Bush Terminal

Hi guys, today me and Maria checked out Bush Terminal. We found a great place to shoot. Unfortunnetly I couldn't take pictures in side but here is some pictures around the area.

Germans in NYC

Who's on finding Germans who migrated here right before World War II? I just found this link.

And here's their contact info:

German-American Community Project, Inc.
871 U.N. Plaza
New York, NY 10017
Tel.: 212-610-9721
Fax: 212-610-9704
email: info@germanyinnyc.org

There's also the German Consulate, which you should really contact:

Deutsches Generalkonsulat
212-572-5633
460 Park Ave.
New York NY 10022

Hitler's Long Island Legion

This is a really long article, but what an interesting piece of history!! I've been doing some internet scouring about Germans in New York during World War II, and got kind of soundtracked into the whole German-American Bund / Friends of the New Germany movement.

Click on the link above for the whole article. Here's some excerpts:

In the summer of 1936, the still-distant threat of Nazism cast an unexpected shadow across the hinterlands of Long Island.

That spring, Adolf Hitler had been preparing for war. His newly mobilized troops rolled into the Rhineland, unopposed by the Allies. It was the first of a series of Nazi military adventures setting the stage for World War II.

On Long Island, Nazism invaded Yaphank in the form of a summer retreat called Camp Siegfreid.

Located on a wooded lakefront near the mid-Suffolk village, the camp was ostensibly a summer place for youngsters and a weekend campground for adults. In reality it was more dangerous -- a project sponsored by the German-American Bund, which had been established to promote Hitlerism in this country.
...
Carrying flags emblazoned with swastikas, the emblem of the Nazi movement, older bundists and young campers paraded in uniform -- showing off stiff-armed salutes and singing the ``Horst Wessel Song,'' a Nazi anthem. Later, it was discovered that plans to commit espionage and sabotage in the future were also discussed covertly. ``We remain oblivious to the Nazi prototype that existed in our own backyard,'' Marvin Miller wrote in ``Wunderlich's Salute,'' the first history of the bundist movement on Long Island, published in 1983. Now 63, Miller was a Long Island high school teacher. He decided to begin the project in the 1970s, he said, when he discovered that no history of the camp existed in book form.

Miller recounted the experience of Murray Cohen, a Brooklyn high school student who rode the ``Camp Siegfried Special'' to Yaphank in 1937. Photographs Cohen secretly took at the camp were later published by PM, New York's liberal afternoon daily in the 1940s. On the train, Cohen chatted with Mueller while, in the background, uniformed bundists sang Nazi anthems.
...
At the camp, Fritz Kuhn, a U.S. citizen who headed the bund, predicted that someday he would be ``America's Fuhrer,'' Miller wrote. Activities included more than sports and sunbathing. There were recorded operas by Richard Wagner, Hitler's favorite composer, and anti-Semitic lectures by Walter Kappe, the camp's propaganda chief. Kappe argued that Jews were the founders of international communism. The Friends of the New Germany in America would become ``what the Storm Troopers were in Germany,'' he promised.

By 1937, up to 40,000 bundists would arrive on Sundays to celebrate Nazism in America, while young Siegfrieders lined up to greet them as the train pulled into Yaphank. A large contingent of Nazis also marched through the village of Lindenhurst that year. Some threats of violence came from members of American Legion posts, who threatened to break up the camp but were dissuaded by Suffolk District Attorney Robert Vunk.

Soon after, Miller wrote, Kappe was ordered to return to Germany to work on plans to land spies on the coast of Long Island. In the early days of the war, four would-be saboteurs were captured after landing near Amagansett -- three turned out to be former Siegfrieders.
...

Operation Pastorius

More submarines!! Or are these the ones always talked about?

Operation Pastorius was a failed plan for a series of attacks by Nazi German agents inside the United States. The operation was staged in June 1942 and was to be directed against strategic U.S. economic targets. The operation was named by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of the German Abwehr, for Francis Daniel Pastorius, the leader of the first organized settlement of Germans in America.

Recruited for the operation were eight Germans who had lived in the United States. Two of them, Ernest Burger and Herbert Haupt, were American citizens. The others, George John Dasch, Edward John Kerling, Richard Quirin, Heinrich Harm Heinck, Hermann Otto Neubauer and Werner Thiel, had worked at various jobs in the United States.

Click on the link above for the rest of the Wikipedia article.

A-Bomb

While I'm thinking about it... Sandy e-mailed me the day after the shoot. She's really upset about the A-bomb footage and doesn't want it in the movie. She said something about it being too controversial... Corliss, on the other hand, WANTS us to include what Barbara said about how if they hadn't dropped the bomb, her husband wouldn't be here.

Sourcing for Ken Burns' footage

Ken Burns' seven-part documentary on World War II that begins Sept. 23 on PBS is said by the producer to explore "the greatest cataclysm in history--a worldwide catastrophe that touched the lives of every family on every street in every town in America."

Just over five solid minutes of archival film used in The War came from Carolina's Fox Movietone News Collection at the News Film Library, which was given to the University by 20th Century Fox in 1980.

Included were scenes of New York City, combat in Europe and the Pacific, the manufacture of dolls for little girls, and presidential reports to the nation, among other images.

For the full article, click here. The article mentions some of his other sources. It would be a great idea to contact Eastman House - if you do, I have a friend with good connections there.

Interview

Hey so I want to shoot on Friday in Brooklyn East 7th between M and N

Aurthor Lonto is the subject

i need to know who's willing to be part of this shoot
if you are i will send you over a copy of his auto biography

This guy lost his brother in the war.
He entered the war in 1943
He has attended several Worlds Fairs
He has some interesting stories

Dates to save

I'm trying to set up another interview with the rockettes. Corliss said that she can almost certainly make it, and so can Ruthie (the one that lives in the center). She's still trying to see if the other two can come, and maybe a third one.

In the meantime, she gave us several possible dates. I told her that the weekends work best for us. If it's possible, don't schedule an important shoot for October 7 or 13, at least until I hear back from Corliss.

These are the possible dates she gave: Fri 5 Sun 7 Thurs 11 Fri 12 Sat 13 Mon 15 Wed 17 Thurs 18 and Fri 19.

STRANGER THAN FICTION

This is a great series at the IFC Film Center in West Village. All documentaries, every Tuesday night, often with the filmmaker present. I'm interested in the next one, so I've bought a ticket. Let me know if you want to come along:

BILLY THE KID
TUES, OCT 2, 8:00 pm
co-presented with the SXSW Film Festival
Q&A with director Jennifer Venditti
Buy tickets here.
Billy the Kid follows a teenage boy in small town Maine as he navigates between imagination and reality, grappling with isolation and first-time love. The film defies attempts at describing. You just have to see it for yourself. It's not a coincidence that four juries around the world have awarded it prizes for best documentary. "Billy resonates as that of an American anti-hero: a loner lost in a fantasy world." (Guardian Unlimited). "Many memorable dramatic films about adolescence have been made over the decades, but few of them can match the impact of Billy the Kid." (Hollywood Reporter). See film web site.

Dear Adolf

There is a great Picture along with this letter in front of the year book of Hitler (great as in hilarious)
I'll scan that this week in school when i get the chance
then i guess I'll send that to Derick



Dear Adolf

Like all Americans, we've been thinking a lot about this war. Plain common sense tells us that its either you or we. We know what we're fighting for. We're fighting for decency and liberty, for Lidice and Pearl Harbor, for our past heritage and our future hopes.

These aren't empty words Adolf. We're backing them up with action. And everything we do to defeat that axis is being directed into the proper channels by able leaders who understand our problems.

This is a mechanized war. Well, a mechanized war is right up our ally. We're the boys who used to model airplanes and fool around with chemical sets and firecrackers. We're the girls who used to play nursing. But we're not playing today. We're today. We're training ourselves in every way possible so that we can contribute to the winning of this war to our fullest extent.

Yes we have our fun too. Americans have a sense of balance. We still have our games, clubs and dances. But, underneath any gaiety, we're thinking of your inevitable doom and of the better world that all decent people will build together after our victory.

Never Yours,
The Senior Class

My friends grandma

Hi guys I found our next interview. She is from Russian desent and worked at the brooklyn navel yard also her husband fought in europe in WWII. I don't have a date yet but let me know who wants to come.

WWII Radio Broadcasts

Follow the link above to radio broadcasts from the year of 1941, listed by date. Lots of Pearl Harbor stuff. You can search archive.org for more WWII radio shows.

Happy Yom Kippur.

Yom Kipur

hey so its the holiday tonight
for all the Jews on the team if your fasting have an easy one
i will not be checking any emails or answering my phone tonight or tomorrow

after the holiday my rabbi and will having a meeting about Jews who we can interview hes been gathering a list for me.
My grandmother, great aunt and uncle and some other family members are all willing to be interviewed but I'm saving them for a little later on being that we have so many grandmas already.

I know have another contact from the alumni association and hes going to be finding some more names for me

I have a really awesome guy to interview next week Arthur Lonto
if any ones interested in coming to the shoot next week
let me know what days your available

Not a Post About the War

This is for high school students. Thirteen is hosting an essay contest. The winner gets a private tour of the National Gallery (in Washington, DC) with Simon Schama. The deadline is approaching, but there is still time to enter.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/powerofart/view.php?page=eessayintro

Ken Burns at the New York Public Library

Ken Burns will be speaking at the New York Public Library next Thursday, which I think we should all go to. Maria Janelli and Channel 13 kindly procured us 7 tickets, so that we can all go. The event starts at 7pm, but we should get there at 6:15 pm to make sure we get good seats.

If the event is similar to one I went to two nights ago, the moderator, Robert Stone, will converse with Ken for about an hour, after which the floor will be open to questions. The audience is given slips of paper for the questions, which get handed in at some point during the first hour. We should all come prepared with questions, but questions may also occur to you after hearing some of the conversation. Please understand that they may ask very few of the audience questions, so don't count on it, but it would be great to get some of our questions in.

Can everyone please post a quick comment that they can or can not attend, in the next couple of days?

new interviews

I set up some more interviews... this old Jewish couple from the lower east side at 4:30 on Tuesday September 25 in Manhattan (the F train), and my grandparents on Sunday September 30 at whatever time. My grandpa was the literary editor of that yearbook with "the letter." (Sorry Isaac, he doesn't know who wrote it).

Also, I have the opportunity to set up interviews with at least three more elderly Jewish couples. Should I go through with any of them, or is that just too many Jews?

Lidice

Hey guys i know its been a while since I've posted on blogger... sorry...

Just something I wanted make aware to everyone if you didn't know what Lidice was.
When you hear what it is it may be something to consider for our interviews.

Lidice came up in the first paragraph of the 1943 letter to Adolf Hitler, from the Midwood high schools senior class.
(you know the letter you all liked...)

Dear Adolf,

Like all Americans, we've been thinking a lot about this war. Plain common sense tells us that it's either you or we. We know what we're fighting for. We're fighting for decency and liberty, for Lidice and Peal Harbor, for our past heritage and our future hopes.


That's the first paragraph of the letter... apparently Lidice was a village in Czechoslovakia, that was completely destroyed by the Germans during World War 2. On June 10th 1942 all adult men from the village were murdered by the Germans, and the rest of the population deported.
(This massacre was not Jewish related but and act of revenge)

Reinhard Heydrich who was a high ranking Reichspotektor of Nazi Germany was in this Village where he was assassinated by two Czechoslovakian resistance fighters.

The Fuhrer furious with revenge had declared to shoot all adult men to death, transport all women to a concentration camp, gather the children suitable for Germanization, then place them in SS families in the Reich. They then burned down the village and leveled it entirely....


The reason i thought we should take this into account with interviewing people in America is that this is a topic Not a lot of people know about today and apparently Seniors in high school knew about this back then and decided it was important enough to include in their letter to Adolf just as much as Pearl Harbor.

"We're fighting for decency liberty, for Lidice and Pearl Harbor...."

A lot of people didn't seem to know what was going on over seas at this time like with the concentration camps and if anyone knew anything they may have heard that the Jews were mostly targeted. From hearing Lidice in those times people may have seen how merciless the Nazis were and it might be a good question to bring up... "what did you think when you heard a whole town was massacred for the reason it was?" or something like that... i would imagine it would have strengthened the Americans resolve in fighting the war... and raised their thoughts that Hitler was a mad man and must be stopped...

well anyways just a thought and a piece of knowledge...
I'm planing on interviewing a really good subject this friday
Good Luck with everything guys

Bamn! Automat - field trip?

Derek's grandmother bought up the automat phenomenon, which is being revived in the East Village.



BAMN! AUTOMAT

The Scene
It's worth visiting this modern-day food automat for the amusement alone. Pumping with high-powered dance music and a hot-pink "Hello Kitty" color scheme, the compact space is standing-room only. All walks of life are drawn to the electric eatery, from post-bar snackers to kids in strollers.

The Food
A wall of coin-operated machines spews out hot, fresh food for downing in a flash. Behind the brightly lit wall of glass-encased food is an actual working kitchen, which whips up classic American snacks with a Japanese twist. Highlights include a tasty Teri-Burger with sweet onions, snatched up in a few bites, warm PB&J and tangy Spam musubi--teriyaki-glazed spam wrapped in nori over rice. Fried mac and cheese looks like a Twinkie, but tastes like the classic cafeteria favorite. Thick, crisp and made-to-order, Yukon Gold fries are must-haves and come with a choice of dipping sauces.

War is Swell

William Anthony responded to my ad in Shane's building, and I met him and his wife this weekend. William Anthony wrote the book War is Swell, "a kid's idiotic vision of WWII." It tells the story of WWII the way he saw it growing up in the U.S. - he makes it obvious that it is in the view of an American kid. It's written like a children's book with childlike drawings of the war. He gave me a copy to borrow, which I'll bring to our next meeting. The book itself may be interesting to include if it fits the context.

William grew up in Washington State, but his wife Norma grew up in NJ, where there were air raids as well, and she had family who in the Bronx, so i suppose i should ask her about them.

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Niaz and I were supposed to go to the Brooklyn Navy Yard on Wednesday, but we did not. I called the BNY and was told to make an appointment before coming. I was told to make an appointment with Daniella Romano - she has the connects we need. I'll make an appointment and post the time when it's done.

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I am also about to line up an interview with my grandma's old schoolmate and lifelong neighbor Natalie Weissman, who lost her husband in the war. Natalie lived in Brooklyn her entire life.

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I suggest we start a google doc with default questions to ask at interviews. I may start it tomorrow, but, heh, if someone else wants to start it, that'd be cool.

New York Japs

I got a Jap to interview... his name is Mr. Fujio Saito, and he was recommended by the Japanese American Association of New York. I set the interview for Friday September 28 at 4:30 PM. He lives at the Isabella Retirement Center in Manhattan, and he said he could recommend other people too... He's an alumnus of Stuyvesant High School. Who wants to come?