Mormons in Nazi Germany: History and Memory

A Chapter. A Chapter. I Finally Finished My First Chapter!

2010-02-15T17:54:00.000-08:00

It has been a long time coming, but I finally submitted the first chapter of my dissertation to my adviser last week. I've had some other priorities between the completion of my research and the writing phase, but now I'm finally back on track to complete my dissertation.

I'm so lucky to have such a patient, encouraging committee chairman. Anyone who gets to work with Dr. Arnold Krammer of Texas A&M's History Department is indeed blessed. He's the consummate gentleman professor, and still a very productive scholar, as well a reputed and esteemed teacher. When we met for lunch to turn in my first installment, he carried galley proofs from his latest book. At his station in life, a distinguished senior professor, he could stop writing and publishing and nobody would be critical. But that's not in his blood, and fortunately his gentle prodding got me back on track.

With any luck, I'll graduate with my Ph.D. in December, and my precious wife Ruth will walk the same stage upon completion of her bachelor's in construction science. It has been a long road for both of us, and we still have challenges ahead. But we're both going to make it!

Working Paper on J. Reuben Clark

2007-05-03T18:21:00.001-07:00

When the European Union Center of Excellence awarded a generous research grant in late 2005, a stipulation involved submitting a "working paper," that is, an interim report of my research that could later be used as a component of my dissertation.

The challenge involved coordinating my research in Mormon and Nazi Germany history with the Center's goal of improving understanding between the European Union and other nations. The solution took the form of investigating private diplomacy during the 1930s, when J. Reuben Clark, an accomplished diplomat who then served as a counselor to the president of the LDS Church, lobbied the government of the Third Reich on behalf of both America's small bondholders and Germany's Mormons.

Clark's diplomatic expertise, gained during a long secular career with the State Department that predated his membership in the First Presidency, contributed immensely to the Mormons' success in Nazi Germany. This working paper, as the name implies, is a work in progress. I don't consider it ready for submission to a peer-reviewed scholarly journal. Nevertheless, I'd be interested in any comments my readers might have. Please feel free to contact me with comments or criticism.

I Hate Microfilm! I Love Microfilm!

2006-12-10T12:22:00.000-08:00

Want to go insane and don't want to wait? Sit in front of a microfilm reader for eight hours a day, as I'm doing at the Church Archives here in Utah. The rules don't allow photocopying primary documents, so I must laboriously wade through the manuscript histories of the German missions, taking relevant notes on my laptop. Try to concentrate as you read page after page of missionary arrivals, reassignments, and releases while waiting to mine that golden nugget that has escaped other historians. I hate microfilm!

Yesterday, in the special collections department at the University of Utah, I was delighted to learn that a collection owned by the Bancroft Library at Berkeley also exists on microfilm right here in Salt Lake City. With the help of a convenient finding aid, an enthusiastic archivist and a little patience--viola! There it was, the letter I was seeking, which supports a point in my project. The feeling of euphoria that exists when a researcher finds such an item can only be appreciated by somebody who has done it before. Not only did they let me make a copy but the archivist did it for me. I love microfilm!

Fawn Brodie: An Unlikely Observer

2006-11-15T19:44:00.000-08:00

Strange twists and turns await the researcher who digs deeply into any subject. At the beginning of this project, I never suspected I'd be reading the private correspondence of controversial Mormon biographer Fawn M. Brodie. In 1945 she published No Man Knows My History, an unflattering portrait of the first Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, Jr., that resulted in her excommunication from the faith of her birth. During her career she also wrote acclaimed biographies of Thomas Jefferson, Thaddeus Stevens, Richard Nixon, and Sir Richard Burton.

Brodie also had a connection with her church in Nazi Germany. Her father, Thomas E. McKay, served three missions in Germany, the last as the Mormon leader who turned out the lights after missionaries evacuated at the beginning of the Second World War. Two others, a brother and former boyfriend, also served German missions during the prewar Nazi period. Married outside of her faith to a fellow graduate student at the University of Chicago, a political scientist of Latvian Jewish origin, Fawn developed an intense sensitivity to the plight of Germany's Jews during the 1930s. Her personal correspondence provides an interesting critique of the Mormons' response to the rise of Hitler.

Evacuee Children During World War II

2006-08-05T11:37:00.000-07:00

Some say that World War Two was the first "total war," in that long-range bombing of Allied and Axis cities brought the distant battlefied home to the citizenry. Parents sought a safe haven for their children, while staying at home themselves to work in war industries or civil defense. Both British and German Mormons evacuated their children to the countryside, a particularly painful separation for people whose religion stressed family continuity. Although much as been written about the evacuation of English children from London, less has appeared about young Germans sent off to live with grandparents or in government-sponsored schools in the hinterlands. One German Mormon, a young child when the bombers hit his hometown of Hanover, found himself in small-town in Austria, where he attended a Nazi-run school for evacuated children.

Mormon Soldier at the Battle of Stalingrad

2006-07-14T00:02:00.000-07:00

Next week I leave for Salt Lake City again, this time to interview a German army veteran who fought to relive General Paulus' Sixth Army at the Battle of Stalingrad. According to his correspondence, his mother gave him a miniature New Testament and Book of Mormon to carry close to his heart for protection.

This elderly gentleman is one of several I have discovered through networking the large LDS immigrant commuity that came from Germany after the war. One introduces me to another, and the result is new primary sources untaped by other historians who have researched this subject.

Obviously, time is critical. Some 5,000 World War II veterans die every day, and already this situation means that I'm relegated to interviewing their sons and daughters on many occasions. However, next week will provide an opportunity that the march of time has not obliterated.

The Mormon Archives

2006-05-11T18:31:00.000-07:00

Working in the Latter-day Saint archives in Salt Lake City is both a pleasant and a frustrating experience. Any trip to one of America's most beautiful cities is a treat, and the Church History Department employees are helpful and pleasant.

However, the rules make conducting research there a time-consuming processes in comparison with other archives. They allow no photocopying of primary source material. That multiplies the time spent, and consequently the cost of doing research--both commodities that many dissertation candidates critically lack.

Also, many documents are restricted, perhaps many more than in most archives.

Nevertheless, an appeals process exists and just recently I received permission to see a long-restricted oral history interview with a key German Mormon who lived through the Nazi experience. Persistence pays off. Today I cracked the covers of a document I applied for, and was denied, some six years ago. Miracles do happen in Mormondom, even for graduate students.

The Cost of War

2006-03-15T22:20:00.000-08:00

This photograph, dated 1940, shows the effect of the wartime draft on the Berlin District priesthood. Note the ages of the men. With the exception of the few service members in uniform, present for the picture because they served locally or were home on leave, everyone is either too old or too young for the initial call up into the army. Those missing from this picture are already at war. The picture comes from a Wehrmacht veteran I interviewed, who served first in the Nazi labor corps and later in the army on the eastern front. Quite a few of the men shown here did not survive the war Hitler instigated, the age range for military service being greatly increased after Goebbels called for "total war" in the wake of the disaster at Stalingrad.

Ghosts from Nazi Germany

2006-01-29T13:28:00.000-08:00

Today I embark on a weeklong research trip. I'll work in the Latter-day Saint archives, but the highlight will be two oral history interviews, each with the child of a Mormon who lived during the Third Reich. Both possess their fathers' diaries.

One man rescued a Jewish couple in the wake of Kristallnacht and drove them to safety across the Swiss border. The other faced a post-war trial, charged with running a "wild" concentration camp in Berlin during the early days of the regime when Hitler was consolidating his power and eliminating political opposition.

The hero's son downplays his father's bravery and the alleged perpetrator's daughter defends her dad. It will be a delicate proposition, being sympathetic to their feelings while still maintaining scholarly objectivity.

I'm lucky. Most historians mine moldy archives, piecing together the tangible evidence left by subjects who died long ago. No witness lives who can fill in the blanks. For all of the scholarly landmines that must be avoided, working with living subjects is fascinating.

Funding a Dissertation

2005-12-21T02:49:00.000-08:00

Until now I financed my own graduate education. I never applied for an assistantship because, as a family man and practitioner in another profession, I could not devote an additional twenty hours per week to TA duties.

This week I received good news. The European Union Center of Excellence, which maintains a chapter in College Station at the Bush Presidential Library, bestowed a generous grant for my dissertation research. That, in additional to a smaller but significant stipend provided by Texas A&M's Department of History, mitigates the pressure of funding my research from the family budget.

Thanks to Dr. Johan Lembke of the EUCE and Dr. Walter Buenger of the History Department for their confidence in my abilities as a scholar.

I owe special gratitude to my dissertation advisor, Dr. Arnold Krammer, who endorsed my applications for both stipends and who made an in-person pitch for me with the department head. Some universities limit their investment to younger students who have more potential for making a big splash in the academic world. Texas A&M is a wonderful place to study for a nontraditional scholar like myself.

Why a Dissertation Blog?

2005-11-27T17:09:00.000-08:00

First, it introduces the rest of the world to my project. Fewer than 15,000 Mormons lived in Nazi Germany. Researching their story evokes needle-in-a-haystack comparisons. I must use every finding tool, including the Internet. Secondly, it serves as a feedback mechanism, allowing subjects to contact me. Third, it allows my committee to track my progress through a convenient medium. Finally, it functions as an implement of self-discipline. I juggle three balls daily--family, career, and dissertation. The need to make periodic blog entries prompts me to pursue a regular research regimen with the goal of defending in September 2007.

If you lived through the Nazi era as a Latter-day Saint or you know someone who did, I want to speak to you. If you have diaries, letters or other interesting documents--in English or in German--please discuss with me the conditions under which you'd be willing to share them. If you know somebody who could help, I would appreciate the reference.

Click here or on the "contact me" button on the right. Thanks.