01:50

Ruth Deutschmann

Benjamin Epp

2008-08-22

Sylvia Manning-Baumgartner

Nicole D´Incecco

1939

One of our guests was the president of the Swabian division. He was a judge from Stuttgart called Doctor Hermann Kuhhorst. And when they had finished singing the customs officers said: "The war is fun; the Poland campaign will be over in three weeks. The war will take three weeks and then that chapter will be closed." My father scratched behind his ear a bit and went into the kitchen mumbling: "Just take care that this war doesn't go on for longer than the other one - the First World War." The president of the Alpine club division ran after him and said: "Mr. Albert, I know you well and I know what you're thinking. But you can't say something like that, otherwise you might be locked up, for saying something like that. It's bad politics. You can think what you want but you can't say it." My father said nothing. Then, just to finish this story: In 1951 my father and we boys were shingling the roof of our house in the valley. We were on the roof busy laying the wooden shingles and my father was on the ladder. Suddenly someone calls us from the parking lot: "Mister Lorenz, look who's here! Do you still know me?" It was the Swabian. My father turned around and said: "Mister Kuhhorst, how long did the war last?" That was just a bit of politics on the side