/210265/download.com-and-others-bundle-superfish-style-https-breaking-adware/" title="Download.com and Others Bundle Superfish-Style HTTPS Breaking Adware"><b>Download.com
and Others Bundle Superfish-Style HTTPS Breaking Adware</b></a><span class="MsoHyperlink"><b>,</b></span> located <a href="http://www.howtogeek.com/210265/download.com-and-others-bundle-superfish-style-https-breaking-adware/">here</a>.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That article sounded ominous, with all those words together
in the same sentence, ominous enough that I went looking for what this stuff
was, because I was in the market for a new computer; I was looking at a Lenovo
computer.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First I came to a tech article on <a href="file:///C:/Users/Administrator/Documents/My%20Writing/Spittin'Grits%20Blog/Technology/Lenovo%20PCs%20ship%20with%20man-in-the-middle%20adware%20that%20breaks%20HTTPS%20connections%20%5bUpdated%5d">arstechnica</a>
with the headline <b>Lenovo PCs ship with man-in-the-middle adware that breaks
HTTPS connections [Updated]. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Uh-oh. I was going to buy a Lenovo computer at a retail
store. What a close call that was.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“SSL” stands for “Secure Socket Layer.” Without this
technology on web servers hackers/criminals can steal all your personal
information, your ID, and rob you blind in a heartbeat. Yikes! This IS the
“root certificate.” And Superfish bored into it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some people and almost all businesses, most importantly,
your financial institution, apply for an SSL certificate. The granting agency
verifies all the information about the persons or businesses to ensure they are
who they say they are: Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Bank America, Best Buy, most retail
stores, credit unions, pizza franchises, everything you can think of have
the SSL certificate to ensure users’ safety. After being thoroughly verified,
these places are sent the SSL "root" certificate to put on their servers. Some businesses,
of course, like Amazon and Facebook and Twitter and on and on have a gazillion
servers. The servers are the internet’s skeletal make up. The rest of us
ordinary users ride the servers like riders on bikes, skates, trains, boats,
planes, anything mobile, and up to now we’ve enjoyed a relatively free ride,
since others were looking out for our safety and privacy. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No more. Once Superfish and other hijackware bored their way
into servers, the “Private: Keep Out” door is opened wide, to all manner of
hackers and criminals, and there we stand naked behind that door. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those hijackware borers are not to be confused with the “normal”
obnoxious, sometimes dangerous, crapware, malware, and adware that come on
Windows’s operating system and are picked up by the major browsers: Explorer,
Chrome, Firefox, and search engines like Yahoo. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They are the repulsive pop-ups and worse. Those are bad
enough, and the major players like Microsoft, Google, and others have been
complicit in this ethically challenged behavior; it makes your PC run like molasses
in the winter of 2014-15 and opens you up to hackers/advertisers. That’s why
when you open your browser to go somewhere, ads pop up that have been following
you, recording you, and know what you like.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So how do you know if a business or financial institution
has a secure SSL root certificate?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I go to my financial institution via Explorer, Chrome,
or Firefox, I first see on the address bar that it turns green, although it
doesn’t stay green. Then I see <a href="https://%2C/">https://,</a> and the ‘s’ is
significant. Then on the far left of the URL bar I see a small padlock. The
site is “secure,” that is unless something like Superfish bored into the root
certificate. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My own view of American businesses, as unpopular as it may
be, is that they are inherently amoral, right out of the box. Too many,
including the “too big to fail” Wall St. banks, are immoral and may be into
illegal stuff. Many are at least unethical. They all depend on consumers, but
they want consumers, lots of them, who don’t know or don’t want to know what
they are getting. Thank goodness for the watchdogs. They are the ones who
discovered the ton of crapware, adware, malware, and most importantly, the
hijackware. I would no more go to a retail store to buy a PC right now than I
would believe that the big banks are not into sub-prime loans -- again. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But I need a trustworthy computer. That’s why I went to the
Microsoft store, to buy one of their guaranteed “sterile” computers. Their
sterile “Signature” line of PCs are free of any viruses, adware, crapware, and
hijackware. If they don’t do what they advertise, I have recourse. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The only recourse current PC users with a Windows operating system have against the bad stuff
inside their computers is to go to a Microsoft store and have them remove the crap.
And we must put pressure on the computer giants; no one will do it for us.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In fairness, Google has pledged to make some changes
regarding crapware. You can read about this <a href="http://www.howtogeek.com/210568/google-is-now-blocking-crapware-in-search-results-ads-and-chrome/">here</a>
on How to Geek. On the other hand, there’s Yahoo. Here’s what the HTG geeks
have to say: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in;">
<span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt;">Contrast this [the
Google page] with searching for “vlc download” [a software] on Yahoo… Every
single thing you see on the screen is an ad for crapware, some of which is
pretty much malware. In fact, you can keep scrolling, because there are even
more ads for crapware when you scroll down, and you have to scroll near the
bottom to find the real download location. In order to get all the ads in a
single screenshot, you have to use a tablet in portrait mode.<span class="apple-converted-space"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in;">
<span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-family: "Arial",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt;"><br /></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="apple-converted-space"><span style="background: white; color: #222222; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The
moral of this techy tome is that we will have to look out for our interests,
including knowing more about what is under foot and listening to the watchdogs’s
barks.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-83322079920179073542015-02-22T21:53:00.003-06:002015-02-22T21:55:18.959-06:00Seventy Years Ago: Pushing into History<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">By January 1945 the Allies were beating back
Hitler’s forces in the Ardennes, what history would call the Battle of the
Bulge. Winston Churchill asked Joseph Stalin if the USSR forces could take over
the offensive forces into Poland to relieve the beleaguered Allied Forces on the
western front pushing toward Germany. It worked: by mid-January, the Soviets had
freed Poland from Nazi control. (In clearing out the Nazi scourge, the troops
came upon Auschwitz, which was the first discovery of the horror the Nazis
levied on Europe’s Jews and others. See the </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2015/02/too-big-to-forget-world-war-ii.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">previous post</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">.) </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">At the
end of January, General George Patton’s Third Army crossed the Our River. The
Allies by this time were in push-back mode, and it would not be long until World
War II would be on its way into history.</span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The U.S. Army Air Forces were finally on the
offensive, and February ended with what would soon become the Allies’ victory in
Europe. </span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On February 22, George Washington’s birthday,
seventy years ago today, my father left San Severo in Italy in his P-51 Mustang
as wingman to the flight leader, Capt. Roger Zierenberg. It was a fateful day
for him -- and his family, including two yet-to-be-born children. That story is
</span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/mission-78822february45-on-february-22.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. </span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">An almost unbelievable twist of fate occurred
twenty years ago, in 1995, when Anton Volgger, living in the South Tyrol in
northern Italy, went exploring on the Übertal Glacier in the Stubai Alps above
his village of Ridnaun (Ridanna in Italian). He stumbled onto the crash site of
dad’s plane. It was about almost a decade later, in a second twist of fate, that
this exploration came to the attention of Roland Domanig, part of a group of air
crash archaeologists, in Austria; then it was another half-a-decade and another
twist of fate before he found me and sent the cold-contact e-mail in September
2013 asking me to replay if I were indeed the right person. (That story is
</span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/07/flying-eastward-into-past-ridanna-italy.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">.) </span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Dad survived and returned home in 1945. Several
years later he was stationed in Munich, Germany, as part of the Allied
Occupational Forces that were sent to help Germany rebuild itself. It appears
that one of the first things dad and mom did, maybe it was 1949, was to return
to the village where dad ended his descent from Zuckerhutl, where he landed in
his parachute. </span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">In looking for and finding the 35mm slides that dad
took during his assignment in Munich, we found many that he took in
Ridnaun/Ridanna. One of them is this, of my mother leaning on the Woodie and
looking down into the Ridnaun Valley. The 11,000 foot Zuckerhutl is the center
peak in the distance. Others photos can be seen </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/10/sonklar-in-morning.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> and </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/10/a-dark-night-to-sonklar.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. </span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-la4cOmpql3Q/VOqeUKJ1JfI/AAAAAAAAHeY/VP6PhpeFD1k/s1600/Mama%2Band%2BWoodie%2B-%2BRidnaun.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-la4cOmpql3Q/VOqeUKJ1JfI/AAAAAAAAHeY/VP6PhpeFD1k/s1600/Mama%2Band%2BWoodie%2B-%2BRidnaun.jpg" height="268" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My mother leaning on the Woodie that she and dad rode in<br />
on their trip into the Ridnaun Valley in 1949.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The day dad went down, he was several months away
from his 30<sup>th</sup> birthday on May 7. He would spend that birthday
wandering the streets of Moosburg begging for food. General Patton liberated his
POW camp only a few days before, April 29, 1945. Today he would be several
months shy of 100. That story is </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/04/the-liberation-of-stalag-viia-at.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> and </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/05/birthdays-moosburg-and-munich.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. </span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Below are several sites for posts dealing with
dad’s World War II ordeal:</span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">June 22, 2009, Father’s Day</span>
<br />
<a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/06/real-fathers-day-part-ii-destiny.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/06/real-fathers-day-part-ii-destiny.html</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">February 20, 2013</span>
<br />
<a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/wont-you-please-come-home-for-reasons.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/wont-you-please-come-home-for-reasons.html</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Feb. 21, 2013</span>
<br />
<a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/mission-78822february45-on-february-22.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/02/mission-78822february45-on-february-22.html</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Nov. 9, 2013</span>
<br />
<a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">A Cold Day in Italy</span>
<br />
<a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-28-1945-cold-day-in-italy.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-28-1945-cold-day-in-italy.html</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">* The details of his February 22, 1945, mission are
housed at the Air Force Historical Research Agency at Maxwell AFB, in
Montgomery, Alabama, which holds more than 500,000 historic Air Force documents:
</span><a href="http://www.afhra.af.mil/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://www.afhra.af.mil/</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. I
drove there to see these original records on microfilm after e-mailing in
advance a request for mission reports from that date. The staff had made copies
and had them on the reading desk when I arrived. I am especially grateful for
their help and support. [AFHRA’s IRISNUM call numbers for these documents were
00248401 and 00248402].</span>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The AFHRA database is searchable on the web at:
</span><a href="http://airforcehistoryindex.org/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://airforcehistoryindex.org/</span></a>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The Lt. Col. John Thomas Cravey WWII USAAF and USAF
Careers Collection<sup>©</sup> is the copyrighted property of Joanna Cravey Hutt
and Susan Rebecca Cravey for their sole use. The collection includes but is not
limited to the contents of three scrapbooks displaying letters, pictures, icons
and other visual matter; 35 mm slide transparencies contained in the original
storage tins; black and white photographs related to Lt. Col. Cravey’s USAAF and
USAF careers; e-mails and letters donated to, given to, or addressed to the
owners regarding the careers; private records; and other visual and audio
materials.</span>
<br />
<br />
<div class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:621db0f1-ff96-4bc3-99a8-4666a481404e" style="display: inline; float: none; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">
BuzzNet
Tags: <a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/San+Severo+airdrome" rel="tag">San
Severo airdrome</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Moosburg+POW+Camp" rel="tag">Moosburg POW Camp</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Ridanna" rel="tag">Ridanna</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Ridnaun+Valley" rel="tag">Ridnaun Valley</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Zuckerhutl" rel="tag">Zuckerhutl</a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-51052625363934458432015-02-02T15:35:00.001-06:002015-02-02T15:37:34.057-06:00Too Big to Forget: World War II Anniversaries <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On the cold first day of January 2015, I stood on the tarmac at the Birmingham, Alabama, airport at 10:24 a.m. Like a colt in a bare, winter meadow, the wind blew freely around the runways. The Delta personnel on the ground passed around earplugs to each of our small group of about 10, explaining that when the plane turned off the runway to pull into its slot, it would be loud. We spotted the plane coming in for a landing from the east. My sister was on that flight in order to join our group; when she boarded in Atlanta, she introduced herself to Major Choi as instructed. They would be the only passengers to exit the plane until the ceremony ended.</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-9VeBblqFkBQ/VM_tcaKPxgI/AAAAAAAAHcI/Gl-d5NhpV8E/s1600-h/Arrival_6129%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Arrival_6129" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Bobqq4G6W0g/VM_tcyJX9vI/AAAAAAAAHcQ/r82RqcCC4D8/Arrival_6129_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="285" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Arrival_6129" width="398" /></a><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-17v8A8Fcoe4/VM_tdhgSioI/AAAAAAAAHcY/i8kHfsVOy0w/s1600-h/Arrival_6102%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Arrival_6102" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-udnE29uqcgc/VM_teuwGYLI/AAAAAAAAHcg/EvsIF0g4fxo/Arrival_6102_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="283" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Arrival_6102" width="395" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHBInWQvUB5u0W4qY-qwvohaFOWSSWChBKOkyITc-uV5KwqRBaDFiyXzJ7bLqBZ3KjJj_oTl9WfSEtDc7soz47pS3MIH2XpSRJFLZaQ-qHPQiI_4wFeZ0a8jy8UVYwf1_5GY8xMlgX1y6d/s1600-h/Arrival_6167%25255B9%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Arrival_6167" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiizmjy36yD4dCxx1_dXv9iqkFq-tdHaBSiuXVFF3g-PZRO2MIU5BS2QDiOV8VfR3hCUAkzKFV2IyfIKkqP7UOvjWJ2SetB6C2IDoPU2VBjzsmqBI1Zhj5sle21HYJ5aWW-YSMwEpFKy5hA/?imgmax=800" height="278" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; src: "file:///C:/Users/Administrator/AppData/Local/Temp/WindowsLiveWriter1286139640/supfilesB1985CC/Arrival_6167.jpg";" title="Arrival_6167" width="388" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The flight was bringing the remains of my father’s first cousin, Major Peyton Mathis, Jr., home at last after being MIA and presumed dead for 70 years. Major Choi was on the flight to escort those remains, to be transferred to the family with the Honor Guard on the ground, in a formal ceremony, as the Delta passengers watched from their windows. (See the previous post for details leading to this Homecoming.) This formal military ceremony was structured, yes, but very moving and emotional; members of our small group were not the only ones to fight back tears. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <br />
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The military Honor Guard, with Major Choi, transport Mathis’s remains from the plane, to be transferred to the waiting family.</div>
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</span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">, </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I wondered, “This is the first day of the 70<sup>th</sup> anniversary of the end of World War II. Could this New Year’s Day ceremony for Peyton be the first event of this anniversary year?” </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Many </span><a href="http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/news/2014/12/30/missing-fliers-remains-return-guadalcanal/21065591/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Alabama news outlets ran this bitter-sweet story</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> of a U.S. flyer returning to his home to be laid to rest after 70 years hidden on Guadalcanal; it also ran in a few national print publications. But none remarked on its place in the context of this year’s anniversary. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Oh, yes, anniversaries of all stripes come and go and come and go. Some anniversaries go out with a whimper; some, like one’s birthday, simply end. Some are simply too big to be ignored; they should arrive as a supernova, having built up over the eons like those mega-dense white dwarf stars in our Universe that carry a dense mass disguised by its camouflaged power. I hope that the next five years of World War II anniversaries do not pass unwatched until we look around only to realize we have lost all those veterans and sufferers and survivors and wives and support workers who link us to such a monumental history lesson. I hope fervently that my granddaughters, who will be young adults when the 100<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of World War II arrives, will feel deeply their direct connection to that history.</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-Aj1mpjZVB5U/VM_tgDMRF6I/AAAAAAAAHc4/3bYenBrHSL4/s1600-h/JLH0184%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img align="left" alt="JLH0184" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Sr-vTdxqNDc/VM_tgt0QSQI/AAAAAAAAHc8/oNT_yy_V5Oo/JLH0184_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="352" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; float: left; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="JLH0184" width="265" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">To have even childhood memories of World War II, you have to have been born before about 1938. My father returned home in 1945; I was short of two. Even Baby Boomers, born between 1944 and 1964, could have only indirect memories, and it’s frightening to think how few of that group will still be around to celebrate the 75<sup>th</sup> and 100<sup>th</sup> anniversaries. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">World War II -- its history, its lessons for humanity, its survivors and its fallen -- is simply too important to fade into a misty past.</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Auschwitz</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">If only one event could stand for all the lessons the War holds for humanity, it would be this one:</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On January 27, a weather event in the northeast captivated the media and their viewers/listeners for hours and days while a truly monumental event was </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGKgV-SuqQk"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">taking place in Poland</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. That day marked the 70<sup>th</sup> anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz and Birkenau Nazi death camps. Some 300 survivors were there, and many expressed their sorrowful recognition that fewer and fewer will be able to attend future anniversaries. Many expressed their greatest fear – not that they would not be able to attend future anniversaries, but that humanity could forget.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Seventy years ago that day, a contingent of the Russian Army arrived at Auschwitz not knowing what they were going to find. What they found was beyond gruesome, beyond horror, beyond human. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Survivor Roman Kent presented his moving account of his experience with his call to remember:</span> <br />
<blockquote>
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I am often asked how long I was in Auschwitz. My answer is I do not know. But what I do know is that one minute in Auschwitz was like a day; a day was like a year; a month, an eternity. How many eternities can one person have in a single lifetime. I don’t know that either. </span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Remember”: this was the work my father frequently uttered to me during the Holocaust. . . . How can I ever forget. . .? I wondered if the cries from youngsters [torn from their mothers] ever penetrated Heaven’s Gate. . . .We survivors DO NOT WANT OUR PAST TO BE OUR CHILDREN’S FUTURE. . . .</span><br />
</blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Kent quoted from Primo Levi’s excruciating <i>Survival in Auschwitz </i>(1947), as he repeated the need to never forget.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Levi defined how Auschwitz should be remembered in a </span><a href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/119959/interview-primo-levi-survival-auschwitz"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">1986 interview with The New Republic</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">: </span> <br />
<blockquote>
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The war can be explained, but Auschwitz has nothing to do with the war; it was not an episode in it, nor an extreme form of it. War is always a terrible fact, to be deprecated; but it is in us, it has its rationality, we “understand” it. There is no rationality in the Nazi hatred. It is a hate that is not in us; it is outside man, it is a poison fruit sprung form the deadly trunk of fascism, although outside and beyond fascism itself. If understanding is impossible, however, knowledge is imperative, because what happened could happen again. Conscience can be seduced and obscured again: even our consciences. </span></blockquote>
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span></b> <br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Other Resources: </span></b> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The 2005 PBS “Frontline” presentation Memory of the Camps, created from footage found in stored in a vault of London's Imperial War Museum, can be viewed on line </span><a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/camp/view/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">HBO’s “</span><a href="http://www.hbo.com/documentaries/night-will-fall#/documentaries/night-will-fall/synopsis.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Night Will Fall</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">,” made from the original footage taken by British film makers, under the direction of Alfred Hitchcock, is currently running; check for local airing times. We must remember.</span> <br />
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BuzzNet Tags: <a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Peyton+Mathis" rel="tag">Peyton Mathis</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/crash+site" rel="tag">crash site</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Honor+Guard+ceremony" rel="tag">Honor Guard ceremony</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Auschwitz+liberation" rel="tag">Auschwitz liberation</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/WWII+MIA" rel="tag">WWII MIA</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Night+Will+Fall" rel="tag">Night Will Fall</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/WWII+anniversaries" rel="tag">WWII anniversaries</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Roman+Kent" rel="tag">Roman Kent</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Survivor+in+Auschwitz" rel="tag">Survivor in Auschwitz</a>,<a href="http://www.buzznet.com/tags/Primo+Levi" rel="tag">Primo Levi</a></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-58134655084609849842014-12-28T13:19:00.001-06:002014-12-28T13:19:51.615-06:00WWII Hero, MIA for 70 Years, Comes Home<p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3"><b>Special Introduction</b>: I’ve shared a several posts over the past couple of years about the discovery of my father’s WWII P-51 fighter plane high atop a Tyrolean glacier. </font></font><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-28-1945-cold-day-in-italy.html"><font size="3" face="Georgia">That story began 70 years ago in Feb 1945</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia">; dad bailed out, succeeded in descending the mountain, was cared for by some villagers in the valley below, and spent the rest of the war in a German prison camp. His story reached a resolution of sorts this past summer when </font><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/07/flying-eastward-into-past-ridanna-italy.html"><font size="3" face="Georgia">my sister and I visited</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia"> the valley, got a view of the crash site and met with villagers who remember dad.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">A parallel story about dad’s first cousin Peyton Mathis has been developing over those same 70 years. His story began a few months before dad’s plane went down, and now comes to its resolution this week. My first cousin Emory Kimbrough has done the research and made the contacts with the people involved in this story. Here it is:</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><b><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></b> <p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3"><b>By guest writer, Emory Kimbrough</b></font></font> <p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3"><b></b></font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">World War II pilot, Major Peyton Spottswood Mathis, Jr., USAAF, will be returned home to Montgomery, Alabama, after seventy years as MIA on Guadalcanal. On the morning of January 1, 2015, the plane carrying Mathis’ remains will land in Birmingham, where a special escort will release the casket in a ceremonial transfer to the family and funeral director. An escorted motorcade to Greenwood cemetery in Montgomery will follow the transfer. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Mathis will be laid to rest next to his father and near his mother and step-mother in a formal military burial ceremony at 2 p.m., January 3, 2015, at Greenwood cemetery. </font><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-enNIJLs63HE/VKBXpgKHXXI/AAAAAAAAHTI/JoLsRLUi-mY/s1600-h/3-Mathis%252520Portrait%2525201%25255B9%25255D.jpg"><font size="3" face="Georgia"><img title="3-Mathis Portrait 1" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="3-Mathis Portrait 1" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-V__MPAEAbGg/VKBXqWGQJPI/AAAAAAAAHTM/xUeeneIVE8o/3-Mathis%252520Portrait%2525201_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="242" align="right" height="302"></font></a> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">As commanding officer of the 44<sup>th</sup> Fighter Squadron, Mathis was returning with his squadron on June 5, 1944, to Kukum Field on Guadalcanal, after a bombing mission on Japanese facilities was recalled. Mathis suffered an engine failure in his P-38J. After jettisoning his two 500-pound bomb clusters into the sea, he instructed his squadron to land ahead of him.</font> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-UdFgrDQ7qCk/VKBXrQUnPXI/AAAAAAAAHTY/r_KLW-9P8jI/s1600-h/1-MathisGuadalcanal%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="1-MathisGuadalcanal" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="1-MathisGuadalcanal" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-SM2kabqwFCQ/VKBXr7IO5GI/AAAAAAAAHTg/Nx4V9T_Es0g/1-MathisGuadalcanal_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="262" height="340"></a><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">Mathis on Guadalcanal</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Mathis flew over the airfield and turned into a landing pattern. For unknown reasons he aborted his final turn and flew south. He was last seen from the airfield disappearing behind hills. Another pilot flying an A-24 saw Mathis’ fighter flip on its back and crash into a ravine. The squadron’s maintenance and engineering officer led a search party in a difficult four to five hour push through the jungle to reach the crash site. They found the aircraft nose-down in a swampy creek with only the tail booms exposed. Pvt. G. H. Hanna swam down six to eight feet to reach the submerged cockpit, but was unable to free Mathis. Exhausted and lacking tools, the search party returned to the airfield. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">On February 10, 1949, a Graves Registration company attempted to locate and recover the remains, but the crash site could not be found. The P-38 had likely settled into the swamp, and the crash site was lost to history.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The mystery remained for seven decades until a farmer clearing land for planting saw some metal sticking up out of a swamp. The farmer, Eddy Aku, contacted Anders Markwarth, an Australian resident of Guadalcanal known for recovering military artifacts. Eddy led Markwarth to the swamp at night to keep the site secret from anyone who might harvest the metal without permission or respect for the pilot’s remains.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Aku and his cousin found remains at the site, and within days, the </font><a href="http://www.jpac.pacom.mil/About/Overview.aspx"><font size="3" face="Georgia">Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC)</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia"> arrived, beginning a year-long procedure to definitively identify the remains found in and near the cockpit. With the aid of local Solomon Islanders, JPAC constructed sandbag dams to pump out water for investigation and recovery. The remains were transferred to Hawaii. Evidence from forensic anthropology and military records would be investigated, along with DNA testing against a sample from a relative of Mathis’ mother, Laura Davis Mathis.</font> <blockquote> <p> <font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">The JPAC team working at Maj. Peyton Mathis’ crash site on Guadalcanal</font></p> <p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3qlaOn8wpmuO28yQ1EoWsdnvBhyphenhyphenUTq5UzH_x3su_NUMcyUW9pXIA8Q-_pwSeJMOvH-iCxxEM14ZQbm2f1ihIRT44muKaD0MNOSdwlUGd7MvAgecY9uhHQiIbYa1qBsCt9vag1cie7hCL5/s1600-h/3-JPAC%252520-Dam%252520and%252520Pump%252520Efforts%25255B15%25255D.jpg"><img title="3-JPAC -Dam and Pump Efforts" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="3-JPAC -Dam and Pump Efforts" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-gm9S9FTIofI/VKBXuNirVCI/AAAAAAAAHTw/jO86CqsFy94/3-JPAC%252520-Dam%252520and%252520Pump%252520Efforts_thumb%25255B6%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="394" height="296"></a><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-PaRdTxDmt5Y/VKBXwxVellI/AAAAAAAAHT4/ZxXjvDKRxxk/s1600-h/2-JPAC%252520Work%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img title="2-JPAC Work" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="2-JPAC Work" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-mg5OPLXOVLA/VKBXxsZ9O0I/AAAAAAAAHUA/XNCwhODPOr8/2-JPAC%252520Work_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="438" height="293"></a></p></blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Mathis had no children, but Peyton Mathis III, of Montgomery, whose father was Mathis’ half-brother, is named in his honor. He has been searching for over a decade for more substantial information about the war hero he was named for. Mathis had been awarded a Distinguished Flying Cross and a Silver Star in North Africa before his tour in the Pacific. </font></p> <p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3">Personnel who helped in the planning for Mathis’ return to Alabama include Karen Johnson with Mortuary Affairs at Fr. Knox, KY, and Major Robert Tindall, Casualty Assistance Officer, Ft. Benning, GA.</font> <font size="3">According to Mathis III, the JPAC team was more thorough than he could have anticipated, explaining why the process took a year to complete. </font></font> <blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">“It is now quite clear why the I.D process and notification of the family is such a lengthy process. They are so thorough and meticulous that it is almost miraculous that we got our results as quickly as we did. We were given a bound report that documents all of the steps in the discovery and identification process and chronicles the events that started on the day of the crash, June 5, 1944 through basically the present, and Karen literally went through it page by page for our benefit,” said Mathis.</font></p></blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">JPAC’s mission is to bring America’s fallen soldiers home, no matter the difficulty or cost. Their teams may go to the jungles of Vietnam and Laos, the deserts of North Africa, Europe, and Korea. These recovery missions sometimes require complex diplomacy, are often difficult, and sometimes dangerous. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Anderson Cooper recently aired a piece </font><a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/a-forgotten-corner-of-hell-bentprop-in-palau/"><font size="3" face="Georgia">on 60 Minutes</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia"> dealing with a WWII aircraft’s crash site and the pilot’s remains, as well as featuring the group that researches such sites.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p align="center"> <font size="4" face="Trebuchet MS"><font color="#4f81bd">JPAC recovery missions sometimes require complex diplomacy, are often difficult, and sometimes dangerous.</font> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> <a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-Mj5IAcPxR44/VKBXysXNCNI/AAAAAAAAHUI/djnLtnwftvI/s1600-h/4-JPAC%252520Team%25255B12%25255D.jpg"><img title="4-JPAC Team" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="4-JPAC Team" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-XfDiPsNpomI/VKBXzHBk8lI/AAAAAAAAHUQ/PKz1_E9eeDw/4-JPAC%252520Team_thumb%25255B4%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="406" height="305"></a> <a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-17fqtHmzG4A/VKBX0LmS6vI/AAAAAAAAHUY/RtoR82wPU7k/s1600-h/1-JPAC%252520Work%252520D%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="1-JPAC Work D" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="1-JPAC Work D" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGJZvr_dNqjCudTicveTNOA8w_Jj8otzTAI_GHeIXBi9JC7WPmH_7qcrfCqh0XrtJtjT8n7svzv4UF-8Kc6jnWCGYQMP-Bp0EGsGQAcy_F2mo3ah8ZpquQINi5r47k0lnO-t3NQp9-Eodj/?imgmax=800" width="456" height="305"></a></font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The New Year will begin the 70<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the end of WWII, and the year will bring numerous memories, events, memorials, stories, and finally, celebrations. Unhappily, at the same time, the United States is </font><a href="http://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured-article/death-of-wwii-vets-is-an-irreplaceable-loss.html"><font size="3" face="Georgia">losing its WWII veterans at a high rate</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia">. Estimates put the number at 1,000 a day. Some 16 million Americans from all walks of life served in the war to bring an end to the scourge of Hitler’s and Japan’s oppressive forces worldwide.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">Photos provided by Emory Kimbrough (who restored the oldest pictures), Anders Markwarth, and the JPAC team.</font> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <div id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:3429ff36-88a5-4773-b573-967a71fe00e5" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" style="float: none; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Major+Peyton+S.+Mathis" rel="tag">Major Peyton S. Mathis</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/WWII+MIA" rel="tag">WWII MIA</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/WWII+crash+sites" rel="tag">WWII crash sites</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Guadalcanal" rel="tag">Guadalcanal</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Kukum+Field" rel="tag">Kukum Field</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/44th+Fighter+Squadron" rel="tag">44th Fighter Squadron</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Joint+POW%2fMIA+Accounting+Command" rel="tag">Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/JPAC" rel="tag">JPAC</a></div> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-23888213493700616942014-11-24T15:05:00.001-06:002014-11-24T15:12:51.615-06:00Riding the AlCan to Grow Up in Anchorage<br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-Q9r8yPXiov4/VHOdmsJaIaI/AAAAAAAAHQc/XxvGBwQHfGY/s1600-h/GUA1_Final-cropped%25255B4%25255D.gif"><img alt="GUA1_Final-cropped" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5u5rjy4st5BT29d5THcuClfyxJpcKEWeZ02uQ6RAJEZ-ZRFkFxM5YE0S6VDlw01Q6kqL0It-VMIp_fxUzD9Z-frr3jM1TJ790iWJdDc7HYJ3-EBNcN5SuNyoOdOPpinJDEtxmEccmiXi4/?imgmax=800" height="376" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="GUA1_Final-cropped" width="562" /></a><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"><a href="http://growingupanchorage.com/">GrowingUpAnchorage.com</a> is not a blog, but a group venture dedicated to preserving authentic</span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"> stories of life in Anchorage during the 1940s through the 1980s. These are not the narratives </span><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">of the luminous historical figures in Alaska’s history; rather they are the memories of everyday</span><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"> people who lived under rather extraordinary conditions.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><a href="http://growingupanchorage.com/">Growing Up Anchorage</a> invited me to contribute stories to this fun blog, and I was honored and pleased to join in. The twenty-three contributing writers represent locations and states from Florida to Moose Pass, Alaska; several are descendants of Athabascan Native Americans in Alaska; their memories and experiences are as varied as your imagination can make up. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">My first post tells the story of how I learned that my father, a career officer in the U.S. Air Force, got orders to take us to Alaska, a place I had never located on a map. Simply getting there was an adventure of a lifetime: driving for six weeks from Alabama across this country, upward to Anchorage on the 1,700-mile AlCan Highway as it was in 1958 – unpaved, pot-holed, fire-smoke infested, and gorgeous.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">If you look really, really close, you can see the royal </span><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">blue Packard camouflaged by AlCan dust (below). </span><br />
<a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-Yxf7XPWselQ/VHOdqsAZQnI/AAAAAAAAHQs/7HwSxNBrY3U/s1600-h/PackardonAlCan-ed%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="PackardonAlCan-ed" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-1JEHgAx8Ovg/VHOdrJCfAeI/AAAAAAAAHQ0/t9pvrYYHUVY/PackardonAlCan-ed_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="280" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="PackardonAlCan-ed" width="421" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgz4aXSFG5H2Bpo95DF1epBN-Jz1B9Z4qTPh9EfFUl-DdFokbXhQ5S5efpO9wxOqlXFihfxRefVyusuHZbSQL5t68ouOa1BKN702ZNnGtr4PP6Rs-p8Ey4at3DXGuVwUs-IzaSubC2Yv_Ob/s1600-h/6AlCan-ed%25255B8%25255D.jpg"><img alt="6AlCan-ed" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-xkIF5HWAFoc/VHOdsUbUaiI/AAAAAAAAHRE/XFMQSvt1kUM/6AlCan-ed_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="283" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="6AlCan-ed" width="423" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS';">When we got here, we still had a long trip ahead </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Please join us at this magical location.</span><br />
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<div class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:571b498d-1a1b-4e9d-9cba-ca3fb01c865b" style="display: inline; float: none; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">
Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Anchorage" rel="tag">Anchorage</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Alaska" rel="tag">Alaska</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/AlCan+Highway" rel="tag">AlCan Highway</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Athabascan+Native+Americans" rel="tag">Athabascan Native Americans</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/GrowinUpAnchorage" rel="tag">GrowinUpAnchorage</a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-27373156930236357722014-11-13T12:01:00.001-06:002014-11-13T12:01:07.049-06:00The Meaning of Crashite Hunting: Real World War II Legends<p><font size="3" face="Georgia">In the second e-mail I got from Roland Domanig two years ago, September 9, 2012 – after my terse reply to the first one asking that he verify his identity, he wrote:</font> <blockquote> <p><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">I assure that all is OK with me. One</font></i> <p><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">Identity you see on my mentor’s homepage Keith Bullock</font></i> <p align="justify"><a href="http://www.bullock.at/"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">http://www.bullock.at/</font></i></a><i><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">. . . .</font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">For third:</font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">In short sentences: but more to follow</font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">We visited your father’s crashite.</font></i></p></blockquote> <p align="justify"><em><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></em> <a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-gj5jIpuITc0/VGTxvTSX4_I/AAAAAAAAHNo/_OL7YDRNcCQ/s1600-h/clip_image002%25255B8%25255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image002" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="clip_image002" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Y5mfjPQKFT0/VGTxwFTFp1I/AAAAAAAAHNw/uRJoHX3d2DE/clip_image002_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="729" height="295"></a> <p align="justify"><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">The first photo Roland sent of the location of dad’s P-51 crash site on Übeltal Glacier</font> <p align="justify"><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p align="justify"><font size="3" face="Georgia">I looked up, turned my head to the window, and said, “What the hell is a crashite?” The e-mail continued: </font> <p align="justify"><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <blockquote> <p align="justify"><font face="Georgia"><font size="3"><i>We/I assume you are his daughter, as you delivered all info in your blog “Spittin Grits”, we had either</i> [earlier?]. <i>So there was 100% correspondence.</i></font></font> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">Could Lt. John T. Cravey be STILL WITH US? Was our question on tour when</font></i> <p align="justify"><i><font size="3" face="Georgia">Talking about this pilot.</font></i></p></blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Again I looked up and said, “Does he mean ‘crash site’? That’s impossible.”</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Yet here we were. Here to see dad’s crash site, but driving back to Innsbruck, wasting a day, to pick up the infernal Hertz car. I used the time to ask questions.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">“Roland, tell me again what motivated you to get so involved in finding and researching crash sites?” </font><font size="3" face="Georgia">I was madly writing in my journal as we drove.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Roland laughed. I had asked this questions several times over the past two years of being in constant communication. It was clear that he spent a lot of time and energy (and probably money) on this “hobby.” A toll booth was coming up. He kept his eyes on the road. While talking and asking questions, I tried to look at the surroundings as we drove the Brenner Pass on a sunny day. A tunnel was coming up.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">“For our or all ancestors we do this research as hobby. And we are happy if we find interested living -- and loving -- people to talk with them about this crash,” explained Roland. “Sometime we find crash survivor.”</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3">I turned back to the scenery.<i> There’s no way to get a clean sense of going through this pass,</i> I thought to myself. <i>Autobahn traffic. Speeds. Toll booths and 18-wheelers, four lanes on both the north- and south-bound sides. It’s about all your eyes can send to your brain.</i></font></font> <p><em><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></em> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">“How did you get started?” I asked. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font face="Georgia"><font size="3">Then I thought to myself, <i>you’re crossing over the Alps, dummy. Pay attention</i>. My mind flashed with the memory of driving downward out of Glacier National Park in 1958 on our reassignment trip to Alaska. Winding downward at such a steep angle scared me. Living in Alaska for three years cured that. This brain flash directed me to dad, who was driving that downward spiral Glacier road: <i>What would he think of this trip to see his crash site? How would he feel? How would he have felt when first getting the news it had been found? By Anton Volgger, of all people?</i></font></font> <font size="3" face="Georgia"> (Anton’s connection with dad’s story will come later.)</font> <p> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">Anton (l) and a colleague at the debris field on of dad’s P-51 on Übeltal Glacier</font> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-pWyGJfqXu7s/VGTxwn48XGI/AAAAAAAAHN4/KPH_gqSz7TQ/s1600-h/clip_image004%25255B11%25255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image004" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: left; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" hspace="12" alt="clip_image004" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4DzzphMbVjOUUkSg7wy9sZCmqZEPeDm9hvlzuAJubf2bKRIsdLiezJDGBmvJKPRtpMCEQpP1YVax1JXzPVHqLW6iAurkYsrLipDk806efhs7TWjrP30ygfmufYBPRfgeHjE2-rMLOSB85/?imgmax=800" width="439" align="left" height="330"></a> <p><em><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font></em> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">“There,” said Roland, bringing me back to the Pass. “Mountain of dolomite. That is.” My sister Susan and I had wanted to visit The Dolomites, wherever exactly they are.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Off to the right, as if iced with white glitter-glue, the entire mountain glistened in the sun. <i>What a sight</i>, I thought. I guessed that it was some kind of marble or mineral. Suddenly this morning’s vision of Zuckerhutl in the unimpeded sunshine raced through my mind. <i>I’ve got to practice remembering that sight</i>, I thought.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Now I saw that there were many mountains of dolomite, all glistening, but it must be different from The Dolomites dad and mom talked about, and how beautiful they were. </font><font size="3" face="Georgia">Yes, they’re different, I discovered. The Dolomites are located south of Roland’s hometown of Lienz, Austria, into Italy toward Bolzano. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Roland broke the reverie. </font><font size="3" face="Georgia">“You see, interest happened when my aunt once told me about her experience with a going down bomber aiming at her house and almost making a victim of that crash. That bomber crashed near my town Lienz,” he explained. “That was 1999. I started research then after talking to mentor Keith Bullock. Anton knows about six crash sites; I do about 20.” </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">We were nearing Innsbruck. We were to meet Jakob Mayer, whom we had met at the Innsbruck train station. Jakob is, with Roland, in the inner circle of the crash site archaeologists, researchers, and historians who mentored under Keith Bullock. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">After coffee, again at the Europa Hotel and after I picked up the car, we drove west to the outskirts of town to visit the crash site of B-17 “Priority Gal.” Jakob had been the moving force behind establishing a bronze plaque at the site in honor of the Flying Fortress’s pilot. The site was located on a slope of the mountain where events at the Innsbruck 2002 Winter Olympics were held. Jakob gave me a copy of the astonishing 2006 story published in a New Jersey newspaper.</font> <p> <p align="left"><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">Below: Jakob Mayer and myself at the Priority Gal crashsite </font> <p align="left"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-tVFv89x0GFY/VGTxyEV1ykI/AAAAAAAAHOE/ItOx-sYe7po/s1600-h/clip_image006%25255B10%25255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image006" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: left; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="clip_image006" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-pYku2wPgE9w/VGTxy2sQSdI/AAAAAAAAHOQ/fSufZyyyeUQ/clip_image006_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="261" align="left" height="347"></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfQePdprSkboUNtCVYbPDzIk-dz5zF_drqzCAlTcpJ1Zt655iR3mNQqKwF-q9EsFG-Yje_tZifBLsdhDyWZcPQcF7HXH0hTZktHUsfJx2D1nCj9KsNlBGJVq5UmVD986z7O5vZ2zMYkSKk/s1600-h/clip_image008%25255B10%25255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image008" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="clip_image008" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-rj8XOqAyoXs/VGTx0sC8WWI/AAAAAAAAHOg/fO18LPbG4Xc/clip_image008_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="404" height="304"></a></p> <p align="left"><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">This B-17 Flying Fortress had taken flak over Munich. Two engines (out of only four) were on fire. Pilot Lt. Henry Supchak decided to aim for Switzerland rather than go down in Nazi territory. Over Innsbruck, still a long way from Switzerland, the plane took more flak. The crew couldn’t put out the fire in one engine, and flames were aiming for a fuel tank. Supchak ordered everyone to bail. Right then! The Priority Gal went into a nose dive. Centrifugal force pinned him down, keeping him from bailing. Then a sudden updraft righted the plane momentarily. He looked out and saw that Priority Gal was aimed directly at the town. In a split second he decided to trim the plane to far left, then jump. Priority Gal crashed on the outskirts, thereby saving the town and inhabitants, but wounding a small boy and his aunt as it crashed.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Supchak’s quick decision had also saved his crew members, but their ordeal was not over. They all spent the remainder of the war in two Nazi POW camps, including dad’s at Moosburg near Munich, where they and 80,000 other POWs would be liberated by George Patton’s troops April 29, 1945.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The story of the pilot of Priority Gal was legend in Innsbruck. His story didn’t end there either, thanks to Jakob Mayer.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">At last, during the mid- to late 1990s and early 2000s, locked gates opened wide on the Internet. Quickly evolving technology sent unimaginable quantities of data to flow to the World Wide Web, allowing the internet to begin doing what it does best: opening new knowledge to the World. For so many researchers like Roland and Jakob and for many families like Henry Supchak’s, that accumulation of information could bring into the light some unknown corners and unanswered questions of World War II. Some stories would bring families and friends sadness, but closure; for others, joy at finally learning the real events and real roles played by their loved one, still living or dead, who helped bring an end to Hitler’s unspeakable ideas and actions. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Legends could become real.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Mayer was scouring the Internet about 2002, looking for the pilot of Priority Gal. About the same time across the Atlantic in New Jersey, Supchak’s daughter, Liz S. Hoban, had begun research on her father. Touchdown. Hoban and Mayer found each other in 2006. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">At age 90, Supchak welcomed Jakob Mayer into his home in New Jersey and learned of the plaque and his legendary status. He reportedly said to Mayer, “You’ve added a new dimension to my life. Your communication with me has done more for me than you know.” </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">A year later Supchak traveled to Innsbruck to rededicate the plaque with his name on it. At that time he learned the rest of the story of the wounded little boy, Ander Haas: He grew up to be a successful hotelier, and he erected a plaque in Supchak’s honor at the foot of his hotel near the crash site.</font> <p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-Mli5QSJeqp0/VGTx1iwOAxI/AAAAAAAAHOo/PLjEghOrEQ4/s1600-h/clip_image010%25255B10%25255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image010" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: left; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="clip_image010" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-txDPoUKsxz8/VGTx2GfuzsI/AAAAAAAAHOw/LbRQbd6voQA/clip_image010_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="283" align="left" height="376"></a> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">Priority Gal, an American Flying Fortress, on the outskirts of Innsbruck</font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">After returning home to New Jersey, Supchak, with his daughter Elizabeth Hoban, wrote a book, “<i>The Final Mission: A Boy, a Pilot, and a World at War</i>” available on line and in public libraries.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Roland had met Jakob in 2002 after reading in a news account about his research of a crash site; then he guided Jakob to mentor and researcher Keith Bullock. Jakob already knew about Anton Volgger and his trip to the crash site of dad’s P-51 Mustang in 1995, after which documents were lost for about six years. After Jakob introduced Roland to Anton; together they went to dad’s crash site on Übeltal Glacier. Then it took six or eight more years of researching the internet to find me at Spittin’ Grits.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Much earlier, in 1965 or so, an Italian man heard rumors of a crash site where he was living; then he heard a second rumor about a “war tragedy” having occurred as well. These rumors stuck in the “item of interest” area of his brain for more than thirty years. Then in 1999 he, Giorgio Pietrobon, found a record of the disaster in a Parish book. His “activity as an aeronautical researcher” had begun, he says in his book, “B-24 Sandman.”</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-ViwV4NNOq8w/VGTx3d-H68I/AAAAAAAAHO4/GouuoqpJAe4/s1600-h/Sandman%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="Sandman" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="Sandman" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-lcGWxZSiwGs/VGTx33JtrLI/AAAAAAAAHPA/3KGO-_0_GvA/Sandman_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="574" height="424"></a> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">Next: The story of the B-24 Sandman, one of the most iconic USAAF planes in World War II. See more images </font><a href="http://armyphotos.net/a-b24-bomber-named-sandman-flying-low-over-its-target-refinery-at-ploesti-rumania-aug-1-1943-one-of-the-costliest-and-most-brutal-air-battles-of-ww-ii/"><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">here</font></a><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS">. </font></p> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> </p> <div id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:10582d41-e2f7-4f4c-a8ee-1f6f035851f7" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" style="float: none; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/World+War+II+aircraft+crash+sites" rel="tag">World War II aircraft crash sites</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/B-17+Priority+Gal" rel="tag">B-17 Priority Gal</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/B-24+Sandman" rel="tag">B-24 Sandman</a></div> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="4" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-44200323769432349932014-11-11T15:13:00.001-06:002014-11-11T15:13:34.846-06:00Veterans Day 2014<p><font face="Georgia">Please see the Veteran Day post of last year</font>:<font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"> </font><a title="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html" href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html"><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2013/11/veterans-day-2013-saluting-two-lt.html</font></a></p> <p> </p> <p><font face="Georgia">Next post tomorrow: Continuing the 2014 Trip Adventure to the Ridnuan – Ridanna Valley to discover more details of my father’s World War II Ordeal, to see the crash site of his P-51 Mustang, and to meet those who discovered the site and those who helped my father to survive. </font></p> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-5769857958798106622014-10-29T17:41:00.001-05:002014-11-11T13:20:47.902-06:00Sonklar in the Morning: The Mountain <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Window wide open, morning at the Sonklar in the Ridanna-Ridnaun Valley enticed our eyes and noses with a clear, sweet wake-up nudge. We heard cow bells. My feet hit the ground; I grabbed my iPhone, having no idea what I would see out the window. Unlike the oil painting, which might or might not have been there, the Mountain, Zuckerhutl, was there, looking west, but having arrived after dark, we had no orientation. Were we facing north, south, east, or west? Leaning out as far as I dared, I saw it, on the left, the highest peak I could see, a throne at the western head of the valley and all else only supplicants. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Susan, here it is, the Mountain” I said. “And the Little White Church. I can’t believe it. Susan, it’s in one of dad’s shots of the mountain. Now we know for sure the orientation of those slides. We’re here. In person.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I stared at this sight, this mountain, me, in person, not wanting my eyes to ever forget this moment. Zuckerhutl, at 11,500 feet and the tallest peak in the Stubai Alps, sat immoveable, containing the earth’s entire history; it felt like sure footing, the reason for making this complex trip. I breathed. Zuckerhutl was imbued with all we had thought we knew about our father and his ordeal nearly seventy years ago; with all that became known and all we would learn in the coming days; with all our assumptions about a man who was first our father and a distant second, a man, a whole person. </span> <br />
<blockquote>
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-93m9582dA0E/VFFs9sP5aII/AAAAAAAAHD8/CFw39Owhbe0/s1600-h/2-RidannaValley2014%25255B9%25255D.jpg"><img alt="2-RidannaValley2014" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-nJKEyh0cqHY/VFFs-Sd6LuI/AAAAAAAAHEE/L1v3a-jJJcQ/2-RidannaValley2014_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="361" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="2-RidannaValley2014" width="276" /></a> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBu8e_AIsbjsb9lFr4OBMEGKSn_adlRrlzGuGw-7Ae9t4vNW10EDvA_lHUVQN310BeUn8PgskE6Vo4xlJzfIwOCjxV9y-cuLRrawHeXM-qoKaYyUnP-kLY-lbPfzuUwqbkcSl5gLj50MyN/s1600-h/01-my%252520first%252520view%252520of%252520Mountain%25255B10%25255D.jpg"><img alt="01-my first view of Mountain" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-rs2WdP2BUY0/VFFs_AK_3ZI/AAAAAAAAHEU/fIsJkZ11Yd8/01-my%252520first%252520view%252520of%252520Mountain_thumb%25255B5%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="354" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="01-my first view of Mountain" width="270" /></a><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"> Two views to Zuckerhutl from the Sonklar</span> <br />
<br />
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-MRZoymagLKo/VFFs_ktZYII/AAAAAAAAHEY/XGpIlR5fzFk/s1600-h/6-2014-RidannaValley%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img align="left" alt="6-2014-RidannaValley" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-YfGDw8SH3zk/VFFtALieURI/AAAAAAAAHEk/akqqccY5oQw/6-2014-RidannaValley_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="357" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; float: left; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="6-2014-RidannaValley" width="273" /></a></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The Stubai Alps closed off this Valley. There is no outlet except back the way we came, making the question of how dad survived an even bigger question mark.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We were facing north. Just across the valley floor, straight ahead, as the terrain began to climb, a tractor, leaning with the hill’s angle, was cutting the grasses and creating the sweet scent, maybe for hay. I wondered. A group of houses, white stucco with reddish roofs, brownish trim, and window boxes of cascading colors, sat huddled together, then one lone house of the same style nearby. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The land was green. Not apple or hunter or emerald, but pure and absolute green. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“I want to see,” said Joanna Leigh. I hoisted her up, keeping a tight grip.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"> (Above) The green Ridnaun-Ridanna Valley</span></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“That’s the mountain Grand John came down from, there.” I pointed.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“The one in the middle? </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Yes,” I said. “The tallest.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“How did he do that?”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“I have absolutely no idea,” I said.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Before the trip was over, we would find out a lot more about how dad got down and how he survived. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The phone rang. It was Roland wanting to know what time we should leave for Innsbruck. “Crap,” I thought. “We have to drive all the way back to the Hertz office and pick up the wretched car.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Would about ten o’clock be ok?”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">He said yes and that he would meet us at breakfast. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Roland met us in our dining room and showed us to our table, explaining in his halting English that this would be our table for the whole visit. Susan and I had liked the idea of our reservations at the Sonklar including breakfasts and dinners. We soon understood that they weren’t just being nice. If those meals were not included, no one would stay there or at any of the few other choices in the Valley, since there was nowhere else to have those meals unless you were willing to drive on those winding roads, in the dark, to wherever. It was certainly not like going down to the Gulf Coast, which would be a bust if you didn’t go out for lunches and dinners to restaurants or beach shacks for the freshest seafood around. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The setup is more like that on a cruise ship; you have the same table, the same waiter, your same bottles of unfinished wine or bottled water, and the same people at nearby tables.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Views of the Sonklar: Our dining room The dessert spread Toward the buffet area</span></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-U_BA_iLBe20/VFFtAiMpMjI/AAAAAAAAHEo/6eyaib9YfuI/s1600-h/9-SonklarDining%25255B9%25255D.jpg"><img alt="9-SonklarDining" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-Gq5fXdo3j8k/VFFtA3NCeaI/AAAAAAAAHEw/Hc69v1IOPVQ/9-SonklarDining_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="298" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="9-SonklarDining" width="228" /></a> <a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-i8lAWKhjW-E/VFFtBd6flYI/AAAAAAAAHE8/GcjyYJ16now/s1600-h/13-SonklarDining%25255B9%25255D.jpg"><img alt="13-SonklarDining" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-6882wNq46Cg/VFFtBxmmFrI/AAAAAAAAHFA/AyVoxVNuBaM/13-SonklarDining_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="296" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="13-SonklarDining" width="227" /></a> <a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-eKgaMSCmxg4/VFFtCIOmf-I/AAAAAAAAHFM/6kGjATkTpmU/s1600-h/14-SonklarDining%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img alt="14-SonklarDining" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-9fEQIYkavlw/VFFtCp-2_FI/AAAAAAAAHFQ/wR7sGXcqqCU/14-SonklarDining_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="293" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="14-SonklarDining" width="225" /></a></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Unlike a cruise ship, with its humongous, loud dining room, the Sonklar had several smaller rooms, lending a sense of familiarity. We saw the same people and families at each meal. I stood up at one meal and my chair fell backwards. I looked around at the other four or five tables. My own eyebrows raised and arms outstretched, I apologized. No one spoke English, but they nodded nicely and grinned a bit. The second time I did it, laughing in spite of myself, I grabbed my own head as if pulling out my own hair; they just laughed with me. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Being the only English speakers in the hotel was kind of fun, since Roland’s passable English helped fill the gaps, but I’ve wondered what our animated conversations sounded like to the others -- a crash site, Anton’s finding it, the glacier, the role of the huts in the mountains, everything.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We had a view toward the patio, heated pool and hot tub. Sun came in the windows and reflected off the warm light brown wood on walls, tables, chairs, and off the white linen tablecloths. I couldn’t ask what kind of wood, since no one spoke English.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Crucifixes decorated most of the wall spaces. Despite German being the primary language and the main social/historical background, the land is nevertheless Italian; the religion and churches are overwhelmingly Catholic, including the Little White Church. (See the October 3 post for a quick sketch of the social, religious, and historical make up of the Süditrol or South Tyrol: </span><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/10/a-long-day-into-italy-over-brenner-pass.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/10/a-long-day-into-italy-over-brenner-pass.html</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> .)</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I pulled out my iPad and brought up photos to remind Roland that one of the earliest pictures he sent me was one of himself standing at the black wrought iron fence surrounding the church. He laughed and said, “That was about ten years ago.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Three views of Ridnaun-Ridanna’s Little White Church, Zuckerhutl in the background: Joanna Leigh and Roland 2014,</span></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"> Roland about 10 years ago, and the photo my father took in 1950</span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9Yg20y6VFcKrXOgyRKUgYitW2ya4QEtpRwncfGubU7H-K2vOxtrqF51_bFnkksVBIPa1SchurU0nlf-pthrvyy8gPGWjvEszxTc3yUGKZ-6PXeveceYMteVT_N9Aoy2D0aDxORwnoPYx4/s1600-h/10-JoannaLeigh%252520and%252520Roland2014%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="10-JoannaLeigh and Roland2014" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-A0pBaNkBx0A/VFFtDqu4kBI/AAAAAAAAHFg/fTRItJa_rQo/10-JoannaLeigh%252520and%252520Roland2014_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="307" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="10-JoannaLeigh and Roland2014" width="231" /></a></span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-E9M3NNG1MRM/VFFtEDEvwZI/AAAAAAAAHFs/YmqEiQ_ui-A/s1600-h/25-0514Roland%252520church%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="25-0514Roland church" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-l0x4oUra5Kw/VFFtErMQN-I/AAAAAAAAHFw/vIUhpBrbuuA/25-0514Roland%252520church_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="224" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="25-0514Roland church" width="298" /></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-QmbRCFhgWjw/VFFtE8FsLzI/AAAAAAAAHF8/P7ZEKDJUC_g/s1600-h/Ridnaun_0023%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Ridnaun_0023" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg07k6CQI92n6hkeX510did4BebBLOM0zskPbR9FiS63MBwflSmks1POOLre5dDk2yrawCwmG6tBZLZKzZPPvWl2khCV0rdg9JJAiGlJWFM3ttIBAqJbj7z_ZZBIT84qc4Hj3MsBR2vPaOk/?imgmax=800" height="296" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Ridnaun_0023" width="390" /></a> </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then I brought up the scan of dad’s 35 mm slide of that same shot of the church taken in 1949 or 1950 and explained that we didn’t know the orientation of the shot until now. The slides didn’t tell you which was top and bottom, so we scanned both sides, ending up with one of the church on the left of the frame and one with the church on the right of the frame. The same was true of all those slides dad had taken on that trip, of the houses being built, the three men “who had helped” him, official buildings, and other scenes. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“I want to get a picture of you and Joanna Leigh in that same spot,” I told Roland.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We had to leave for Innsbruck, for the stupid car, as it was to be our means of getting back to the Munich airport, which is some 40 miles northeast of the city. And the whole debacle of the Hertz car would get even stupider when we got to Munich to turn it in.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On the autobahn I quizzed Roland about crash sites, the research process, and his circle of other crash and aircraft archaeologists/researchers. We would meet his friend whom we met at the Innsbruck train station Jakob Mayer, and he would take me to a well-known and exciting crash site.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Roland said, “That is Anton over there cutting his hay. He must cover it before it starts raining again and rots it.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We had not yet met Anton.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"> Anton cutting hay near his house, 2014</span></span> <br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-ATDgbTeapMY/VFFtGKNqGKI/AAAAAAAAHGM/ZPZ26a3vu4E/s1600-h/1RD-1making%252520hay%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="1RD-1making hay" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-a1ZDJ3Pfijk/VFFtGm5lQCI/AAAAAAAAHGQ/1QrfU4KerFU/1RD-1making%252520hay_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="324" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="1RD-1making hay" width="431" /></a> <br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Note: The next post will include the story of Priority Gal’s crash near Innsbruck and Jakob Mayer’s role in honoring the U.S. pilot of the plane. Future posts will look at other stories of crash sites and their meanings to survivors and to the families and friends of those who didn’t, as well as how the sites can help heal old wounds. Links to many more pictures start here: <a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums" title="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums</a> </span><br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sonklarhof" rel="tag">Sonklarhof</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Ridanna-Ridnaun+Valley" rel="tag">Ridanna-Ridnaun Valley</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Zuckerhutl" rel="tag">Zuckerhutl</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Stubai+Alps" rel="tag">Stubai Alps</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/the+Suditrol" rel="tag">the Suditrol</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/World+War+II+aircraft+crash+sites" rel="tag">World War II aircraft crash sites</a><br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-9711361487916735212014-10-16T16:17:00.001-05:002014-10-16T16:17:48.508-05:00A Dark Night to Sonklar<p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">What I remember about the short drive from our turn off the autobahn at Sterzing-Vipteno to the Sonklar Hof is winding through darkness.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The headlights didn’t give up much of this Ridanna-Ridnaun Valley, the heart of our journey, where secrets would emerge in the light of day. Here we expected to see and feel the place where our father had appeared out of nowhere after bailing out of his P-51 into a 10,000-foot nothingness of clouds and somehow survived his descent in snow deep enough to drown in. The several roundabouts that Roland maneuvered in mostly darkness didn’t do much but disorient me. After what must have been the final roundabout, we began winding upwards sharply right, then left, then right, left again, back and forth, switchback after switchback, Joanna Leigh on my lap with a suitcase, Roland pulling uphill, Susan and Jakob Mayer in the car behind us.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Faint lights appeared in the distance. Soon Roland, slowing down, said, “We are here.” I could see very little of the hotel itself or whatever lay beyond the parking lot. I remember thinking that if someone was holding a lit candle in the distance, we’d see it in such darkness. The air and darkness were so complete and fresh that it seemed to have come from millenniums ago. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">I would have to wait to put my eyes on the Mountain – Zukerheutl – that dad had survived.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">I still felt disoriented as we entered Sonklar. The man who greeted us was like some kind of mirage, a German official from a black-and-white World War II movie. Jarring me out of fuzziness, he was talking loudly to Roland, and fast, in German. I handed him my credit card. I looked around the lobby and peered around a corner, wanting to see if the oil painting hung on some wall. Because it was late, people were not coming and going in the lobby. Then we walked over to the staircase. We’d be on the third floor, and I wondered if there was an elevator. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Dreading my own exaggerated emotions, good or bad, I expend a lot of energy on anticipating what is going to happen, a senseless exercise, I get that. I try to make this free-floating anxiety look and feel like “planning,” but it doesn’t really work, and anxiety was taking over. I think it is what’s left over from the trauma of the night I learned my 23-year-old brother was dead. In Vietnam. I got to Tuscaloosa tired from the day’s work and trip from Huntsville. Joe Lee said, “Your dad called and wants you to call him.” He said it so casually. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">I called. Dad said, “we’ve lost John.” I went blank. I said “lost where?” He had to explain “lost.” The damage from the concrete wall I hit emotionally was permanent and became free-floating.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">So, true to form, I put too much needless energy into anticipating whether the oil painting would be there or not be there. Infused with way too much symbolism, the painting was going to hyper-charge my emotions – overreacting if it was there, deflating if not there, either way, an omen of something.</font> <blockquote> <p> <font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">Below: Dad’s 1950 photograph of the oil painting of Zuckerhutl at Sonklar</font> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-k-W1mwr8-NCXHpPoknYjqQKd0YIMSbDT7tYUBuvriKhB_JPsFuYOXpvfw6LeUhKrxB-CWVpwYTNoDeqG6O5anSo-YsWnzmSVUnFB41H108Zx7d7MxxzO5AI0cZDoATdIwqxCGFlacO1z/s1600-h/Hutt%252520J%252520059%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img title="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" border="0" alt="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-f_lQprENBog/VEA18HtoA5I/AAAAAAAAG_4/BNCzihrmTu8/Hutt%252520J%252520059_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="620" align="right" height="420"></a></p></blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Research on the Sonklar revealed it to be popular as a winter resort, for sure, <a href="http://www.sonklarhof.it/">as the pictures and videos show</a>, the steam of the heated pool and hot tub rising up against a snowy background. In the summer it is a health and wellness spa resort where physically fit families and hikers and mountain climbers, and hang-gliders vacation. As we started up the three flights with suitcases, I wondered how I could hide my lumbering for the next five days from all the young and fit, bounding up and down the stairs.</font> <p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Ah, the last stretch. I hauled the monster bag up step by step, facing backward. I turned and looked up. Two stairs to go until the landing. And there it was. The oil painting unframed, about 7 feet across by 4 feet or so high, above a German cabinet. It hung just outside our room. I looked at it each time I came and went, as if it were a seeing and knowing totem that had lured us to the Valley and to the Sonklar.</font> <p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">Below: My 2014 photograph of the same oil, now on the Sonklar’s</font> <p><font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS"> 3rd floor landing.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMxoQzerKV_9G_nIlu3r0E-hcWb6b_lm2Fgx5aq6YvGOuYs0eRqkCEwHJUPR_AwWsNpxFvMz82P4hv4UxYbNfB9LBMfLi8PN01hj2HyOiM_bOw6PT_ZdbQUA-bVvqaMr1AedEAC6nDlbTS/s1600-h/17-Oil-3rdFloorLanding%25255B7%25255D.jpg"><img title="17-Oil-3rdFloorLanding" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; display: block; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="17-Oil-3rdFloorLanding" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy7qXHjZtiVCe3O85H1aZq35tSnnvUzpvBWvEaPCXjpoj8pTXeNWSVA-d6VuNgFE5M-HJjdBGuLWDN-rlnH5-a3gWa7fNngvS-EhQh_ROf1i0Lk_qMcwkY_0GTAdPoauAZT-PGu3OyNPKM/?imgmax=800" width="574" height="432"></a></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">The 1950 Sonklar</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">This Sonklar is where mom and dad stayed in 1949 or 1950, when we were still living in Munich. We knew about this trip from having to watch home slides and movies a thousand times, but understanding dad’s strong need to come back was never revealed to us. At that time the Sonklar’s oil painting of Zuckerhutl was in the dining room. He shot it four or more times with his 35 mm camera. I shot it that night with my iPhone. It all felt spookily ordained, but I managed to corral my emotions and be grateful it was there, on our floor.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Many curious, unbelieving, eyes were on our Woodie in 1950 as it drove the winding road to the Sonklar; then the villagers saw that mysterious, strange airman who had shown up out of the snow to the mining community just above this level of the valley. Word spread quickly, the airman and his wife were there. Not only was he driving this big, wondrous Woodie, but he wore his official U.S.A.F. blue uniform.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The military had to ship all the belongings to the families of the allied forces, from their clothes to dishes and tableware, to the tables and beds and sheets and towels and all their furniture all the way up to their cars. There was almost nothing in Germany but destruction. Food to stock the military commissaries, goods for the PXes -- everything had to be shipped over. Frozen foods, still their new phase, had to be shipped over; I gag today remembering the grotesque frozen English peas and asparagus we had to eat. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">And that’s why we had the Woodie overseas and why the military families had all their stuff. <font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">Our 1950 Woodie </font><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-wiHKG6rDTGU/VEA19xTvoXI/AAAAAAAAHAM/H2_4j_XIqDc/s1600-h/Hutt%252520J%252520060crop-ed%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img title="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" border="0" alt="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Go1EY-8gGLo/VEA1-jH7pFI/AAAAAAAAHAY/m4E_Uy_Eo1A/Hutt%252520J%252520060crop-ed_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="391" align="right" height="432"></a></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Mom and dad were able to travel in Europe a lot because of the household help they had. The German people needed work and food and clothes. We lived in German’s houses, us at 30 Fraunkimmsee Strasse, Herr Dahlmeir’s home. Annie helped with cleaning; I remember Oscar polishing all the copper mom had collected; Susan was born in Germany and Inge was her nanny and my brother’s and my sitter.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Military personnel wore their uniforms at all times, and that’s how I saw dad, always in his blue uniform; he had to wear it even when travelling on his own time. Always, whether in Paris or Madrid or the Ridanna-Ridnaun Valley or on the Isar River in Munich on a picnic. Wearing it was mandatory. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">The Strange Airman</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">World War II was still new and fresh, destruction too close, and Allied occupation possibly only a substitute for what they had been living with. Even in this beautiful and closed-off Ridanna-Ridnaun Valley with its complex political make-up, people’s allegiances were unknown. Some villagers in the Valley thought that dad, in his blue uniform, was there on some kind of official mission; a few, war weary, suspicious, cautious, stayed away. Anton Volgger, (then about 10 years old) and his older brother Joseph (then a teenager) were there that day in 1950.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">I first knew of Anton from the second or third e-mail I got so unexpectedly from the then stranger Roland Domanig, dated Sunday, September 9, 2012, almost two years ago.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The e-mail said, “Anton is now about 70 and he remembers the admirable tall young man, with short hair, mysterious and unique, adventurable. The villagers in Ridnaun talked silently, with hands in front of mouth about the strange American. South Tyrol was still occupied by the US, but people were save from the Italians.”</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">We would finally meet Anton the next day. For now, when we got in our room, we flung open the window onto the darkness, the air unmarred, only scented with nature’s cleanliness. We slept long and well under a down comforter.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Future posts: Anton, the Mountain, and the Little White Church.</font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">More pictures: <a title="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums" href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums</a></font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The Sonklar: <a title="http://www.sonklarhof.it/" href="http://www.sonklarhof.it/">http://www.sonklarhof.it/</a></font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> </p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> </p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> </p> <div id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:3df6ce14-fad4-4494-bfbd-e5b44494f280" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" style="float: none; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sonklarhof" rel="tag">Sonklarhof</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Vipiteno" rel="tag">Vipiteno</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sterzing-Vipiteno" rel="tag">Sterzing-Vipiteno</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Zuckerhutl" rel="tag">Zuckerhutl</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Ridabna" rel="tag">Ridabna</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Ridnaun+Valley" rel="tag">Ridnaun Valley</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Woodie" rel="tag">Woodie</a></div> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-74736294748156843472014-10-03T16:32:00.001-05:002014-10-03T16:34:05.720-05:00A Long Day into Italy: Over the Brenner Pass<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Roland had brought a colleague to the Innsbruck train station for us to meet. He had worked with Jakob Mayer for many years on crash site archaeology and research. Both had begun their tutelage years ago under Keith Bullock, their mentor. (More about Bullock in a post to come.)</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-29WYeEfHO1M/VC8Vv7RhHKI/AAAAAAAAG74/ar5xEaazVf0/s1600-h/09-2014-08-05-19.19.374.jpg"><img align="left" alt="09-2014-08-05 19.19.37" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-4ZxI_Zs5ysk/VC8VwRbacsI/AAAAAAAAG78/wsA5dlgwBTc/09-2014-08-05-19.19.37_thumb1.jpg?imgmax=800" height="458" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: left; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="09-2014-08-05 19.19.37" width="344" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I was happy to meet Jakob. As Roland’s long-time colleague, I knew he understood very well the feelings and thoughts when a family member or crash survivor unexpectedly learned of the crash site, made the trip to see the site or a piece of the aircraft, and was determined to learn more details of what happened.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Because of Hertz’s upcoming screw up, Jakob, Roland, and I would have a chance to visit the crash site of a U.S. B-17 Flying Fortress, “Priority Gal,” on the outskirts of Innsbruck, right where some skiing competitions of the 1972 Winter Olympics had been held. Jakob was one of the prime movers in having that site made a memorial and in finding – as unlikely as it was – the surviving pilot of that bomber.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Before returning home, I would have a much better understanding of the work and dedication that goes into unraveling the mystery of a U.S. aircraft downed in World War II enemy territory.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Meanwhile I had gotten a text from Susan saying that she would arrive at the train station shortly, so we waited. Then, pulling luggage behind us, we all walked over to the Grand Hotel Europa to talk, drink coffee, and eat Austrian desserts. Everyone seemed to know Jakob, who is in real estate in Innsbruck. Roland and I had to walk across the street to the Hertz office to get a car. </span> <br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">We met Roland (back) and his colleague Jakob Mayer at the Innsbruck train station</span> <br />
<b><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span></b> <br />
<b><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Number Two to Hertz</span></b> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">And I don’t mean the number 2; I mean the other one. When we got to the door, it was locked. We banged in case someone was in the back. No one. We looked at the hours and sure enough, they closed at 5 p.m. It was about 5:20. “But I called them earlier and told them you’d be here,” said Roland. So there we stood. No car. They knew I was coming, so what was the problem here? I knew Roland had a small European car, but I didn’t know about Jakob’s. Guess what. It was also very small. The price of gas in Europe motivate people to buy small cars. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Back at the hotel and ordering more coffee, we tried to be rational and figure out what to do. I got out my paperwork and we called Hertz International, which I had tried to do before we left home. I had needed to know if we would be able to use the car charger plug in the rented car. In a curt manner and bored tone, the person on the other end said, “I don’t know.” Pause, as I tried to process; after all it was Hertz International. Then, “You’ll have to call the office where you’re picking up the car.” Funny thing about the office where I was to pick up the rental car. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Surely you’re kidding,” I said back. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">No, she wasn’t. That whole conversation seemed really stupid. Now it seemed even stupider. And, believe me, the Hertz stupidness would become a debacle in Munich before we left on our return trip for home.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The next decision wasn’t Flexibility: It was Physics. How were we going to get all of us and all of our luggage into the two small cars? The answer was, “We just are.” We did, but by the hair of our chinny-chin-chin.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Jakob had made dinner reservations in a </span><a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/116717233576841190590/albums/6054163236500901745"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">restaurant he knew well</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">, off the autobahn but well up into the Alps. It was dusk, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to see the views over the historic Brenner Pass, which marks the border between Austria and Italy. I had heard my mother and father talk about the Pass many times, especially when we lived in Munich after World War II (see previous posts) and they traveled to Italy. </span><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=brenner+pass&espv=2&biw=1454&bih=711&tbm=isch&imgil=jiCPCLplUdnrlM%253A%253BZRWF6Ge3N5Kx2M%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fcommons.wikimedia.org%25252Fwiki%25252FFile%25253ABrenner-Pass-highway-0819.jpg&source=iu&pf=m&fir=jiCPCLplUdnrlM%253A%252CZRWF6Ge3N5Kx2M%252C_&usg=__CRTklvRQCM6zsdchIXg7YiC-yJ4%3D&ved=0CDYQyjc&ei=1I4lVNiKFISmggTO1oGgDQ#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=jiCPCLplUdnrlM%253A%3BZRWF6Ge3N5Kx2M%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fupload.wikimedia.org%252Fwikipedia%252Fcommons%252Fe%252Fe7%252FBrenner-Pass-highway-0819.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fcommons.wikimedia.org%252Fwiki%252FFile%253ABrenner-Pass-hi"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">(Images of the Pass.)</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> The Pass has been in use since the European Ice Age. It was a well-used route for the Romans and invading Germanic Tribes; during WWII, Hitler and Mussolini met here after agreeing to a treaty that lured Italy into the Axis countries against the Allied Forces. The carrot for Mussolini was land; the stick would have been an invasion into Italy. He could keep the Tyrolean lands that the despised Treaty of Versailles ending World War I had turned over to Italy. The irony of course is that the Fascists and Nazism were already in Italy, and Hitler was not known for keeping agreements.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">(</span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODEqUSWS3P4"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Here</span></a><span style="color: #4f81bd;"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> is a fun, but long, YouTube video that puts you in the vehicle driving the autobahn between Italy and Innsbruck. If you agree, give the videographer a thumbs up.)</span> </span> <br />
<br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-5ILvhZme2_Q/VC8VxPko-sI/AAAAAAAAG8I/3PdGk__NsgE/s1600-h/15-2014-08-05-20.08.498.jpg"><img align="right" alt="15-2014-08-05 20.08.49" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-bLnIEMCCZ4o/VC8VxrgFzqI/AAAAAAAAG8Q/14vcy47LskE/15-2014-08-05-20.08.49_thumb2.jpg?imgmax=800" height="454" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: right; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="15-2014-08-05 20.08.49" width="342" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">When we left the Trinfer Hof it was dark; the clarified air invited you to skip to the car, and I think Joanna Leigh in fact skipped. We stuffed ourselves back into the cars and got back on the autobahn. Once over the Pass we were in Italy, </span><a href="http://www.suedtirol.info/en/Experience-South-Tyrol.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">in the South Tyrol</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">, Italy’s northern most province, its summer and winter playground, well known to Europeans and little known in the U.S. </span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">After about 20 minutes or so, I saw the exit: Sterzing (German)-Vipiteno (Italian). In the past two years, after getting that first e-mail from a then-stranger, Roland Domanig, I studied maps of this area many, many times, and I knew we would turn right off the autobahn here, in the South Tyrol. Dark became darker and we could not see this town of Sterzing-Vipiteno that dates to the Romans. It is located at the junction of three Alpine passes, including Brenner, and became an important medieval trading post and mining town. It grew rich on silver from nearby mines until the 16<sup>th</sup> century. Many burger homes dating from that time are still standing.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">(Before) I had trout at the Trinfer Hof (After)</span></span></blockquote>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpaEIvZLrJY_uQZANPMCyxFIKLNPHeBLTQIH9IrRTVgzoOixiZvckzz_6t2e96diJJEuqxdlYxDIwNek1H5928OGP70JYWwCTWpew4M2mU_83tXFI6daKVKyLF4QyiE3N4Y-y76r0v5Yg0/s1600-h/24-010226f5c568bfe2521f81cd396bd05d6dadcf64c8%25255B3%25255D.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="24-010226f5c568bfe2521f81cd396bd05d6dadcf64c8" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-_dQ2Si2TQ5w/VC8V0VJuzvI/AAAAAAAAG8w/BQWGMWg2UbY/24-010226f5c568bfe2521f81cd396bd05d6dadcf64c8_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="342" style="background-image: none; border: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="24-010226f5c568bfe2521f81cd396bd05d6dadcf64c8" width="258" /></a><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-RUWwUOr7Ds0/VC8VyhqLxrI/AAAAAAAAG8Y/yNdXF8o3yr8/s1600-h/23-IMG_0600%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="23-IMG_0600" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-aYVsiWn3YGY/VC8VzBp_dNI/AAAAAAAAG8c/pMJfuI3-pD0/23-IMG_0600_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="340" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="23-IMG_0600" width="256" /></a> </blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #4f81bd;"><strong>The South Tyrol—Südtirol</strong></span> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">This area has a complicated history with a mostly happy ending. Its current social, cultural, and political stability is relatively new, dating from the 1960s and 1970s. If you ever decide to visit this part of Italy, here are some introductory facts that explain the area:</span> <br />
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">1. Currently, this gorgeous land sees nearly 6 million tourists each year, but has only 500,000 residents.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">2. The population is comprised of three general cultural/ethnic groups most easily identified by their language: not quite three-fourths speak German, about one-fourth Italian, and less than five percent, Ladin (the language of the indigenous population of South Tyrol dating from the Romans). </span></blockquote>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">3. Its political make-up stayed in a state of flux after World War I, when the infamous Treaty of Versailles took the South Tyrolean lands from the Austrian monarchy and turned them over to Italy, with the Brenner Pass being the border. This move explains the large percentage of German-speaking people. The Fascists took control in 1922, and Mussolini initiated a forced migration of Italians to this northern-most province, explaining the smaller percentage of Italian-speaking people, even though it’s located in Italy. His demands included the Germans having to give up their identity by not speaking the language, not dressing in traditional German clothes, and by banishing German teachers, political administrators, and other officials. </span></blockquote>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">4. Then in 1939 Hitler demanded that the South Tyrolean people choose between returning to the Reich or staying, thereby giving up their German identity to become Italian citizens. </span></blockquote>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">5. After WWII, at the demand of the Allied Forces, Austria and Italy signed the Paris Treaty designed to afford the South Tyrol special considerations in determining its social, cultural, and political identity. Nothing was implemented until the 1960s when the area saw violence erupting because of these differences. </span></blockquote>
<blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">6. Finally, in 1972 an agreement known as the Second Autonomy was signed by Vienna, Rome, and the Bozen Province, giving the different groups making up the population equal rights and protections. By 1992 under the watch of the United Nations, all the measures were implemented.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><a href="http://www.suedtirol.info/en/">Today, the Südtirol</a> is a stable and autonomous area of Italy. The population of 500,000 has a high birth rate, a low death rate, a very high life expectancy (80+ years for men, 85+ years for women), a low unemployment rate (a little more than 3%), a long history, an extremely varied and beautiful landscape, and fabulous summer and winter activities for the six million tourists who vacation in the area every year.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The South Tyrol and Sterzing-Vipiteno would have particular significance for my father in 1945.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Next stop, the Sonklar Hof where we would spend the next five days. </span> <br />
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<div class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:287f2a7d-4458-4240-a3b7-0fc38fc2af61" style="display: inline; float: none; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">
Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Innsbruck" rel="tag">Innsbruck</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Hertz+International" rel="tag">Hertz International</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/%22Priority+Gal%22" rel="tag">"Priority Gal"</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Brenner+Pass" rel="tag">Brenner Pass</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sterzing-Vipiteno" rel="tag">Sterzing-Vipiteno</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sudtirol" rel="tag">Sudtirol</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/South+Tyrol" rel="tag">South Tyrol</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sonklarhof" rel="tag">Sonklarhof</a></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-29072557958759263712014-09-28T15:19:00.001-05:002014-09-29T12:12:12.569-05:00The Plan: A Train Ride to Innsbruck<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The plan was this: Since Munich’s Bahnhof, train station, was only two blocks from the </span><a href="http://www.kingshotels.com/muenchen-zentrum/center-hotel.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Kings Center Hotel</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> where we were staying, we would walk, which would coincide with check-out time and give us plenty of time to figure out the train logistics; we would meet Susan there at the station, as she would take the subway from the airport to the train station a little after 11 a.m.; we would rail to Innsbruck, meet Roland in person (for the first time), pick up the rented car we reserved months ago, and follow Roland on the autobahn over the Brenner Pass and into Italy to the Sterzing-Vipiteno exit. We’d turn right at Sterzing (coming from the Pass), and, if I was reading the maps correctly, it’s a short ride to our ultimate destination, the Sonklar hotel in the Ridnaun-Ridanna Valley. Simple.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Except when it’s not.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">No way we could walk to the Bahnhof from the hotel with all the luggage, get everything up stairs, wander into shops to pass time, and get past whatever other barrier there might be. Then, “tweet,” a text from Susan landed on my phone. Problems with her flight from the U.S. and then the layover in Frankfurt wiped out any chance of getting to the train station in time to meet the 2 p.m. trip we had tickets for.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Great. Except when it’s not.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Suddenly it was time to punch either the Panic or the Flexibility button. I hit the Panic button. I, a 71-year-old grandmother, decided to sit down on the edge of the bed and cry, a wonderful example for my granddaughter.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Don’t even think about it. I told Joanna Leigh we would go down to the desk and get help with these problems. I shot Susan a quick text, saying (ha ha ha) “sit tight. I’ll figure this out.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Two incidents helped me out. First, the staff at this small hotel knew us; they had already solved a couple of things for me. Second, (and it will be hard to admit what I’m about to confess) thinking that this small hotel wouldn’t have a hair dryer, I had stopped at a local beauty salon, where no one spoke English and somehow made them understand I needed a hair dryer. The young woman nodded yes, she understood. She and an older woman went back to a storage room and came out with a new unopened hair dryer. I was delighted when she said 18 Euros. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">She shook her head and wrote down the price on a piece of paper: 80 Euros. I nearly fainted, but I was in a bind. I paid. Please don’t do the conversion. It’s disgusting. When we checked into the hotel, there was a hair dryer. Feeling completely stupid, I took it down to the desk and gave it to the man in charge; he said, with a wide grin, his wife needed a new dryer.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Great.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I explained our plight and he said, “I will call you a taxi to take you to the Bahnhof.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I protested that the driver might get angry over a two-block trip. He said, “No, it’s his job. Don’t worry.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then he brought up on the computer the train schedules to Innsbruck. There were plenty of choices. I texted Susan with times and said that we’d go on but wait for her in Innsbruck at the train platform. She was pretty grumpy. My nerves were hanging out.</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-NTCyH4K6eaE/VChtVac-dMI/AAAAAAAAG50/-U1OeGJMyPo/s1600-h/S63008295.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img align="right" alt="S6300829" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-29-LJokdXyk/VChtV54AEsI/AAAAAAAAG58/JwvU7eGqqZU/S6300829_thumb2.jpg?imgmax=800" height="267" style="background-image: none; border-width: 0px; display: inline; float: right; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="S6300829" width="354" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I tipped the taxi driver adequately, as indicated by his behavior, not his English, and we went to find the right platform. At the platform, we walked up and down looking for the right car. Joanna Leigh pulled her carry on and took turns helping me with mine. The “monster” piece, the largest one in a set, was the problem. I wondered if I could get it on the train and put it somewhere on the floor, as I wouldn’t be able to put it on any overhead spot.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">In the King Center Hotel waiting on the taxi that would take us to the train.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">That’s the Kings Center bear on my shoulder.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">We got on a car that had seat numbers 25 and 26, as printed on our tickets. One person offered help with the “monster,” and I accepted. We plopped down in our seats and a nice young man helped with the overhead pieces. The Age Card wasn’t necessary; it’s obvious. Sometimes it takes getting out of your element and environment to see the truth of a thing. No one was going to take me for a 55- or 60-year-old anymore. I’m an old grandmother and I look it. “Accept the help graciously and get over yourself,” I thought to myself.</span><br />
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<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">A lovely family got on as the train was filling up – a pretty mother and two cute children. She came up to me and indicated we were in their seats. Again, no English, but it became clear to me somehow that she must be right; it became clear to her that I had no idea what to do about it, as both our sets of tickets said #25 and #26. By then the train began pulling out. I looked up, looked toward the door and the space between cars. I looked pitiful. She indicated “never mind.” She sat down with her little boy, about 5, in her lap and her daughter in the second seat. Speaking in a kind of sign language, we learned that our girls were both seven. By now the train had picked up speed and the ticket-checker came into our car. I said, “I think we’re in the wrong seats.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">He said, “No, you’re in the wrong car.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Great. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">She again indicated again that it was ok.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then Joanna Leigh got my iPad and began playing games. The little boy got interested, then the daughter. Things were going to work out. We both kind of laughed in a knowing way, that sometimes a language barrier didn’t really matter. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Theirs was the stop before Innsbruck. When they got ready to get off, she indicated up on the hill was where they lived. Joanna Leigh said, “Wait a minute.” She got a stuffed bear that the Kings Center Hotel had given her and presented it to the little girl. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Really, everything was fine. We both had a good time watching the kids play games. We said our good-byes as they got off. They waved.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It wasn’t long before the engineer announced the Innsbruck stop. The same fellow who had put luggage in the overhead, got it down; then he helped get it all off the train onto the platform.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span><br />
<div class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" id="scid:5737277B-5D6D-4f48-ABFC-DD9C333F4C5D:9e638061-8992-46fb-9029-23d1e544f9b0" style="display: inline; float: left; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On the train in seats #25 and #26</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">
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Then I heard, “Joanna, Joanna” in a German accent. Finally we were to meet Roland face to face after two years of constant communication by e-mails and a growing friendship. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-31oXFCX9cFQ/VChtXFy4dLI/AAAAAAAAG6E/HAcWX3HGf3Q/s1600-h/10-2014-08-05%25252019.19.54%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="10-2014-08-05 19.19.54" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-PZ91nQQEFMw/VChtX4uXauI/AAAAAAAAG6M/iqPSrKi0-VA/10-2014-08-05%25252019.19.54_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="426" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="10-2014-08-05 19.19.54" width="320" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #4f81bd;">At the Innsbruck train station: (left to right)Susan, Roland, Jakob Mayer, </span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">
<div align="right">
<span style="color: #4f81bd;">and Joanna Leigh (no duh!)</span></div>
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Going into Italy, next.<br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/King+Center+Hotel+Munich" rel="tag">King Center Hotel Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Bahnhof+Munich" rel="tag">Bahnhof Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Innsbruck" rel="tag">Innsbruck</a></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-89449516385117508392014-09-21T18:19:00.001-05:002014-09-29T12:11:27.259-05:00The Bavarian Castles: Look at THAT<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Travel mirrors life. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">No, you’re not likely to have to deal with the awful stuff life can dish out, like tragedy or grief. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Along with the fabulous facets of a great trip, however, you can expect to contend with mishaps, screw-ups, getting lost, weather, electrical currents, your devices’ cables, and the stuff you’ll encounter from being at the mercy of other people, businesses, and animals. To help mitigate some problems, using a travel agent for a complicated trip is a good idea, but it’s not a magic shield. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We traveled by air, rail, bus, car, and foot to three countries – Germany, Austria, Italy. And we had more than our share of fabulous. Nevertheless. . . .</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">As one of Germany’s great international cities, Munich has an extra little bonus tucked into its pocket; it has all of the Free State of Bavaria to offer. It encompasses the German lands between the majestic Alps to the wetlands of the Danube River. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-acDfjDqoGBw/VB9czvLzDSI/AAAAAAAAG2g/Hc180mKxRaU/s1600/1Bus6%5B5%5D" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-acDfjDqoGBw/VB9czvLzDSI/AAAAAAAAG2g/Hc180mKxRaU/s1600/1Bus6%5B5%5D" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: #45818e;">The Bavarian landscape en route to the castles</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I chose the Bavarian Castles in deference to Joanna Leigh’s immersion into the World of Disney Princesses. So, on our second day in Munich, we made our way to “Mad” Ludwig II’s Bavarian castles Linderhof and Neuschwanstein. Our hotel was only a short walk to the tour-bus stop, except when we rounded the corner we saw what looked like hundreds of buses and lots of confusion. It looked like the floor of the NY Stock Exchange, with lots of hands waving in the air and a jumble of languages and people. We heard English, headed in that direction, found our bus by waiving our tickets in the air, and got on. It was a beautiful day.</span> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">As you got further from Munich and closer to the Alps, the foothills’ fields, meadows and countryside got more lush with each mile. It’s dairy cattle country, so you could hear cowbells. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I was having an unfortunate mental image of Julie Andrews appearing from a hill in her blue Bavarian dress and white apron and breaking into song. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<b><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Schloss Linderhof</span></b> <br />
<strong><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span></strong> <a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-xuwKHvfRpWY/VB9c0z7wvdI/AAAAAAAAG2o/pE6-IKWnjas/s1600-h/2SchlossLinderhof-4%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img alt="2SchlossLinderhof-4" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVHYHV0DGWXkG5D_NLXpWfLvmugTlrhmjoKrckFJhx0pOfybArtonWeNTXyYkgY2nXUUeTDvWpzUhToq_AxSIvvbtsuYrMrX-Aj1HozxhmpsAFhRdHgUwIvaoTRZH5D4CQPUMNCxOk5cfI/?imgmax=800" height="541" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="2SchlossLinderhof-4" width="407" /></a> <a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Jr4QzRJfV1k/VB9c13LfN4I/AAAAAAAAG28/d8yX2ulFxVE/s1600-h/2SchlossLinderhof-6%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="2SchlossLinderhof-6" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-3J0X1SWF6MU/VB9c2Wx6HZI/AAAAAAAAG3E/HJpo6p_F8Eg/2SchlossLinderhof-6_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="529" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="2SchlossLinderhof-6" width="398" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: medium;">Linderhof façade and gardens</span><br />
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-H0dL0MLllkM/VB9c3GchnsI/AAAAAAAAG3M/TC1oNU96lUw/s1600-h/2SchlossLinderhof-10%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="2SchlossLinderhof-10" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHsOy8TUpJ6RK2UDgyp0H-692Vc4KToHOmvKo03_4NwrDbZVd5pq7ty18s0aHvPF8o4VqmU5xBAYPqqQl8hSG1bOE7V40HCtVqSZVQLjzCYSKBSdZMjPEyv7BVMvz3ZtUmnoG7dVMmY2WB/?imgmax=800" height="416" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="2SchlossLinderhof-10" width="554" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: medium;">Linderhof from the Music Pavilion</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Schloss Linderhof is high up a mountain. As we went up, up, up, switch-backing as we climbed, I became fixated on how Ludwig’s builders, architects, musicians, decorators, cooks, cleaners, gardeners, tailors, guards, shoemakers, animal keepers and grooms, and all the stuff all these people had to bring with them up that mountain to satisfy His Madness – how did they get it all up there? How many hundreds of trips did they have to make? At a certain height buses could not go any further up; visitors are left with a good walk to the castle. Along the way the lush forests offer plenty of natural beauty to land your eyes on, including the small lake inhabited by the castle’s swans. It seems Mad Ludwig had a thing for swans, both real and as a motif echoed everywhere.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">But we had been warned by our tour guide. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Yes, they are beautiful,” said our tour guide, “but they are evil. Recently these swans took off after a man who got a centimeter too close, tore his pants leg off, and injured his leg bad enough that we had to call an ambulance.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">So, was “Mad” Ludwig II insane or angry? He was probably angry first, because he had not been named Divine and Absolute Ruler of all his domain, as France’s Sun King, Louis XIV, Ludwig’s idol, had been. As absolute ruler, he could have continued his unabated spending on castles and the fantasy retreats he was creating. At the same time, he became enamored with the heroic music of Richard Wagner and the mythology it was built on. His devotion to Wagner, the music, and the themes pushed him to extreme limits; he became determined to escape to a fantasy world of his own making, and he made it with Linderhof, Neuschwanstein, and other lavish dwellings. He blew out the coffers doing it, and made enemies of powerful people. At Linderhof, he would sleep all day then stay up all night in the Hall of Mirrors to surround himself with the extreme light of many candles bouncing off all the mirrors. That sounds a little crazy. He lived out the rest of his life in this fantasy world until the day of his “mysterious” death by drowning, even though an autopsy revealed no water in his lungs.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The grounds and castle interiors at both places have been described as French Baroque. I call it Outlandish Rococo, echoing Versailles to the insane limits. The photography police were out in force, keeping visitors from taking their own pictures, but the stores at both places are overflowing with postcards, and many photos are available on the internet.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">My favorite Linderhof room was the dining room with its dining room table-floor. No, Ludwig wasn’t mad enough to eat on the floor, but the whole dining room table and the floor beneath it was lowered into the kitchen area below the dining room, the table was set for four, the food served, drinks poured, and sent back up to become the dining room floor and lavishly served table all at one time. The word is that His Madness didn’t have company or dinner parties, but he liked to talk to favorite people he imagined were dining with him. That seems a little Rococo-cuckoo to me.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Outlandish Rococo includes items like a carpet made of ostrich plumes, an ivory chandelier, Meissen centerpiece of bunches of flowers, gilded everything you can imagine, a table inlaid with jewels, mantles of jewels, and so much else, you cannot see it all.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Schloss Neuschwanstein</span> <br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Schloss Neuschwanstein’s famous silhouette</span> </span> </div>
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<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-oBYm9IIXQOA/VB9c4SdkuLI/AAAAAAAAG3c/meuBOnrEtvQ/s1600-h/3SchlossNsw-6%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><br /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRYzVg8jeDygLBke2QAgMQwvarsBpZ8ScO3ht10zVLPts43C0XWKs7djLhKIvdKiw3tAyyDGk9MNgkNhacV1WRzH5C4thqCecNsC_Ri1Z4e_3KGAUilsLo-xe4oEW0tLI1_HrX3aJOte8P/?imgmax=800" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="3SchlossNsw-6a" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRYzVg8jeDygLBke2QAgMQwvarsBpZ8ScO3ht10zVLPts43C0XWKs7djLhKIvdKiw3tAyyDGk9MNgkNhacV1WRzH5C4thqCecNsC_Ri1Z4e_3KGAUilsLo-xe4oEW0tLI1_HrX3aJOte8P/?imgmax=800" height="300" style="background-image: none; border: 0px; display: block; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="3SchlossNsw-6a" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The Bavarian fantasy world continued as we spent a little time at Oberammergau, the village of the Passion play, which lasts for 6 or 8 hours, and houses painted in the colorful style of <i>trompe l’oiel</i> with figures from German fairy tales, cuckoo clocks, bowers of flowers and more, seeming real enough to jump to the ground in front of you. Standard dress is Basic Bavarian – men in Lederhosen, knee socks; women in low-cut peasant-type dresses with white aprons. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then on to Schloss Neuschwanstein, up an even more dramatic climb, until you catch a sight of one of the most astounding silhouettes in all of photography. The castle sits atop a huge outcropping over the 300-feet-deep gorge over the Pöllat River. No wonder Walt Disney chose this as his model for Disney Castles. You may recognize it as Sleeping Beauty’s castle and one of its towers as the place where Rapunzel let down her hair.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Two <i>caveats:</i> Again, busses have to let passengers off at a certain point; that makes me wonder even more how all His Madness’s stuff got up there. First for Seniors and disabled visitors: it’s a tough walk to, inside of, and from the castle, including a 15-20 minute walk uphill, three or four levels of stairs, and a very long (like 45-60 minutes) and sometimes arduous walk down to the busses. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Second: If you have any fear of heights at all, don’t do this: On the way up, as you get close to the castle, you can step onto a bridge spanning the 300-foot gorge. Looking down was unnerving; we felt like daredevils putting our feet on it. Then Joanna Leigh spotted on the opposite side, across that gorge, people! Several people were up there, maybe 100 feet </span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">higher than at our level.</span> <br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-S40So3DrJkU/VBB-_d9RBJI/AAAAAAAAGbg/2zgegKYe0-U/s1600/4Gorge-3.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-S40So3DrJkU/VBB-_d9RBJI/AAAAAAAAGbg/2zgegKYe0-U/s1600/4Gorge-3.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
<a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-q5Xv4jQkuvE/VB9c-xQP3-I/AAAAAAAAG4M/XMrfG50GGTY/s1600-h/4Gorge-1%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="4Gorge-1" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-fvD_ZBo3tJQ/VB9c_Rto4lI/AAAAAAAAG4Q/QjENiYU_k-8/4Gorge-1_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="301" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="4Gorge-1" width="227" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: medium;">The gorge and the “hikers” on the cliff opposite the bridge</span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: medium;"> and higher than we were on the bridge</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“What are those people doing,” Joanna Leigh asked.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Here’s what I said: “Oh, my gosh, I don’t know.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Here’s what I thought: They probably think of themselves as hikers; I think they’re dumbasses.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I said out loud: “Great, we’re about to witness a horrible tragedy and it will ruin our trip.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then, a drop out of the sky came down. None of had even noticed that rain clouds had built. Then another, and they were big drops. After checking my Intellicast app before we left the hotel, I grabbed Joanna Leigh’s raincoat and my waterproof poncho. We put them on just as it started coming down, in buckets. I have no idea how those dumbasses across the gorge survived; so far as any of us knew, they did. It had to be slippery as ice on that tiny ledge. Hundreds of people were in the line waiting for their group to be called. Most had no rain gear, and there was nothing to do but start the LONG walk down or stand and take it. Either way you’d be drenched. It rained and rained and rained. People were huddled under anyone’s umbrella, to no avail at all. It poured. Joanna Leigh’s raincoat seemed to be holding. The buckets became barrels. Rain dripped off people’s noses, hair, glasses, the umbrella’s teats, fingers, any bit of a slope it could find. The drips went down on people’s shoulders, their backs, the seams of their jackets, into their shoes. Hundreds of us, standing outside, for at least 30 minutes. I was trying to protect my phone-camera. I reached under my poncho. It wasn’t holding. It was wet inside. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I thought, “Wouldn’t it be better to just let everyone in rather than drip all this water onto the castle floors?” But it’s a “small” castle, so we all waited. It was amazing that there was so little grumbling. My guess is that because there were hundreds of us, a grumbler would be banished. The group ahead of us was called. Joanna Leigh must have gone with that group and I kind of panicked. I called and called. I told the women who was doing the group calling that I need to find her. She said, “No.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I said, “Watch me, hag,” and got by her. Some of our group has already gotten to the entrance steps and were looking out for her. Our tour began.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It’s funny, but I don’t have clear memories of much except for sneaking to get a photo or two and for the kitchen, which led to a long white plaster passageway out. I remember wondering if His Madness had imaginary dinner guests here too. </span> <br />
<a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-spxG_vkWT7c/VB9c_2VDcbI/AAAAAAAAG4c/adZNWAcdkqE/s1600-h/S6300747%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="S6300747" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-6QviaZfX3a8/VB9dEAfOCzI/AAAAAAAAG4k/bNZ6IaSsDC4/S6300747_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="464" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="S6300747" width="349" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: medium;">Moments before the Heavens poured buckets of rain</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I do remember that these interiors could be described as Extreme Outlandish Rococo, which may cause blurred memories. The internet has plenty of pictures, but I doubt that googling Extreme Outlandish Rococo will get you there. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">People have asked me what Joanna Leigh said about everything. More than saying things or commenting on everything, she seemed to be just sopping it all up. Mainly she said many times, “Jo, look at THAT, look at that.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Downhill has its advantages, but it was hard to keep that in mind for the long wet walk back to the buses. On the trip back to Munich it poured again. It was what we call a “frog strangler” and it was almost impossible to see much out the window. Everyone seemed exhausted. The tour guide sneaked a plate of French fries to Joanna Leigh and put her finger to her mouth to keep it under wraps.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The next day we would get on the train for Innsbruck and for the primary reasons for the trip. As in life, you have to be flexible.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">All photos here: <a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums" title="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums</a></span><br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Munich" rel="tag">Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Bavaria" rel="tag">Bavaria</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Oberammergau" rel="tag">Oberammergau</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Schloss+Linderhof" rel="tag">Schloss Linderhof</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Schloss+Neuschwanstein" rel="tag">Schloss Neuschwanstein</a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">My 7-year-old granddaughter, Joanna Leigh, and I traveled to Munich, Innsbruck, and Ridnauntal (German)-the Ridanna Valley (Italian) in northeastern Italy in August. Many friends are admitting astonishment that I planned, went, and pulled off such a trip. </span> <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zx1a6mcf1RY/VBdUfIubqTI/AAAAAAAAGz4/3u6Yg1LQO-w/s1600/2014-08-01%2B12.52.25%5B3%5D" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zx1a6mcf1RY/VBdUfIubqTI/AAAAAAAAGz4/3u6Yg1LQO-w/s1600/2014-08-01%2B12.52.25%5B3%5D" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">First, no one is more surprised than I am.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Second, how did we do it without ending up as wandering vagabonds somewhere in Europe? Help! And I am glad to admit it. And to admit I had drunken butterflies and hard rocks in my stomach for three months before we flew.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">And guess who did best of all: Those who know her know who did – yep, Joanna Leigh. Three statements indicate why: When we got to Munich and wandered away from the hotel, I got turned around coming back from the restaurant. She announced that from then on, she would take pictures along the way so I wouldn’t get us lost. She’s been reading too much Hansel and Gretel. The second was an order: “Jo, the next time I tell you to turn right, you’d better do it.” The third is what she announced after exploring the Sonklarhof in Ridanna: “Jo, I’m going to find a waiter and ask for a coke. If you need me, I’ll be back.” Mind you, my sister, Joanna Leigh and I were the only English speakers among everyone we dealt with, except for Roland’s passable English. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">On Friday, August 1, 2014, Joanna Leigh, all the suitcases – including the “Monster” piece in a set of three or four bags -- our documents, Euros, and I started out for Atlanta to board Delta’s repulsive 10-hour, non-stop flight to Munich. We would arrive the next morning (because of the time difference) about 8 a.m., tired, lagged, and fuzzy-brained.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The best help came from my travel agent, Teri, at </span><a href="http://www.wittetravel.com/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Witte Travel and Tours in Grand Rapids, MI</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">, which managed a tour I took some years ago. I turned over our trip details to her when I finally admitted that figuring out the ins-and-outs of this complicated adventure was too much for me. Before it was over, I would be plopped down in a puddle of tears. The payoff came right away. When we landed in Munich, feeling exhausted and goofy, and had gone through customs, we headed for the baggage area; lo, there stood a young man dressed in a white shirt under black pants and coat, very neat and professional, holding up a sign that read “HUTT.” I could have cried with joy. He got our luggage and we got in a black VW Jetta. Now the adventure could begin.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">As he pulled away and headed for the autobahn going, well I’m not sure, but fast, I looked back at the glass encased, dazzling Munich airport and wondered how in hell I would figure it out when we returned in a rented car for the flight home.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I peered out the Jetta window wondering if I would remember anything about Munich from my childhood, or if some scene would spark a flood of memories from the three years I lived there when I was Joanna Leigh’s age. No spark; just tired eyes. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The driver stopped right at the door of the <a href="http://www.kingshotels.com/">King’s Center Hotel on Marsstrasse</a>, which my agent, had chosen. I had told her not to book a four-star hotel because I wanted to spend that money some other way. The King’s Center turned out to be a great pick – four stars of service in a three-star disguise. Neatly tucked away in the middle of a block and two blocks from the Grey Line Tours stop and the Bahnhof, train station, it was cozy and small, with a small staff and a breakfast dining room across a private, quiet courtyard. The staff got to know us; they presented Joanna Leigh with a King’s Center stuffed bear when we left. The rooms and bathrooms were small, but enough for us. And it’s within walking distance to the city’s center.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">MUNICH</span></b> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I opted to spend three days of our limited vacation time in Munich because I had never been back since my father’s assignment, as part of the Allied Occupational Forces in Germany, soon after the end of World War II. I wanted to feel its character, touch its face, and see if I could recognize anything. I didn’t remember anything in particular, but emotions stirred when I saw the Frauenkirche, the Angel of Peace, the Isar River.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">My memories of our stay from 1948-51 are ones of a “normal” life, even though I remember bombed out buildings and rubble. It wasn’t really normal, but military brats have to get used to new places quickly.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Germany was pure devastation in all directions when I lived there. <span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">(See below. Notice the building and parade-goer perched in the window.)</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fJ6tTpsudow/VBdUgenGpmI/AAAAAAAAG0I/2xGblxDJWnY/s1600/Hutt%2BJ%2B012%5B5%5D" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-fJ6tTpsudow/VBdUgenGpmI/AAAAAAAAG0I/2xGblxDJWnY/s1600/Hutt%2BJ%2B012%5B5%5D" height="268" width="400" /></a></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-fJ6tTpsudow/VBdUgenGpmI/AAAAAAAAG0A/6HQGRAxkNS0/s1600-h/Hutt%252520J%252520012%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><br /></a></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Munich is more than 850 years old; it was almost totally destroyed in World War II and was rebuilt. Today, Munich’s face is clean and modern, with the old and the new put together; it was re-built in a rational order. Everything radiates from the pedestrian-only Marienplatz, the geographical center since the city’s founding, symbolized by the Mariensaule. Munich’s character is vibrant and lively. <a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-5R7V8_8rYpg/VBdUhcM5lEI/AAAAAAAAG0Q/wl_qt8TIXRw/s1600-h/Hutt%252520J%252520047%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img align="right" alt="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-JH7vXY8ImYE/VBdUiWEgZxI/AAAAAAAAG0Y/9LqlDS-MFzc/Hutt%252520J%252520047_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="293" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; float: right; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" width="433" /></a></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Except for one glaring flaw: Munich has a Michael Jackson Memorial. That I am able to find, Munich doesn’t have any worthy building or ruin or statue or memorial that demonstrates some responsibility for the horrors of Hitler’s reign or World War II in general. That the first Nazi concentration camp, Dachau, is near Munich and Bavarian children are mandated to go does NOT erase this extreme flaw. This failure, whether conscious or unconscious, stands in stark contrast to Berlin and its hollowed out Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche, which houses a plaque reading “The tower of the old church serves as a reminder of the judgment that God passed upon our people during the years of the war.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<a href="http://time.com/3375768/antisemitism-jews-germany-chancellor-angela-merkel/"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Time magazine</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> is reporting in the on-line edition that Germany is seeing a significant rise in anti-Semitic actions, which Chancellor Angela Merkel is vowing to do all it can to stop. </span> <br />
<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-JnLu9oRVjrE/VBdUjEU4zXI/AAAAAAAAG0g/pPtjHnnLncY/s1600-h/S6300802%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="S6300802" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-qbpfi-K5XwU/VBdUjgbtH0I/AAAAAAAAG0o/LpRAu9IhByk/S6300802_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="374" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="S6300802" width="497" /></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Marienplatz then (above) and now (left).</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Munich pictures: </span><a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6053080489927328145"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6053080489927328145</span></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"> </span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Post WWII photos taken by my father in 1948 to 1951, including the first Fasching Parade allowed after the War: </span><a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6034161984099124353"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6034161984099124353</span></a><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"> </span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">I have tried to ID the locations of the shots.</span><br />
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Lively, varied Marienplatz, Munich</div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Bavaria has a distinctive character; it is extraverted, familiar, and fun. It has a distinctive look; traditional Bavarian dress is treated not as a costume, but as everyday clothes for many; everywhere in the summer, buildings, homes, places have window boxes or planters with waterfalls of geraniums, impatiens, and all sorts of summer blooms. It has a distinctive sound, like the gulping down of great beer, the Oktoberfest that engulfs the town and area, the beer hall music. The Alps loom, like only one remaining wall of a fortress.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We got our first taste of the Alps when we made the trip to two of “Mad” Ludwig II’s castles: Linderhof via Oberammergau, and Walt Disney’s favorite, Neuschwanstein, on which he modelled castles for the Princesses, especially Sleeping Beauty. Our tour guide told us a couple of interesting facts: First, Ludwig II was not likely “mad” in the sense of “insane”; he was angry that Bavaria would not anoint him Divine Ruler, so he just built these Rococo castles as his fantasy world and stayed there. Sounds like to me that Ludwig carried both meanings around. Second, if you mispronounce the very mispronounce-able “Neuschwantstein,” you might be talking about some pig trail. </span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">The Castles: </span><a href="https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6057480604944440129"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">https://plus.google.com/photos/+JoannaCraveyHutt/albums/6057480604944440129</span></a> <br />
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-IxXLUAAjXSY/VBdUkZvMULI/AAAAAAAAG0s/FdRZoPGo3nY/s1600-h/3SchlossNsw-6%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><br /></a> <br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Joanna Leigh and I really enjoyed Munich, but after three days, I was ready to get on with the main reason for the trip: To meet Roland and Anton, and to discover what we could about dad’s bailout into the Stubai Alps and the crash site of his P-51. That’s next.</span><br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Witte+Travel+and+Tours" rel="tag">Witte Travel and Tours</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Kings+Center+Munich" rel="tag">Kings Center Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Munich" rel="tag">Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Fasching+Parade" rel="tag">Fasching Parade</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Lindhof" rel="tag">Lindhof</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Neuschwantstein+Castle" rel="tag">Neuschwantstein Castle</a></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-38360485171654224322014-09-08T08:54:00.001-05:002014-09-30T09:00:54.833-05:00The Mysterious Case of the Knee Defender<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Ok, I’m biting. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Now </span><a href="http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/news/2014/09/knee-defender-battle-puts-blame-on-passengers/index.htm"><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Consumer Reports</i> has weighed in on its Web site</span></span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> with a Knee Defender piece, and this is after many media reports on an incident at 35,000 feet. Attention includes </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/28/upshot/dont-want-me-to-recline-my-airline-seat-you-can-pay-me.html"><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;">the <i>New York Times</i></span></span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">, that stiff and credible publication; unlike other reports, the NYT and CR pieces have something substantial to say. Well, I do too. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">At first, responsibility for this incident and others like it was dumped on passengers. When I saw that angle being reported, I ended up screaming to the television “It’s no mystery who’s at fault here, dummy. It’s not the passengers; it is the airlines.” It’s my guess that I wasn’t alone. I’ll bet many, many passengers were thinking, if not screaming, the same thing. Isn’t it just like so many big businesses and corporations shouting, “Oh, no. It’s not us. It’s Halliburton,” or “Oh, no, we’re not the same company now. Those faulty cars were <i>back then</i>, not <i>now</i>.” “Oh, not on our airline; we have Economy Plus.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It may have been the Associated Press who first put it out there. </span><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/aug/26/plane-diverted-as-passengers-fight-over-seat-reclining"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The Guardian picked it up</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> with these headlines: “Plane diverted as passengers fight over seat reclining”. Then the story of the incident went viral. Whose curiosity could resist? One tall passenger put the knee defender on the tray he ate on to prevent the passenger in the seat in front of him from reclining. That passenger was so infuriated, she threw her cold water on him. Fight on. Then the United plane made an unscheduled stop to dump them both off the plane. Then it went on its merry way. I wonder what descending and taking off costs in fuel and whatever else.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Frankly, I don’t know why the rest of the passengers didn’t rise up in a revolt.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I’m biting because my passengership makes me an expert on this subject. On August 1 my granddaughter and I boarded Delta’s flight 130, a non-stop ten-hour trip to Munich. We would arrive the next morning (because of the time difference) about 8 a.m., tired, lagged, and fuzzy-brained from no sleep. On the 11<sup>th</sup>, we had to repeat the trip backwards on Delta’s flight 131 to Atlanta. Then I drove us home, with no sleep.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It wasn’t so much that it was grueling. It’s the fact that it was NASTY. Plain nasty. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Which Customers First?</span></b> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Fourth (I’m going in reverse order), I paid extra for Delta’s version of Economy Plus, seats located behind first class, an area where the airplane hasn’t yet started getting narrow – more room, more comfy, more perks. <b>Are you kidding, Delta?</b> When we got on and found our seats I looked back at “regular” economy and I knew: I had wasted that money. Perks? <b>Have you lost your mind, Delta?</b> We weren’t offered anything, not even water, while I watched some fawning steward offering all the, what, maybe 10, First Class passengers champagne and what could have been chocolate truffles.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Don’t waste your money.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Third, coming back I asked one of the stewardettes in charge of snapping the blue netting together on the boundary of First Class and Economy Plus if my granddaughter, age 7, could use the bathroom between our Economy Plus and First Class. The hag said, No, I’m sorry.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then Joanna Leigh spilled about half of her orange juice the stewardettes brought with the one-inch square, tiny bag of pretzels. Juice was dripping off the tray. I was frantically looking for something to sop it up with. I even grabbed napkins off other passengers’ trays. I realize now a fight could have ensued. The stewardette in charge of rolling that blasted cart down the almost too narrow aisle came by. I said, “Please, I need some paper towels or napkins.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The hag handed me two, count ‘em two, <b>cocktail napkins</b>. I was flabbergasted.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then came dinner, the “food,” and that’s a real knee-slapper. I wondered if the airlines pay an employee to stop at Walmart or Target to pick up the Fisher Price “food” they serve the passengers. I remember giving some like it to Joanna Leigh when she got her kitchen set for Christmas.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Second, and this one really should be First, the bathrooms. For a 10-hour flight with 250-plus passengers, you essentially have four little cubbies when you subtract the two for all those ten First Class passengers. If they catch the hoi polloi using those, they might disembark them along with any fighters. Those bathrooms were worse than any port-o-potty at the State Fair. Don’t bring your own spray bottle of Clorox or the hidden Air Marshalls would rise up and deplane you. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The bathrooms on a long flight are a health hazard. Plain and simple.</span> <br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">First Class Dumps</span></b> <br />
<strong><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span></strong> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Finally, number ONE, the <b>seats</b>, which is where the primary fault lies. Or sits. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Imagine a profile of a seat in the famed “upright and locked” position – with no lumbar support – up to the pillowed “head rest.” Now imagine the poor passenger sitting in it, arched forward all the way up to the “head rest,” which tilts your head down toward your chest, which means that you are sitting in a crescent-moon arched position. That’s against the laws of physics, except for the Dream Works logo of a kid sitting on a moon sliver with his fishing pole hanging into the stars. You need lumbar support and a pillowed area to support <b>not your head</b>, but your neck. Then your head can rest slightly back. Passengers would sleep instead of fight. Like this:</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
I <br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-wGBD60-zIjQ/VBdWuTAhOvI/AAAAAAAAG1E/zkVJPtviasc/s1600/seat.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-wGBD60-zIjQ/VBdWuTAhOvI/AAAAAAAAG1E/zkVJPtviasc/s1600/seat.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></div>
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">I use this chair at my desk in my study. Look, lumbar support, padded neck support that lets you tilt your head back a bit, and a tilt function for the chair. I think Sealy makes it, and I got it at Sam’s Club. So, duh, what would it take to convert it to an airline chair?</span> <span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">As far as I’m concerned, this chair redesign and attention to the bathrooms are high priority. <span style="font-size: small;">Mystery solved. </span></span></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I almost forgot -- the baggage. The airlines have you cornered here. Luggage sets come with a monster bag, a “carry-on,” a tote, and sometimes one other. To keep the Monster bag under 50 pounds, you’d have to pack nothing but cotton balls. So you pay. And if your “carry on” is too big to fit in a measuring bag the airlines use, then you have to leave boarding and re-go to the checked bags line. And miss your flight, so that the airlines can assign your seats to someone else who will pay, thereby double-dipping. So you pay.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Delta should be ashamed of breaking the first rule of business: Successful companies put customer satisfaction first. There’s competition out there, Delta; American companies turn on customer service. I’ll end this rant with <i>Consumer Reports</i> angle: “The airlines are largely to blame precisely because they’re shoehorning more people into tighter and tighter spaces, says a travel industry expert and <i>Consumer Reports</i> consultant, William McGee.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">And, “most U.S. airlines have decided to reduce ‘seat pitch’—the distance between rows—in economy/coach sections. In many cases, the existing knee room is inadequate for some passengers, McGhee says, even with seats fully upright. ‘The last I checked, the seat pitch on Spirit Airlines was 28 inches, which is simply cruel’, he said.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Joanna Leigh and I had a memorable and astonishing trip, Delta notwithseating. Next time I’ll look at Lufthansa or maybe Singapore airlines. It flies east via Europe to go to the Far East. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">More on our wonderful trip in future posts.</span> <br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-51254154301523348512014-07-20T13:43:00.001-05:002014-09-30T09:00:28.543-05:00Flying Eastward into the Past: Ridanna, Italy<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-2594W5UIqZU/U8wNspxbGSI/AAAAAAAAFQk/YrbAmqcL77Q/s1600-h/1-crash%252520site%252520glacier%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="1-crash site glacier" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-KGTZgWIZyhM/U8wNtW2OFmI/AAAAAAAAFQs/kPljh76-D9g/1-crash%252520site%252520glacier_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="290" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="1-crash site glacier" width="578" /></a></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">In a recent phone conversation, a friend pinned me down. “Now, why are you making this trip, what will be your takeaway? Since Joanna Leigh is only seven, what do you want or expect her to get from it?” she asked.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">A few years after my father died in 1995 and I had brought home a lot of his possessions to store, I decided to take on the project of looking deeper into his World War II event. I wasn’t sure why.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I started by pulling out the three 55- or 60- year-old scrapbooks (now they are more like 70 years old) my mother had put together beginning with dad’s enlistment after Pearl Harbor, getting his wings, his Missing in Action status, his return, and our lives living in Munich from 1948-51 where dad was assigned as part of the Allied Occupational Forces. I was in the first, second, and third grades there.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I slipped the second one out of the plastic wrapping; it covered his War experience as a P-51 Mustang pilot flying out of Italy into Bavaria ( see below). I opened it and realized the pages were terribly fragile, crumbling into sand as I turned them. There were letters, telegrams, notices of his MIA status, pieces of his parachute, Nazi money, all kinds of things, but one news article cut from an unidentified paper caught my eye. It was dated February 22, 1945, the day dad had to bail out of his damaged P-51 over the Alps.</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-O6TJO_mwHEA/U8wNuKgtbRI/AAAAAAAAFQ0/wKj25LK2-Wk/s1600-h/Scrapbook%252520Cravey%252520Parachute%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Scrapbook Cravey Parachute" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-r_kp1p8lJSQ/U8wNu9G6lUI/AAAAAAAAFQ8/44X3OxcvSn4/Scrapbook%252520Cravey%252520Parachute_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="387" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Scrapbook Cravey Parachute" width="542" /></a> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Here’s what the article said</span>:</span> <br />
<b><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“9,000 Planes Pound Nazi Rail Lines Greatest Air Fleet of War Deals Kayo Blow ---- Results Good: Aerial Offensive Against Reich in Final Phase LONDON, Feb. 22 – (UP) </span></b> <br />
<i><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The greatest air fleet of the war – an estimated 9,000 bombers and fighters – dealt a knockout blow today to the entire rail transportation system of western Germany, blasting every primary and secondary rail line in that section of the Reich and paralyzing enemy communications.”</span></i> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It went on to say that with the 2,000 additional air planes of the Red Army, the total would be more like 11,000 Allied planes in action over Germany that day.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>“Every type of plane at the disposal of the Allied air chiefs was thrown into combat,” </i>it went on.<i> And it was the “best flying weather since Summer [1944].”</i></span></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">After that 1944 summer came the infamous winter of the Battle of the Bulge, weather that continued over Europe until spring 1945, including that fateful day dad took off in his P-51.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>“Italy-based heavy bombers dropped the largest tonnage of bombs ever carried in one operation by the 15<sup>th</sup> Air Force planes. Fighters and bombers together flew more than 1,000 sorties to attack communications along the Brenner Pass, in northeast Italy and northern Yugoslavia</i>,” it continued. Then quoting returning airmen, it said, <i>“. . . ‘and Berlin is completely cut off from northwestern, eastern and southwestern Germany’.”</i></span></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The War would come to an end sooner than expected, and part of the reason must have been this day. I wanted to know more of what the day meant. Dad was taken into custody by the Nazis after his descent from “Sugar Mountain,” according to his sketchy retelling, into a small Italian village in the mountain’s valley. According to dad, four men “nursed him back to health.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Suddenly I realized that the date he went down was a week after the horrendous and infamous Allied bombing of Dresden and Leipzig.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Something about the date and the following week – it had meaning, but what?</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<b><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Life Changes</span></b> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then circumstances grabbed my life, including the birth of my granddaughter we are raising, and I dropped the project. Until September 2012, that is.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The telltale “ping” alerted me to an e-mail coming into my virtual mailbox on Sept. 1, 2012. It was in the preview pane, and it came from someone with a strange name. Maybe Domanig Roland or Roland Domanig. Naturally I thought it was spam or a hoax. I lifted my finger to delete it. Something stopped me; I just closed the preview screen of it and went on to something else. Yet something must have been tickling my brain; I let it sit there for a week as I dealt with stuff all around it.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Days later I looked at it in the preview pane; yes, the “something” was the subject line and the stranger’s e-mail address. When I first looked at it, I had skimmed the subject line and I saw “Lt. Col. John T. Cravey,” but it wasn’t those words. Instead, it was “Lt. John Cravey.” Dad was a lieutenant 70 years ago. Then I saw “Tirol” in the sender’s address. I finally spotted another clue -- “USAAF,” the War acronym for what became the USAF (United States Air Force) after World War II. Dad had gone down in the Tyrolean Alps on the border between Austria and Italy. So, I took the risk; I opened it. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">It read, in sort of halting English, “Madame, if you get this, please send note. I am researching WWII fates.” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Hmmm. A language problem. And his name was Roland Domanig. I bit. I answered, asking for some proof of ID, a bit insulting, I think. Thankfully he sent another e-mail. In that one he said, “We have visited your father’s crashite.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">With the e-mail came a weird picture of some barren-looking mountain landscape, a turquoise blue glacier lake, and a black dot in the middle of the photo (shown at the top). It hit me. He meant “crash site.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Not only have we never known where dad’s P-51 crashed, truthfully, I’m not sure it ever mattered much. He came home. As kids, my brother and sister and I knew about dad’s World War II adventure, but to us that’s what it was, an adventure. He never told us anything different. The story we knew was like reading a good comic book and we liked to tell it to other kids: <em>“My dad’s a Super Hero and flies cool planes. He bombed the bad guys and shot stuff up until they fired flak into the air from a cannon or something and it hit his plane. He had to bail out onto a mountain and get down it. Some men helped him, but the bad Nazis captured him and he went to a prisoner of war camp. Then the Americans won and he left the prison; he was a hero. He got on a boat to get home.”</em></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Dad didn’t know the location either, as far as we knew. Dad’s flight leader, Capt. Roger Zierenberg (who later received the Silver Star and was eventually promoted to full Colonel), said in a letter to mom dated May 1, 1945, that the plane went down “about 25 miles southeast of Innsbruck, Austria.” That’s all. He did say that dad was the best wingman he ever flew with. That letter did not reach mom until dad had already returned in June, so she had no answers about his fate until she got a telegram from him on about June 1, 1945, saying he was on his way to Atlanta. She was battling a badly abscessed tooth, but she took off as fast as she could, swollen face and all.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Roland Domanig said there were more photos.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">In the flood of e-mails that followed, he sent photos of the long debris field with pieces mixed in with gravel, ice, and dirt. I would learn much later why there were no large pieces or the engine or propeller. Among the small pieces was the P-51’s production plate. It’s about the size of a good hardback novel lying on its side. If you find the production plate, you can track down the plane and its airman. There’s no figuring out the odds against ever finding the crash site, let alone the production plate when so much of the crash had been hauled off. I believe that warming in the Alps uncovered pieces lying deep in the glacier ice and snow in 1945.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then he told me about Anton, his friend and fellow crash site “archaeologist” who lives in the Ridanna Valley (called Ridnauntal in German) and who led Roland to the crash site. I would learn later of the incredible role his father and older brother played in dad’s story.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">So, Joanna Leigh and I will board a plane August 1 for a direct flight to Munich. We will stay several days. Then we’ll take the train from the Munich train station, which is said to be gorgeous, to Innsbruck, where I will finally meet Roland Domanig in person; I will rent a car, and Roland will lead us over the Brenner Pass into Italy to the Ridanna Valley, where we will meet Anton Volgger, put our eyes on Zuckerhutl, the mountain, and stay in the hotel (greatly transformed) where mom and dad stayed (when we were stationed in Munich) when they went back to the valley to revisit the site of dad’s unimaginable survival. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">What will my takeaway be? I don’t know, but the thought gives me butterflies. I’m feeling low-level anxiety. I know that Roland and Anton have given us a rare gift: Truth. He has offered us a real story of the real person, not an Action Hero, his moment in real history, his odds-crushing survival, and the reality of the awful nature of War. It was not the John Wayne and Hogan’s Heroes version that we were fed for decades.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Here’s what I believe Joanna Leigh will get from it: I was her age when we were stationed in Munich. My memories are spotty, childish, and now dim. I remember the Fasching Parade against a backdrop of bombed out buildings and piles of rubble. I remember several iconic pieces of the undamaged city scape: the Frauenkirche, the Glockenspiel, and what I’ve always called the Angel of Peace. I remember the cold water of the Isar River.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Her memories may be as fuzzy. But one takeaway will serve her, and my other granddaughter, in a remarkable way: They will be alive to celebrate the 100<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the end of World War II and will hold hands with that past to make the celebration come alive for them. Their great-grandfather, Grand John, was there and played his heroic part to end that gruesome war. </span> <br />
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;">Special Note:</span> We will stay in the Sonklarhof located in the valley (</span><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">http://www.sonklarhof.it/en/)</span><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">. It has a <a href="http://%28http//www.sonklarhof.it/en/more-than-400-years-of-hospitality-and-gastronomic-tradition-in-the-ridanna-valley/">long history</a></span><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"> and is a modern winter ski resort and a summer wellness spa. Germans, Italians, and other Europeans often vacation there.</span><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">On the history page, the second photo in the slideshow is a shot of the old dining room. Here is the photo dad shot in 1950:</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-9P4XmMrbMew/U8wNvtutzpI/AAAAAAAAFRE/j7F_PL5qljs/s1600-h/Ridnaun_0015%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Ridnaun_0015" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Wn5c0t6hiwQ/U8wNwaXcJHI/AAAAAAAAFRM/j0foqbuTQuY/Ridnaun_0015_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="403" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Ridnaun_0015" width="585" /></a></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">Notice the large oil, shot perhaps because it is of the Mountain. I will find out; I will also keep my fingers crossed that the hotel still has it somewhere.</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;">When dad and mom returned to the Valley in 1950, they drove in our Woodie, which the military has shipped to Munich, as Germany had very few goods of any kind. Anton was a boy, maybe about ten, and has a distinct memory of the legendary airman returning in a mythic car. Here it is:</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-HZm4G3I-qTU/U8wNw0xTSwI/AAAAAAAAFRU/BffzL2NsLog/s1600-h/Hutt%252520J%252520060%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" border="0" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-8Z1G9pp3nuY/U8wNxeiX92I/AAAAAAAAFRc/kwZr-xtCMIM/Hutt%252520J%252520060_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="345" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Autosave-File vom d-lab2/3 der AgfaPhoto GmbH" width="509" /></a> <br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Ridanna+Italy" rel="tag">Ridanna Italy</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Ridnaun" rel="tag">Ridnaun</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/southern+Tyrol" rel="tag">southern Tyrol</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Sonklarhof" rel="tag">Sonklarhof</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Woodie" rel="tag">Woodie</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/P-51" rel="tag">P-51</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/production+plate" rel="tag">production plate</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/World+War+II" rel="tag">World War II</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Allied+Occupational+Forces" rel="tag">Allied Occupational Forces</a></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-50822894348792588352014-07-13T21:56:00.001-05:002014-07-13T22:00:05.324-05:00Flash Post<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Right this minute I think I could KILL for some aspirin. That’s ASPIRIN. Generic. Bayer. Ralph Lauren. I don’t care whose name is on it. Don Corleone. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I’m having a pain block for my chronic back stuff Tuesday, so I can take Joanna Leigh to Germany, Austria, Italy in less than three weeks with some peace of mind. (To see a bit about that trip, go <a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/05/paris-were-going-to-paris.html">here</a>; I hope to post more about the trip soon.) The instructions were, “Quit taking your anti-inflammatory meds, including aspirin, Celebrex, all the other NSAIDs, because they are blood thinners.” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">So I quit taking the meds Friday. Yesterday was ok, but today is awful. The doctor’s going to ask me where it hurts, and I’m going to say, “How much time do you have?”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I want three aspirin right now more than I want the Peach Cobbler I made with <a href="http://www.beachbecky.com/index.html/index.html/">Chilton Co., Alabama, peaches</a> – the best in the world.</span><br />
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<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-8poTxV1pwuU/U8NG3baIWwI/AAAAAAAAFPk/-BPUKT-mlxg/s1600-h/Peaches-1%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img alt="Peaches-1" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJuKQddcnqNBCjMm3Q6RAU7hWJcJSI1Pee7ud8-mgFSWLRVxIfsr0Je0_T9YnvydZSvp1SXmAa7YwFQsU6Le8OKsJ_kn2a8fldhhRTRDqg-EX_xm3-JHznjv7FXh8z9GUN0TvCYkHEu8G7/?imgmax=800" height="372" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="Peaches-1" width="280" /></a><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-px2WCEUCnvM/U8NG4sL-l0I/AAAAAAAAFPs/1AT5YICSRIg/s1600-h/peaches%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="peaches" border="0" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-L7OXC6BLuBc/U8NG5ZXTUwI/AAAAAAAAFP8/rlgBjk6ceIk/peaches_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="370" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="peaches" width="280" /></a><br />
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<a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-NW8QHVwzApw/U8NG53FVw-I/AAAAAAAAFQE/AH0dPj3YBt4/s1600-h/PeachCobbler%25255B5%25255D.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="PeachCobbler" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-1hKkubXfgr0/U8NG6dkeRSI/AAAAAAAAFQM/OsAufcUEqRg/PeachCobbler_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="370" style="background-image: none; border: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="PeachCobbler" width="277" /></a><br />
<blockquote>
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">These + these = </span></blockquote>
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<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;"> This Beauty</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">But I want three aspirin more than I want cobbler. In rattling off the instructions, the nurse also said, “Oh, but don’t worry. You can still take your hydrocodone.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Oh, whoopee. I don’t’ want hydrocodone. I want anti-inflammatory medicine for the fourth item on the list of my back issues: arthritis in my spine. Not in my hands or feet or anywhere else; just in my spine. Is that a good or bad thing? I have no idea and I don’t care. I just want my aspirin. Wwwhhhhhaaaaaaa!!!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Thanks for listening.</span><br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/aspirin" rel="tag">aspirin</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/peach+cobbler" rel="tag">peach cobbler</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/peaches" rel="tag">peaches</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Chilton+Co.+peaches" rel="tag">Chilton Co. peaches</a></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-54087239839549117622014-07-04T15:17:00.001-05:002014-07-04T15:17:29.327-05:00Celebrate the 4th with Grits: A Reminder<p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">NOTE: This post is an edited version of a 2010 post</font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-IApZXklFy6Q/U7cLxnno01I/AAAAAAAAFDA/yaml6_HDY3Y/s1600-h/225px-T_Jefferson_by_Charles_Willson_Peale_1791_2%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="225px-T_Jefferson_by_Charles_Willson_Peale_1791_2" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="225px-T_Jefferson_by_Charles_Willson_Peale_1791_2" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-icOoWOVyz6o/U7cLySCPNRI/AAAAAAAAFDI/b0E7jhOoaIo/225px-T_Jefferson_by_Charles_Willson_Peale_1791_2_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="288" height="402"></a></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">This July 4<sup>th</sup>, celebrate by including America’s “first food,” grits. </font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">For 400+ years, Americans </font><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/05/grits-first-food-first-family.html"><font size="3" face="Georgia">have been eating corn</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia">. It stands to reason that grits came into the culinary repertoire soon after that. </font> <p><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/07/400-year-old-grits.html"><font size="3" face="Georgia">Thomas Jefferson served grits, according to Craig Claiborne</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia">, one of culinary America’s Founding Fathers and long-time food editor for <i>The New York Times</i>. So, serving grits on July 4<sup>th</sup> is really, well, the patriotic thing to do.</font> <p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">But soon after Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, a cultural event occurred that probably sealed grits’ becoming America’s First Food. Twenty years after the American Revolution, in 1796, a young orphan lady named Amelia Simmons published a cookbook, America’s first one. </font><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2009/07/400-year-old-grits.html"><b><font size="3" face="Georgia">Until then no cookbook dealt with the indigenous food ingredients available in America</font></b><font face="Georgia"><font size="3"></a>. Even one by a man. <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-gSGnjB15PAs/U7cLy1bgZdI/AAAAAAAAFDQ/78siRfWZS9k/s1600-h/image8.png"><img title="image" style="border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px" border="0" alt="image" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-GIGiCfwQD7A/U7cLzv8NyeI/AAAAAAAAFDY/FRAL14ZnjAA/image_thumb3.png?imgmax=800" width="331" align="right" height="497"></a> <p> <p> <p><b><i>AMERICAN COOKERY</i></b><i> or the Art of Dressing Viands, Fish, Poultry and Vegetables, and the Best Modes of Making Pastes, Puffs, Pies, Tarts, Puddings, Custards, and Preserves, and all Kinds of Cakes from the Imperial Plumb to Plain Cake Adapted to the Country and All Grades of Life</i> – the first cookbook aimed democratically at the masses and <b>slanted towards women; it is the first cookbook to show corn meal</b> as a primary ingredient. It includes the first recipes for Indian Slapjacks and Johnny Cake, as well as <strong>“A Nice Indian Pudding,”</strong> all of which became staples in the following centuries. <p> <p>This was the first cookbook aimed democratically at the masses and <strong>slanted towards women; it is the first book to show corn meal</strong> as a primary ingredient. It includes the first recipes for Indian Slapjacks and Johnny Cake, as well as “A Nice Indian Pudding,” all of which became staples in the following centuries. Text and page images of this original edition are available at the <a href="http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks/html/authors/author_simmons.html">Michigan State University Digital Library “Feeding America”</a> site. <p> <p><strong>In the preface, Miss Amelia says</strong>: <p><em>As this treatise is calculated for the improvement of the rising generation of Females in America, the Lady of fashion and fortune will not be displeased, if many hints are suggested for the more general and universal knowledge of those females in this country, who by the loss of their parents, or other unfortunate circumstances, are reduced to the necessity of going into families in the line of domestics, or taking refuge with their friends or relations, and doing those things which are really essential to the perfecting them as good wives, and useful members of society.</em> <p> <p>So this 4<sup>th</sup> of July, <b>serve grits</b>. <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-sjrlQZnkzSQ/U7cL0IJxbpI/AAAAAAAAFDc/uTP1nhK1GL4/s1600-h/amer025%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="amer025" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: left; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="amer025" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-KB_pOD0pCPU/U7cL0m8hmcI/AAAAAAAAFDk/ozr2NARCxHk/amer025_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="262" align="left" height="425"></a> <blockquote> <p>In honor of the birthday, here are Miss Amelia’s three recipes for A Nice Indian Pudding, found in the facsimile on page 26: </p></blockquote> <p>No. 1. 3 pints scalded milk, 7 spoons fine Indian meal, stir well together while hot, let stand till cooled; add 7 eggs, half pound raisins, 4 ounces butter, spice and sugar, bake one and half hour. <p>No. 2. 3 pints scalded milk to one pint meal salted; cool, add 2 eggs, 4 ounces of butter, sugar or molasses and spice q.s. it will require two and half hours. <a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-8MAqM0WRDpk/U7cL1fMcpcI/AAAAAAAAFDs/qwkj63lDSa8/s1600-h/amer033%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="amer033" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="amer033" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-iRs5xrVgm4A/U7cL14YmviI/AAAAAAAAFD4/hwo-zOwIjic/amer033_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="279" height="445"></a> <p>No. 3. Salt a pint meal, wet with one quart milk, sweeten and put into a strong cloth, brass or bell metal vessel, stone or earthen pot, secure from wet and boil 12 hours. <p> <p>Hope your July 4, 2014 is fun and safe. <p> <p> <p align="center"> </p></font></font> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-52485757164650481812014-05-15T13:59:00.001-05:002014-10-22T09:50:38.440-05:00“Paris! We’re Going to Paris!”<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcWWV7aE7yNUTFa0xTk62NBNBQP1t537stNodsSpTPf-xgpYpfolaSj44OBm2ww67EBnsMdZMrZ55IxIJukM2UHd3Q5mQLwBN99eCm-suaXEgRbRxuTOD3Lvq4z92tr-1AmpNc8P_cFtjT/s1600-h/clip_image004%25255B3%25255D.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="clip_image004" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-WpvnxZVB-UM/U3UOgf-o2fI/AAAAAAAAE5o/l4v3hLh89cs/clip_image004_thumb.png?imgmax=800" height="244" style="background-image: none; border: 0px; display: inline; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="clip_image004" width="226" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">So it was time to query Joanna Leigh about the trip this summer. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">(If the “so” at the beginning of the opening sentence is like fingernails scraping across the blackboard, go </span><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-everyone-is-starting-sentences-with-the-word-so-2014-5?utm_source=slate&utm_medium=referral&utm_term=partner"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">here</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. It’s simply the newest thing in words.)</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Anyway, as I was saying, I needed to make sure she would not be afraid of a big airplane. Or flying over a big ocean. Or going where she might have to eat new food. I waited until after I put her in the bathtub. I got started while she was a captive audience.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Honey, I need to talk to you about a big trip. If you go some places, you have to fly in a really big plane for a lot of hours and you have to fly over an ocean and. . . .”</span> <br />
<a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-g1Y3JO4NqXE/U3UOaUVsP_I/AAAAAAAAE5I/ORQzCJoODkU/s1600-h/clip_image002%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span></a> <br />
<a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-cs3bhnYSzWw/U3UOb335mPI/AAAAAAAAE5Q/dfMi4WJyDg8/s1600-h/clip_image002%25255B8%25255D.jpg"><img alt="[clip_image002%255B8%255D.jpg]" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-cs3bhnYSzWw/U3UOb335mPI/AAAAAAAAE5Q/dfMi4WJyDg8/s1600/clip_image002%25255B8%25255D.jpg" /></a> <br />
<div align="center">
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Figure 1, The Eiffel Tower, Paris</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">She jumped up in the bath water, waving her hands in the air and screaming, “Paris! We’re going to Paris! I just know it. Oh, I’ll get to see the Eiffel Tower. . . .”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I’m thinking, “What does she know about the Eiffel Tower? Or Paris?”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“I just LOVE their clothes,” she says.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I’m thinking, “Whose clothes?”</span> <br />
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<h3>
</h3>
<h3>
<img alt="Photo" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/5eKHKRwih8F5ZMd7pq_Z8z69qacT_Oh9n9KLHH3sTUg=w233-h250-p-no" /></h3>
<h3>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">More here about </span><a href="http://www.vogue.com/voguepedia/Coco_Chanel">COCO CHANEL</a>. . .<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS;">who put Paris couture on the map</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">My eyes are getting dangerously wide, like maybe they’ll pop out of the sockets.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“And their desserts! Oh I just love their desserts!” </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">At first I just stood there, speechless. Then I had to leave the bathroom, go into my bedroom, and silently scream, “Wwwhhhaaaatt? What the hell does she know about Parisian clothes and desserts??? What about wines? Has she been reading up on Burgundy, too?”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I had to break the news. I walked back into the bathroom, holding out Truth in my hands. “No, honey, not Paris this time (I’m thinking, ‘Like maybe there’ll be a next time?’).”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Ooohh. Ok, where are we going?” she asked, sitting back down in the water.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“Well, we’re going to the country just past France. It’s Germany. I need to know if you want to go.” Then I ran through all the items that might be scary to her.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“I want to go. When can we go? Where is Germany? Do they have pizza and French toast? Will we fly over Paris?” </span> <br />
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<div align="center">
<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-DS-hJaBTfsk/U3UOhQmu7rI/AAAAAAAAE5s/T2EYVoRaWhg/s1600-h/clip_image006%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="clip_image006" border="0" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-uWBMNf6HTEA/U3UOh5ft86I/AAAAAAAAE50/hXdU011Rhv4/clip_image006_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="346" style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; border-right: 0px; border-top: 0px; display: inline; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="clip_image006" width="461" /></a></div>
<div align="center">
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: Trebuchet MS;">Figure 2, Neuschwantstein Castle, Bavaria</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">The questions were coming fast. We talked it out until I felt like it was safe to nail down airline tickets, reservations for side trips, like a tour to Mad Ludwig’s fantasy palaces in </span><a href="http://www.castles.org/castles/Europe/Central_Europe/Germany/germany7.htm"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Neuschwantstein</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"> and </span><a href="http://www.castles.org/castles/Europe/Central_Europe/Germany/germany12.htm"><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Linderhof</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">. I tried to imagine all the new stuff, like riding a train and a subway, crossing some really big mountains, not understanding the language, and on and on. She said she couldn’t wait to do it all.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">We talked a while. I laid down the law on certain things, like how she would do what I say, when I say it. I started brushing my teeth. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">Then she said, “Jo, here’s what we’re going to do.” She got out of the tub and got her towel.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">She has this manner when she takes on the role of the Boss. She puts one hand on her hip and gesticulates with the other hand in a kind of Queen Elizabeth position. So there she stood, in the pose, making decisions, bossing.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“When we get on the airplane, here’s what you need to do. Tell the pilot. . . .’</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I’m thinking, “What does she know about the pilot of a Delta Airbus???”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">“. . . the pilot that when he flies over Paris, he needs to fly really low and go over the Eiffel Tower kind of slow, so I can see it.”</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I nearly blew my toothpaste onto the mirror.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">So as it stands, we walk down the covered walkway to the plane, enter, she spots one of the pilots greeting guests, and . . . . </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: small;">I don’t know. She’ll decide.</span> <br />
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Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Paris" rel="tag">Paris</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/The+Eiffel+Tower" rel="tag">The Eiffel Tower</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Coco+Chanel" rel="tag">Coco Chanel</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Neuschwantstein+Castle.+summer+vacation" rel="tag">Neuschwantstein Castle. summer vacation</a></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-21032413258145969202014-05-07T15:21:00.001-05:002015-11-10T13:57:01.208-06:00Birthdays: Moosburg and Munich<img alt="[Frauenkirche_M%25C3%25BCnchen_as_seen_from_St._Peter%255B3%255D.jpg]" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv5LKAgPFdUblhjYOHP9nfJ23L9fX0tNGP517pcVtxlwsmt0yJoCH7mKzvuFZ8GtPVPPQxwZhR5DMByWsnrInRuCi2dRZAuUKJzJAXAy7rSrhkgwdyHMS6NO1mJGyOvgHBnbJ_Ze0m6P5N/s1600/Frauenkirche_M%2525C3%2525BCnchen_as_seen_from_St._Peter%25255B3%25255D.jpg" /><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia";">Today, 69 years ago on his 30th birthday, my father was wandering the streets of Moosburg, Germany, as a liberated POW from the nearby camp – Stalag VII – begging for food. He was a bony, emaciated version of his large, imposing figure, always described as handsome, that he kept below 200 pounds. Under 200 at least until after he retired and started eating lots of ice cream. ( I have seen “Moosburg” also spelled “Moosberg.” I’m landing on the first one.”)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia";">He stood on a 6-feet three-inch frame topped with a full head of dark hair. In his starving condition, his hair was likely thinning, a symptom of malnutrition. But I don’t really know. Photos after his return and for a year or two afterwards don’t exist, as far as I know.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia";">I once asked dad a question that arose in my mind probably from watching one of the many stupid, lying, deplorable versions of life in a POW camp, like “Hogan’s Heroes” or “The Great Escape.” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia";"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia";">“Dad, what did you all in the POW camp think about? Betty Grable’s legs or something else off a pin-up poster?” I think I may have asked the question suggesting “sex” as a possible answer.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia";"> <br />
“Oh, for crying out loud, no,” he answered, sort of laughing. “The only thing any of us ever thought about was food. Just food. We talked about our favorite food, our favorite meal, our last meal before being captured, what we’d eat first when we got out. Just food.”<br />
<br />
He always explained that the Germans, by that time in the war, had nothing to eat either. He told my cousin that all they ate were turnips.<br />
<br />
But the widespread starvation was the very thing that brought such danger to prisoners captured that late: The Germans could have simply killed many, many of the prisoners in that camp built to hold 10,000, but which had somewhere between 80,000 to 100,000 POWs. <br />
<br />
Only four years after World War II, dad had to return to the place where the evils of Nazism had caused such horrific death and suffering for millions and millions and millions of human beings including himself. And that place where his role was to bomb, strafe, and bomb. He got orders to Neubiberg AFB, in Munich, Germany. He would join the 86th Fighter Group as part of the Allied Occupational Forces. He left just after the first of the year, 1949, and my mother, younger brother, and I (my sister was born in Munich) followed some months later, on the QE I, where I threw up every single day for the two-week trip crossing the Atlantic. It’s my only memory of that trip, except being held down by a big orderly and a nurse who gave me daily shots. Dramamine hadn’t been invented yet. <br />
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I don’t think I ever asked dad how he felt about going back to Germany, to Munich, just down the road from Stalag VIIA. In my moments of regret over what I never asked or didn’t get answers to, I remind myself that dad wasn’t going to provide any details anyway. He always answered those questions in a light, evasive way. He would have said, “Oh, I didn’t think about it much. I got orders and I just went.”<br />
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Only recently have I learned that he must have made a conscious decision early on to lowball his World War II experiences that by all reason should have caused his death.<br />
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<a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-sdczSEXob_4/U2qVt6NzWbI/AAAAAAAAE4g/jPUeaJqBP8w/s1600-h/MunichClass1%25255B5%25255D.jpg"><img alt="MunichClass1" border="0" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-xZV4jevXDDk/U2qVvFGk-MI/AAAAAAAAE4k/RXBgj-i8GVw/MunichClass1_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="244" style="background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; display: block; float: none; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;" title="MunichClass1" width="342" /></a><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-EFein7DqD0I/U2qVvlV7_gI/AAAAAAAAE4w/Y5l-o7o_dqM/s1600-h/ReportCard-Munich2%25255B4%25255D.jpg"></a><br />
<br /><img height="320" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/WDjrVKwoQZ29DKEODYhl4aCWrqKbCtIBp1UvM63SAMlmt4Uqr4EmfRP0K998JCdWkF0n51U4C1KSSj4JZRtcbVV1xZlfII4D8HxGx4vtLuhXgCkK8EW3jK25WQlcKjgXER7X1PASwfHZdC-ieY2V4aRpfrzIItPsFACGwbAnuIMh3_c2RJpqyAhyX0HGIo2z58qlOkese6kxuJmQ0K_RdfTpRkL7Lkwf_gN4RJfLoqgyn3L2IA04J46-58eqIfe1XWDHcgEUYxjvn_1d7F8H3aKqF044mFfbyla7vUXu2vQu2Q_kVtdnAZ9743P_UAYbDZ50Up_3lZY6-wyxPxJVx8FCWaZNkQ-EuXboWYX0LBcJMJ-GVteoUPX-WOqOUNmbdiM9HgNmfTVRqCMjwRNTuwQBWm37I7M5yb2-JbMNDMN5MhjowLxPWclJ5YF-hdE5WTGYrohphd0v3Bvtv3JX82aJIszaskAabXx-Wnz19ZySkoNvqX-Kd9y8FCWLJ74DgUulQzLgQJS8Pbykh0sn7K-dbQGyjYvuDofAxHZ7eo4=w563-h768-no" width="234" /><br />
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My memories of Munich are episodic, childish, and spotty. I was the age my granddaughter is now. I spent the first, second, and third grade in Munich’s American School. (In the picture above, I’m on the back row, right, girl.) I remember the Frauenkirche, bombed out buildings, what I called “The Angel of Peace,” which I don’t know what it really is. And the Fasching Parade (equivalent to our Mardis Gras), the first one allowed after the war ended, all set against the backdrop of bombed out buildings. We will find out in a few months, when we travel to Munich, Innsbruck, the South Tyrol, and the Ridanna Valley where dad ended up after his incredible descent from the alpine mountain called Zuckerhutl. We will at last meet the two men who discovered his P51 crash site, found me by chance, and gave us the rare opportunity to know dad’s story in a real, not a comic book, way.<br />
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Somewhere in the bowels of the family memorabilia are black and white prints and 35 mm transparencies of our years in Munich. I will post those when I find and scan them.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "georgia";">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Moosburg" rel="tag">Moosburg</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Stalag+VIIA" rel="tag">Stalag VIIA</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Munich" rel="tag">Munich</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/86th+Fighter+Group" rel="tag">86th Fighter Group</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Munich+Frauenkirche" rel="tag">Munich Frauenkirche</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Fasching+Parade" rel="tag">Fasching Parade</a></span></div>
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</span> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-28462831251660519732014-04-30T10:39:00.001-05:002014-04-30T10:39:16.921-05:00The Liberation of Stalag VIIA, at Moosburg, Part II<p> <p> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS"><font size="3"><em>NOTE</em>: This account of the liberation of Stalag VIIA at Moosburg, Germany, on April 29, 1945, was posted by Glenn M. Strong <strong>nine years ago</strong> on the armyairforces.com site (</font></font><a href="http://forum.armyairforces.com/Liberation-of-Stalag-VIIA-April-291945-m75144.aspx?high=Stalag+VIIA"><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">http://forum.armyairforces.com/Liberation-of-Stalag-VIIA-April-291945-m75144.aspx?high=Stalag+VIIA</font></a><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"> ) honoring the 60<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the Liberation. An amalgamation of various sources, accounts, conversations, Strong’s piece captures the intense pandemonium, jubilation, and joy of that day. His father was among the POWs liberated. My father, Lt. John Cravey, was also liberated that day. Spittin’ Grits thanks strong for permission to re-post. He plans to create a presentation for next year’s 70th anniversary.</font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-SUL7LFx7HTQ/U2EZFtCBUaI/AAAAAAAAE20/NAvmGgpyAf4/s1600-h/tower%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img title="tower" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="tower" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-5mzsBMtCwSg/U2EZGZnnXuI/AAAAAAAAE28/ZcZGjTthaVE/tower_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="288" height="428"></a></font> <blockquote> <p align="center"><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">The Guard Tower at Stalag VIIA,</font> <p align="center"><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS">Moosburg</font> <p align="center"><font color="#4f81bd" size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> </p></blockquote> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> </p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">In roaming the town, the 47th and the 68th uncovered almost a score of arsenals, loaded with German machine guns, pistols, rifles, panzerfausts, all sorts of small arms. <br>The tanks of S/Sgt. Claude E. Newton, S/Sgt. William T. Summers, Lieut. Hack and Lieut. Boucher led the chase through town; Moosberg was not all the battalion wanted. There was a bridge across the Isar River; and this bridge was blown as Newton's tank moved into the first span. </font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> </p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">Among its own men liberated, the 47th found Tec/5 William Weichelt, Corp. Laufor Cobbledick, Tec/5 Edward Kulawiak, Corp. Gilbert Maines, Pfc. John Nestorek, Tec/5 John Wertz, Pfc. Verle A. Kruger, and Corp. Robert D. Hills. <br></p> <p>German prisoners taken included boys of nine, fully uniformed and armed, and girls of 17 and 18 - also uniformed and armed.</p> <p> <br>By night, the Division was established along the Isar, and behind it were unbelievable scenes - mile long columns of German prisoners being marched to the rear, a light tank in front of the column and a light tank in the rear - each with its lights on full blast - and fields with 2000 Germans in a bunch, being guarded under lights, while among them lay the burned out German vehicles caught in the fight that morning, the German dead lying in grotesque positions as Graves Registration Officers moved among them preparing for burial - all the bloody incredible litter of a battlefield just passed, under the bright lights of the overwatching vehicles.</p> <p> <br>And through the streets roamed streams of Allied prisoners, newly freed and not quite sure what they wanted to do, but they wanted to do something. <br>They broke into liquor - schnapps and champagne and cognac and wine - in cellars and kitchens and wine shops and warehouses.</p> <p> <br>They got into food - chickens and pigs and lambs and geese, potatoes and eggs and ham and bread - in pantries and kitchens and living rooms and stores. <br>They found clothes - shoes and pants and shirts and coats - in closets and trunks and windows and suitcases.</p> <p> <br>Ex-PWs and ex-slave laborers, ex-concentration camp inmates, soldiers and civilians, men and women, young and old, from every nation in Europe, drunk or sober, crying or laughing, they roamed the streets that night and reeled along the sidewalks, singing, shouting, kissing, wearing tall silk hats gotten from God knows where, carrying stoves, geese, pictures, cross-bows and sabers.</p> <p> <br>Through that seething jam the American Army was trying to move back more German prisoners of war, columns four men wide and half a mile long. <br>And - up through the mad bacchanalia the combat troops were trying to move, tanks and endless lines of silent infantrymen from the 68th Armored Infantry Battalion, faces set and hardly seeing the weaving scene about them, eyes straight ahead and with trick men have who are going into combat of catching their lower lip and holding it caught between their teeth.</p> <p> <br>The dying nation dissolved into a snarling, giggling montage of human shapes, like a color fantasy on a movie screen where the eye is not able to see nor to understand, but only to snatch at endlessly shifting swirling jumbles of shapes of the wildest human emotions, and joy is translated into a dissolving cone of orange fading quickly into red and black and green and ravage</p> <p>. <br>British ex-prisoners of war rode bicycles through the towns - freed prisoners took most of the bicycles and motorcycles and autos with which Germany was so well supplied. Slave laborers, men and women stood by every road, making a "V" with their fingers and grinning and throwing flowers. "Endlisch frei, endlich frei," said one, and a private first class of the French army introduced himself and gravely said: <br><em></em></p> <blockquote> <p><em>"It is very fine that our governments understand each other, and our generals and ministers, but I would like to tell all the American privates first class that I am eternally indebted to them and eternally grateful."</em></p></font></blockquote><font size="3" face="Georgia"> <p> </p> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">NOTE: The introduction to this series </font><a href="http://spittingrits.blogspot.com/2014/04/honoring-two-world-war-ii-liberations.html"><font face="Trebuchet MS">here</font></a><font face="Trebuchet MS"> mentioned eating instructions handed out to liberated POWs. It is a yellowed crumbling document in the fragile scrapbook that my mother had put together. My sister, Susan Cravey, found the instructions and sent a photo of it to me. The content had to be transcribed.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">She has the task of removing each item as carefully as possible and to put them all into high quality plastic holders or to put them on acid free paper. We hope to donate the contents to one of the U.S. Air Force’s musems.</font> <p> </p> <p></font><em><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-wryY2keh80k/U2EZHMkq15I/AAAAAAAAE3E/sUh-y7ELGo0/s1600-h/eating%252520instructions-ed%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="POW Eating Instructions" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: right; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="POW Eating Instructions" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-MPwNuHeSVMw/U2EZH44TZ6I/AAAAAAAAE3I/s4rkOj9rd5U/eating%252520instructions-ed_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="270" align="right" height="410"></a></em></p> <p><em></em> </p> <blockquote> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">HEADQUARTERS</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">CAMP RAMP</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">NORTHERN DISTRICT, NBS</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">COM Z, (?)TOUZA (maybe, STOUZA)</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">Surgeon’s Bulletin APO 562 1 May 1945</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">T O O U R R A M P S</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">T A K E T H E D O C T O R ‘ S A D V I C E</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">The Medical Department welcomes you - - with an armful of pills and paregoric! You have just been liberated from your enemy, the Germans. It is up to you now to liberate yourselves from your new enemy, - - your appetite and your digestive system.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">After eating here several times you may begin to wonder what the score is, why the medics won’t let you gorge yourself with doughnuts and hotdogs complete with mustard and sauerkraut, about which you must have dreamed for months. You may begin to wonder why the mess supervisors won’t let you come back for seconds when you are still hungry. There’s a reason for it!</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">Most of you have been on a starvation diet for months. A regular diet consisting of coarse German bread and watery soup wen taken over a period of weeks and months does something to your stomach, digestive system, and entire body. You have lost tremendous amounts of weight, there have been changes in your digestive system, your skin, and other organs. You have become weak and are susceptible to diseases. You almost all have the G.I.’s.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">The reason is that you lack vitamins and you have lost the proteins so necessary in building healthy, solid tissues and muscles. The lining of your stomach is sore, delicate, inflamed, and irritated. Your stomach has shrunk.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">If you overload that weak, small, sore stomach of yours you will become acutely ill. Your belly will become swollen and painful. You will have cramps and your diarrhea will be much worse. Some of you will have to be hospitalized and even become very seriously ill. You must overcome this terrible craving of yours and curb your appetite. You must realize that to become well quickly and get back to normal you must eat small feedings and at frequent intervals until gradually you can once again tolerate a normal diet. The food you will be served is good and you will get more than enough. If you get hungry between meals go to the Red Cross for cocoa and egg-nog. Just don’t drink too much. The first kitchen you will go to will feed you a soft, bland, non-irritating diet. Your next kitchen will give you a diet which approaches normal. Know this for your own good.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">The Medical Department advises you to obey the following rules and build yourselves gradually to the point where you can once again eat anything you want and as much as you want, without getting severely ill:</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">1. Eat only as much as you are given in the chow line.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">2. Don’t come back for seconds.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">3. Take the vitamin pills that are given to you in the mess</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">line (and swallow them).</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">4. Go to the Red Cross for egg-nogg (sic) or cocoa between </font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">meals if you get hungry. Don’t drink more than one cup.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">5. Don’t overeat. If you overload your small stomach you will</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">get sick.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">6. Don’t eat candy, peanuts, doughnuts, frankfurters, pork,</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">rich gravies, liquor, spicy foods, or anything that you know </font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">will make you sick.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">7. There are three dispensaries in each of the three areas </font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">where you will bivouac. If you move from one area to the </font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">other, go to the dispensary in that area. Sick Call will be held</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">between 0800 – 1700 hours. After that come only for an</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">emergency. If you have trouble see your Medical Officer. He will be glad to help you.</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">For the Camp Surgeon:</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">(signature)</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">WALLACE W. BIXBY</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">CWC, USA,</font> <p><font face="Trebuchet MS">Adjutant.</font></p></blockquote> <p><em></em> </p> <p align="center"><font face="Georgia">The Lt. Col. John Thomas Cravey WWII USAAF <br>and USAF Careers Collection <br></font><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-ddiYUNJm9ug/U16NbD-LVKI/AAAAAAAAE04/BUeHWMTJXVk/s1600-h/clip_image002%255B3%255D.jpg"><img title="clip_image002" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px" border="0" alt="clip_image002" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-8ov9MQUBhTQ/U2EZIYci_kI/AAAAAAAAE3U/bFG3_VugIag/clip_image002%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="244" height="176"></a><br>™ <br>The Lt. Col. John Thomas Cravey WWII USAAF and USAF Careers Collection is protected by copyright<sub>© </sub></p> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-31565092900651954072014-04-29T14:42:00.001-05:002014-04-29T14:42:46.866-05:00The Liberation of Stalag VII at Moosburg, Part One<p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font size="4"><em></em></font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font size="4"><em></em></font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font size="4"><em></em></font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font size="4"><em></em></font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"><font face="Trebuchet MS"><font size="4"><em>NOTE</em></font>: This account of the liberation of Stalag VIIA at Moosburg, Germany, on April 29, 1945, was posted by Glenn M. Strong nine years ago on the armyairforces.com site</font> (</font><a href="http://forum.armyairforces.com/Liberation-of-Stalag-VIIA-April-291945-m75144.aspx?high=Stalag+VIIA"><font size="3" face="Georgia">http://forum.armyairforces.com/Liberation-of-Stalag-VIIA-April-291945-m75144.aspx?high=Stalag+VIIA</font></a><font size="3" face="Georgia"> ) <font face="Trebuchet MS">honoring the 60<sup>th</sup> Anniversary of the Liberation. An amalgamation of various sources, accounts, conversations, Strong’s piece captures the intense pandemonium, jubilation, and joy of that day. His father was among the POWs liberated. My father, Lt. John Cravey, was also liberated that day. Spittin’ Grits thanks strong for permission to re-post and will run Part Two tomorrow. </font></font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-I4iX1vuuIks/U2AArRoWqoI/AAAAAAAAE2I/U28rMZkrkO8/s1600-h/tower%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="tower" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="tower" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-ctHlBRP_TTQ/U2AAr3lUS2I/AAAAAAAAE2Q/qdYGMeW3WlI/tower_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="217" height="321"></a></font> <p><font size="3" face="Trebuchet MS"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">It is 0600, 29 April. The attack of Combat Command A is due to be resumed at this moment. The command post is located in Puttenhausen, Germany.</font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> <br>The 47th Tank Battalion is eight miles to the southeast where it halted operations at 2300 last night. Lieut. Col. Bob E. Edward's 68th Armored Infantry Battalion is three miles north of the command post, having run into hard resistance late the preceding day and having been ordered to halt in Mainburg to avoid running into a known night ambush.</font></p> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> <br>Soon now, reports should arrive that the battalions are moving, and the guns of Joseph J. Murtha's 500th Armored Field Artillery Battalion should be heard. At one minute before 0600 a strange group strode into the headquarters of Combat Command A, to meet Brig. Gen. C. H. Karlstad, Combat Commander. It consisted of a German Major, representing the commander of the Moosburg Allied Prisoner of War Camp, Col. Paul S. Goode of the United States Army and a Group Commander of the British Royal Air Force, the senior American and British Officers respectively, imprisoned in the Moosburg Camp; a Swiss Red Cross representative; and Lt. Col. James W. Lann. The German Major brought a written proposal from his commander for the creation of a neutral zone surrounding Moosburg, all movement of Allied troops in the general vicinity of Moosburg to stop while representatives of the Allied and German Governments conferred on disposition of the Allied Prisoners of War in that vicinity. <br></p></font> <p><font size="3" face="Georgia">The German proposals were rejected and the party was given until 0900 to return to Moosburg and to submit an unconditional surrender offer - or receive the American attack at that hour; a CCA staff officer was dispatched to General Smith. </font></p><font size="3" face="Georgia"> <p><br>German SS troops moved outside the city and set up a defense perimeter. They opened the fight.</p> <p> <br>By 1030 the SS were lying dead in the fields and along the roads, grey-white faces and open mouths, twisted and staring sightlessly at the cold, blue sky above; and American medium tanks were roaring through the cobbled streets of the ancient city.</p> <p> <br>The 47th had split in two columns, one led by Maj. Kirchner and the other by Col. Lann; and Gen. Karlstad went into the city with the 47th. Gen. Karlstad picked up a German officer as guide, and with Lieut. Joseph P. Luby and Lieut. William J. Hodges took off for the prison camp proper.</p> <p> <br>The jeep mounted a .30 caliber machine gun; as it swung up, there were several score armed German guards outside. Luby rolled into their midst, his jeep stopped, and with his hand on the gun called: "Achtung!" The group surrendered. </p> <p><br>General Smith arrived at the camp shortly thereafter; an American flag was raised. </p> <p><br>Official estimates of the total Allied prisoners freed at Moosburg were 110,000, including an estimated 30,000 Americans, officers and men. Besides a series of seven prisoner of war camps, the Division captured a German garrison of 6,000 men at Moosburg.</p> <p> <br>Once the sharp, pitched battle by the SS was over, the German defenses crumbled. The 600-man 47th Tank Battalion took 2,000 prisoners; the 600-man 94th Reconnaissance Squadron took 2,000 more. Division total for the day was set at 12,000.</p> <p> <br>Scenes of the wildest rejoicing accompanied the tanks as they crashed through the double 10-foot wire fences of the prison camps. There were Norwegians, Brazilians, French, Poles, Dutch, Greeks, Rumanians, Bulgars. There were Americans, Russians, Serbs, Italians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Australians, British, Canadians - men from every nation fighting the Nazis. There were officers and men. Twenty-seven Russian Generals, sons of four American Generals. There were men and women in the prison camps - including three Russian women doctors. There were men of every rank and every branch of service, there were war correspondents and radio men.</p> <p> <br>Around the city were thousands of slave laborers, men and women.</p> <p> <br>All combined to give the 14th the most incredible welcome it ever received. The tanks were finally slowed to five miles an hour as they went through the camps - the press of men in front of them was so great. Men, some of them prisoners five years, some American Air Corps men prisoners two years, cried and shouted and patted the tanks. <br>"You damned bloody Yanks, I love you!" shouted a six-foot four Australian and threw his arms around a jeep driver.</p> <p> <br>A weary bearded American paratrooper climbed on a tank and kissed the tank commander. Tears streamed from his cheeks. The women had flowers, and they threw the flowers on the tanks and in the jeeps. Italians and Serbs, tired and drawn, jammed around the vehicles, eagerly thrusting out their hands to touch their liberators, weeping. <br>An American Air Corps lieutenant kissed a tank. "G*****n, do I love the ground forces," he said. "This is the happiest day of my life!" "You were a long time coming, but now you are here!" There were no words to express the feelings of these men. <br></p> <p>As the German guards were formed in columns of four and marched away, each man carrying two or three loaves of black bread, some of the tankers took the bread from them and tossed it over the fences to the Allied prisoners. </p> <p><br>Tec/5 Floyd C. Mahoney of C-47 freed his own son, a lieutenant in the Air Corps.</p> <p><font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">Part II, tomorrow’s post.</font></p> <p> </p> <p align="right"><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/--45YfoEANzc/U2AAsl6eleI/AAAAAAAAE2Y/hut3MWshfLM/s1600-h/Allied%252520Command-ed%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img title="Allied Command-ed" style="border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; float: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin-left: auto; border-left: 0px; display: block; padding-right: 0px; margin-right: auto" border="0" alt="Allied Command-ed" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq2Q1XwyvHErNYs4Db31U7tDnY72yQM8E4OpllYJgMaQaD3Z7F3dkPTxSj5sBRTj-SpGepmcQyxJqugJdJcFqJF_w2ROcdYjEvgoAXJ-dDZ9RU_4Hryok0naslpixvej7xtuYs8RPUZwtn/?imgmax=800" width="401" height="328"></a></p> <p align="center"><font color="#4f81bd" face="Trebuchet MS">The Allied Command at Liberation</font></p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p>Other sites: <u><a href="http://www.moosburg.org/info/stalag/indeng.html">http://www.moosburg.org/info/stalag/indeng.html</a>, </u></p> <p><u></u> </p> <div id="scid:0767317B-992E-4b12-91E0-4F059A8CECA8:1a900886-91f9-4303-8f3d-8925eeb33c2b" class="wlWriterEditableSmartContent" style="float: none; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px">Technorati Tags: <a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Moosburg+POW+Camp" rel="tag">Moosburg POW Camp</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/WWII+Stalag+VIIA" rel="tag">WWII Stalag VIIA</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/Liberation+of+POW+Camp" rel="tag">Liberation of POW Camp</a>,<a href="http://technorati.com/tags/WWII" rel="tag">WWII</a></div></font> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16250546870006047586noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3106396362715818607.post-39565529626708650662014-04-28T12:18:00.001-05:002015-11-10T14:20:21.288-06:00Honoring Two World War II Liberations<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">On May 7, 1985, a clear and sunny late spring day in Alabama, my father, my aunts (his sisters), my husband and children, our dog and cats, maybe my sister and cousin — all gathered outside on the patio to eat. Dessert was a huge pound cake I had made — dad’s favorite — with real butter and bourbon instead of vanilla. My paternal grandmother, who may never had had a drop of whiskey in her life, taught me that little trick. So, how did she know the bourbon would make a great substitute?</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">We were there to celebrate dad’s 70th birthday. Seems like we celebrated most occasions with food, lots of food.</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">After eating too much, I saw dad sort of staring into space. I asked him if he wanted anything. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">Still kind of off in space he said, “You know, on my 30th birthday, I was wandering the streets of Moosburg with a friend from camp begging for food. He was an architect, as I recall. No thanks, I don’t need any more food.”</span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">Preserving the Past for the Future</span> <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5lHqTpZnILI/VEU8AKeTktI/AAAAAAAAHDI/cJR6F8ez9dU/s1600/tower.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5lHqTpZnILI/VEU8AKeTktI/AAAAAAAAHDI/cJR6F8ez9dU/s1600/tower.jpg" width="215" /></a></div>
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">The tower at Stalag VIIA. More pictures are available at</span><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;"> </span><a href="http://www.moosburg.org/info/stalag/indeng.html" title="http://www.moosburg.org/info/stalag/indeng.html"><span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">http://www.moosburg.org/info/stalag/indeng.html</span></a><br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">At Thanksgiving 2012, my sister, Susan Cravey, first cousin, Emory Kimbrough, and I were in my study going through the fragile scrapbook my mother had put together during those years, trying to decided how to save and preserve all the pictures, telegrams, documents, letters, pieces of parachute, German money — all manner of stuff. I came across a yellowed crumbling piece of paper which was a handout to the POWs explaining how they should eat in the days after being liberated and in a starving condition. It read something like the following (on the Web at <a href="http://ww2db.com/doc.php?q=165">http://ww2db.com/doc.php?q=165</a>):</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">Hints on Diet During Recuperative Leave for Liberated Prisoners of War</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">1 Jan 1945<br />As a result of the privations you have endured as a prisoner of war, you have probably lost weight, and it is natural to think that the more food you eat the sooner will you recover your lost weight and strength. But you must remember that your physique as well as your weight may be temporarily below par, and this includes your digestive system. Just as you need rest at first and your muscles require gradual retraining, so your digestive system requires rest at first and then retraining in the handling of the sort of foods you normally like to eat.<br />To get your digestive system back to normal as quickly as possible a few simple rules that you should follow, especially if you are having trouble with your digestion, are given in the dietetic instructions below. You should show these notes and the following instructions to anyone who is giving you your meals, so that they can understand why you have to be careful about eating for a time, and what they should give you to eat.</span> <br />
<ol>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">Don't overload your stomach. Avoid heavy meals, and instead, eat small amounts frequently. Try eating three light meals a day, with three snacks of biscuits and milk variety - two between meals and one last thing at night. </span> </li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">Remember that your digestion is weak, and at first give your stomach foods easy to handle.<br />Eat: Foods such as milk and milk puddings, eggs, cereals, toast or bread, biscuits, preserves, cake, and fish and tender meat if you can eat these without discomfort.<br />Avoid at first: Fatty or fried foods, bulky vegetables, raw salads or fruit, highly seasoned dishes, twice-cooked meats, pickles and spices, rich, heavy puddings and pastries, strong tea and coffee.<br />Beer and other alcoholic drinks are hard on a weak stomach, and you should take these very sparingly, if at all, for the first few days at least.</span></li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="color: #4f81bd; font-family: "trebuchet ms"; font-size: small;">Freedom</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">Tomorrow marks the <strong>69th Anniversary of two major World War II Liberations</strong> that were occurring at just about the same moments on April 29, 1945: first, the unspeakable Dachau, on which much has been written and reported and which we can all honor in our own ways. (See <a href="http://www.thirdreichruins.com/dachau.htm" title="http://www.thirdreichruins.com/dachau.htm">http://www.thirdreichruins.com/dachau.htm</a>, for example.)</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">And of Stalag VIIA, Moosburg, Germany. Moosburg, (sometimes spelled Moosberg), as that stalag has come to be known, was built to hold about 10,000 German Prisoners of War (POWs). </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">On 30 April, 1945, the New York Times wrongly reported: "Huge Prison Camp Liberated...27,000 American and British prisoners of war at a large camp at Moosburg." </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">The following day, the Times printed a correction: "The Fourteenth Armored Division liberated 110,000 Allied prisoners of war at Stalag 7A at Moosburg, instead of the 27,000 prisoners previously reported. This was Germany's largest prisoner of war camp."</span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">Tomorrow Spittin’ Grits will honor that liberation of 110,000 German POWs, including my father, by running a <strong>two-part account by G. M. Strong</strong>, the son of another of those POWs, a piece which he wrote commemorating the 60th anniversary of the Liberation. <strong>Following is the Preface to his account</strong>:</span> <br />
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<div align="center">
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"><strong>Liberation of Stalag VIIA, April 29, 1945</strong></span> </div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;">Today is the 60th Anniversary of the Liberation of Stalag VIIA Moosburg, Germany. Thousands of Allied airmen and soldiers, as many as 80,000 were in the Lager (all nationalities). Some had been POWs for over 4 years. American and British airmen had been marched in the bitter cold in January from Sagan SL III and from SL IV. This was the single largest liberation of POWs in Europe and a day not to be forgotten. As one of Patton's tanks tore a huge hole in the wire, thousands of men were now free once more. As the American flag rose over the clock tower in the town there was first silence and then pandemonium of cheers and tears. Later, when General Patton came in and addressed the Kriegies, his first words to them were said to be, "I'll bet you sons-a-b*****s are glad to see me.” They were. My dad was one of them. Bless'em all. </span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia"; font-size: small;"></span> <br />
The Lt. Col. John Thomas Cravey WWII USAAF <br />
and USAF Careers Collection <br />
<br />
™ <br />
The Lt. Col. John Thomas Cravey WWII USAAF and USAF Careers Collection is protected by copyright<sub>© </sub><br />
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