| Notes |
- RESEARCH_NOTES:
1. Per Leo, his son, Robert was born 19 Sep 1885 in Libava, Latvia. He emigrated in 1925 from Hamburg, Germany to Oruro, Bolivia. He died on 24 Oct 1955 in Santiago, Chile, where he was also buried. He was married to Gerda Gerson (daughter of Samuel Gerson and Malvine Kahn) on 28 Feb 1932 in Antofagasta, Chile. Gerda was born on 8 Jun 1900 in Lodz, Poland. She died on 22 Nov 1990 in Freeport, Illinois. They only had one child: Leonardo. Samuel Gerson was the brother to Fanny Gerson (1861-1887) who married Leonhard Herzenberg (1858-1932) making Robert Herzenberg and Gerda Gerson first cousins.
BIOGRAPHY:
1. http://users.rcn.com/cherzenb/AASmain/shortbio1.doc Robert Herzenberg - a brief biography by his son Leonardo:
"Robert Herzenberg was born on 18 September 1885, in Libau, Kurland, what is now Latvia. He attended kindergarten, then elementary school. In 1894 he enrolled in a preparatory class for the Realschule. He was enrolled in it, passed his admission exam, and started wearing the black uniform of the Realschule that he wore until the summer of 1902.
He then attended various universities and polytechnics in Germany and Latvia, obtaining a Ph. D. in mineralogy from the University of Hamburg in 1911. Following this he became a lecturer, and curator of mineralogy at the university, which required German citizenship. He applied for it, but could not receive it until Russia released him. With the outbreak of war, the release requirement disappeared and he became subject to the draft in 1914. He volunteered for service in the German army to avoid the draft, where he spent three years as a Russian translator.
After the war life in Germany was difficult, especially when the hyperinflation arrived, which wiped out Robert's savings. He survived thanks to having his own mineralogical laboratory, and in 1925 was recruited to establish an assay laboratory in La Paz. When he arrived, he found that the company that had recruited him was bankrupt
He met a chemist who needed help, and worked with him until 1926, when he was hired by Mauricio HochsChild S.A.M.I. as chief chemist for the laboratory in Oruro. He was married to Gerda Gerson in February 1933, and his son Leonardo was born on 19 September 1934. At that time life for Jews in Germany was getting more difficult every day, and Robert did what he could to rescue our family members. The family, including his sister-in-law and a cousin, was living in a rented house, and Robert decided we needed a larger house to shelter any further relatives who could be rescued. He built the house around 1939, and many relatives started their Bolivian lives there.
World War II started roughly at the same time that Robert's son, Leonardo was ready for first grade of elementary school. Robert and many other foreigners (gringos) felt that the public schools were inadequate. The alternatives were the German school, good academically, but children learned to say "Heil Hitler" in kindergarten; and the Catholic schools. So Robert gathered together several other parents with Jewish, American, English and other Allied origins to found a new school.
The school started in two rooms on the second floor of a rental building, and later expanded to a new location. The United States state department heard about the sachool and decided to support it as part of the war effort, and American teachers, starting with Mrs. Ruth Martin, the new director, started arriving. Mrs. Martin lived in the Herzenberg household while she was in Oruro. Several groups of relatives lived in the house until they settled elsewhere. Then an empty room started supplementing the AAS boarding house by housing two AAS students.
He continued running the Hochschld lab, and during his stay in Oruro discovered eight new minerals. When the mines were nationalized he chose to stay with the laboratory even though HochsChild offered him retirement.
His dedication to his family, the AAS, and the lab continued until his death, in October of 1955, in Santiago, Chile, where he was buried."
2. 28 Jul 2007 Http://www.herzenberg.net/leo/htmlrh/Content.html copyrighted by Leo Herzenberg:
"An meinen Sohn (To my son) Leonhard Herzenberg von (from) Robert Herzenberg. Memoirs written during the 1940's." Translated during the 1990's by Leonardo (Leonhard) Herzenberg. The entire memoir is quite lengthy and included in its entirety in two portions: the first or earlier part of the memoir is with my notes with Joseph Herzenberg, the original known ancestor, in this database. The following is the balance of the memoir which deals more directly with Robert, the author of the memoir.:
"MY PARENTS
FANNY GERSON, Leonhard Herzenberg, SARA HALPERT
[110] My mother was born on 10 Schmat 5621 (January 1861) in Pilten, my father on 12 Ab 5616 (July 1856) on a farm [gute] near Goldingen. Their great-parents were siblings. They had known each other from youth, and were attracted to each other, probably because both not so much stood out as fell out from their own sibling group. My father came to the Firm Nachman in Libau at age sixteen, where he eagerly joined the western Jewish culture circle [sich ganz dem west judischen kulturkreis anschloss]. The German pastor of Pilten had taken my mother to heart [ins herz geschlossen] and taught her along with his own children. Pilten, once an important city, bishop's see and of political-historical significance, had become a totally insignificant place, in Russian terminology "z... r....," that is, a city that had been declared as having lost city rights [111] and privileges. A single street led through it. When one came there from Windau, at the entrance there was the church, on the right the house of Jacobsohns, left the house of the Gerson grandparents, and further on relatives lived in almost every house. Behind the houses were fruit and vegetable gardens. Where these adjoined the pastures one could comfortably go through gaps in the fence to the mill field. There my mother used to play, and there I also played with other brats [lausbuben] my age when I was in Pilten for the long summer vacation. These brats attended the Pilten yeshiva next to the little old synagogue. The latter was pathetic, and the yeshiva even more so; it stopped operating long before the world war, and is not even mentioned in the Jewish encyclopedia. Through the pastoral education my mother must have gotten estranged from the whole family milieu, so she liked my father best among the few acquaintances. He was no "match" ["partie"], riches neither had, but they hoped that with help of the [112] wealthy, or better off, uncles in Libau, Goldingen, and Moscow they could get through. They became engaged, and married.
[Engagement Announcement card, Pilten, Libau] [Wedding Invitation Card, from G. Gersohn and frau, 4:00pm, 24 July 1884, Pilten]
As the guests sat at the wedding meal came the news of the death of Uncle Robert Herzenberg in Mitau. The celebration was not to be disturbed, [113] so the news was kept secret until the end of wedding. It was interpreted as a bad omen, and unfortunately the interpreters were right. The parents moved to Libau, where my father founded the firm Leonhard Herzenberg. The business did not go, the uncles were stingy [kargten] with goods and credit. Soon thereafter I was born, possibly the only pleasure my parents experienced together. And then everything collapsed, the firm failed, my father returned as a clerk to the Nachman Firm, and on 6 Nissan 5647 (19 March 1887) my mother passed away, after suffering for three weeks with enteric typhoid [unterleibtyphus]. Her sister Sophie, who had nursed her during the illness, was infected, and died 11 days later. They were buried in a double grave in the old Jewish North cemetery of Libau, near the north shore of the harbor, next to the building of the linoleoum factory. The grave is almost in the middle of the graveyard. When I visited the cemetery as a child, it was quite full of graves. Then when I
[114]Hebrew grave inscription]
[msp 115] visited the graves later, on vacation, an oak tree grew behind the cast iron marker [tafel]. Later, after the first world war, the graveyard was abandoned and hardly protected. The low wall was easily climbed over, and everything useable was plundered. All trees were cut down, many grave markers were of wood, these were also stolen, the fences were broken off to be sold as scrap-iron. When I last visited the graves in Libau in 1930, except for the grave of mother and aunt, only a few were still preserved. The cemetery was flattened by time and weather. I don't know whether a transfer of the remains to the south cemetery occurred.
When my mother died I was one and a half years old; I have no memory of her. When I was a child one did not speak of her; when I was older and got a second mother it had been agreed that one especially did not speak of my mother. So I know almost nothing of my mother. According to stories and the few photos, she was of short stature, blond, and very beautiful [116]. She was also very clever [klug] and calm in her bearing. I have several letters of hers, that through some kind of shyness I have been unable to read, and a few handicrafts, among them my father's prayer shawl [tales] bag.
There was great sorrow in the family over the deaths of my mother and aunt Sophie. Aunt Fanny, who later married Nathan Lowenstein, came into the house to care for me and run my widowed father's household. She knew nothing of child rearing or housekeeping, she was herself only a big child. In contrast to that, she vas very pretty, and let the students of the upper grades in our neighborhood court her much and often. Apparently the situation was not good either for me or my father. So it was natural that he would have to marry again. My father went on most of our holiday trips to the relatives, of which I wrote already, [msp 117] to find himself a wife and me a mother. It did not seem to work, because it lasted very long. Perhaps the candidates shied away from taking such a wild spoiled brat as me under their care. Finally my father made a match outside the country. He went to Konigsberg in private [i.Pr.] (without taking me along), got engaged to Sara Halpert, the daughter of Hirsch Halpert, Rabbi [Gabbe] in the polish schul (Synagogue), and the wedding took place on my father's birthday in 1893. I was already almost eight when the new mother, whom I always called Mamachen, came into the house in Libau. The marriage was happy, though not smooth. The percentage of happy unions was not smaller, perhaps larger, among the arranged ones than among the accidental ones (so-called love matches). When I met her at the railway station, Mamachen was a very pretty [bildhubshe], gentle [sanfte] woman, somewhat buxom [vollschlank] wearing a camel colored plush jacket, into which I liked to cuddle. [118] She was usually serious, an outstanding housewife [hausfrau], and cooked and baked wonderfully; your mother is the only one I've met so far who can do it still better in every respect. Mamachen was no longer young, did not make herself younger, but would give her age as ten years younger.
Unfortunately neither she nor anyone else thought of it that smallpox immunization disappears at around age 30. She was vaccinated as a child, and in Germany smallpox was a rare, almost unknown, illness. But in Russia, and in God's little land of Kurland, it was all too common. Perhaps she got infected in an employment agency for servants, and became seriously ill with smallpox. She lay in the city [stadtlichen] hospital, and I would visit her with my father. She was in mortal danger for a long time; when she came out of it the once beautiful, smooth, white, face was a single red scar. [msp 119] She remained pockmarked the rest of her life. (In Russia pockmarked is called ..... (rjaboi); it is such a common sight that a special [urtumlich] word was coined [gepragt] for it. The bodily manifestation of her disease disturbed Mamachen's spirit for the rest of her life. [gab Mamachen ein knacks]. Papachen could surround her with the greatest love, concern, and attention, but she would convince herself that he did not love her, that he cared more for other women; I am sure she was mistaken, but she suffered in spite of it, and Papachen suffered along with her. But they lived quietly and withdrawn. In 1895 uncle Erich was born, at the end of 1896 uncle George. We three grew up, Erich and I left the parental home and moved away [fremde], George stayed home, he was Mamachen's darling. Mamachen fulfilled her step-motherly duty in an exemplary way; before going to Libau she had to swear to her father that she would not touch the orphan [waise], and she never did. [120] I never got a slap from her, though I must have driven her to desperation with my mischief, stubbornness, and back-talk. In later years we understood each other very well, and I would get her annoyed only in jest, for example when I would say I was going to marry a Christian she became speechless just as in my Childhood when I did not want to be subdued.
For a time she became very fat, she went to Marienbad several times, she visited me in Freiberg, in Kiel and in Hamburg. She complained [krankelte] about various things. In 1922 she was in Kissingen with Papachen. The diagnoses of the physicians did not sound good, and at the end of 1922 she suffered a stroke which robbed her of speech and movement. So she suffered until the 15 Kislev (November 1923). When she died I was in Hamburg, I went to Libau for the funeral, but arrived too late. Uncle Erich was not allowed to return to [121] Latvia at that time, so uncle George and I were there alone to console Papachen. During Mamachen's illness an electric heating pad set the covers on fire. Since she could not call or move, she would have been seriously burned had not cousin Fanny (now in Prescott, AZ) happened to come in the room and torn the burning cover away. During her illness a very strange thing became evident. Some time before she had set a room aside and locked it with keys from which she would not be separated. Then she declared that the business staff were dishonest, that when Papachen and George went to lunch she herself sat in the cashiers place. She used this daily period to cut off pieces of cloth and hoard them in her locked room. Papachen found this collected hoard when he acquired the key during Mamachen's illness. This hoarding did not make sense, because the cut pieces were not useful for either [122] a suit or a dress. Perhaps this all happened in a state of craziness that later culminated in the stroke. To accomplish it she won the complicity of one of the clerks, who took the opportunity to cut coupons of cloth for himself, but with more sense, with which he supplied his girlfriend's [geliebten] shop in New Libau, who ran an active [schwunghaften] business with the stolen goods.
When I wish to describe to you my father, Leonhard Herzenberg, after whom you are named, I can approach it only with a certain shyness [Scheu]. Your grandfather, who attended only a miserable cheider in the country, worked himself out of nothing up to a very high position. I have studied, and graduated from two universities, but always see how far behind my father I stand. No matter how I approach it, from intelligence, [123] diligence, work strength [arbeitskraft], endurance, or observation gift, [beobachtungsgabe] I can only conclude that had he grown up a generation later, under my circumstances, he would have been a light for humanity in any field he may have chosen. Circumstances offered him a small range of occupations, but he fulfilled their and his possibilities 100%. I still envy his letter writing style, and his being had a dignity [wurde] and charm that I have never seen in another person; may they be granted to you, Nardi. The relatives in Berlin would laugh about Mamachen when she spoke of Papachen: "You must see him behind his desk [ladentisch], he stands there like a prince [furst]." And so it was, and whenever he attended a meeting, or led a conference, he would dominate it, without special schooling, without special speaking gifts, and modesty in appearance and dress. He easily stood out from his 9 siblings [msp 124], and perhaps that is why he did not get along with any of them. As I got to know him [als ich ihn kennen lernte] he was just as bald as he is in all his photos. Then I saw very little of him. On work days we never had a midday meal together, since school lasted until 2:30 and often 3:30, and most evenings he came home late from the store, around 9:00, when we would all be together for a short time.
Saturday the store was closed, and then we were together more; Papachen was not very devout - only after the death of my grandfather, when he would go to the synagogue daily to say Kadish, and was elected leader of the congregation, did he change; he no longer smoked on Saturday, I was allowed to smoke at home, but he did not like to see it on the street. In later years we sat together longer in the evenings, I with my school work, [125] or reading, Papachen with his bookkeeping, which he always handled himself and was very skilled at. Especially during inventory and year end he would work until late at night. Every Friday evening after dinner we would both go for a walk, in any weather, and then I talked about my school experiences, and he talked about the store. So it went during the school years; then when I went abroad [in die fremde] I would be home only occasionally on vacations, and then, briefly. I would search for every hour I could be together with him, and in later years we were the closest of friends. After I emigrated to Bolivia we would write each other weekly, and thus remained in close contact.
Soon after his second marriage Papachen with his brother Joseph founded the firm Gebruder Herzenberg. The shop was located in the Knopf building, on the corner of Korn and Julian streets. After a few years the whole [126] block of buildings up to the market burned down. The shop changed locations several times until the Knopf's rebuilding was complete. The shop again moved back to the old corner, and is still there. However, I don't know what it is called now, since the Bolsheviks who took back Latvia after France collapsed in June 1940 "nationalized" the business, that is took it over without compensation, and your uncle George, the owner, was set out on the street.
The business went well, but it was no true happiness. Papachen did not get along with uncle Joseph, and Mamachen even less so with aunt Frieda, uncle Joseph's wife. Both had equal rights, and when Papachen hired somebody, and uncle Joseph did not like them, the latter would fire them. But they both withstood it. Shortly before the world war uncle Joseph died, and Papachen became sole owner. Then the war came, almost all Jews in Libau left the city and moved to inner Russia, partly to save what one could take along, partly to flee to the capital invested in Russian [127] banks and enterprises, partly due to forced evacuation of Jews from the border areas. Uncle Leopold moved to Riga, but Papachen stayed; the Germans came, and were greeted as liberators from the Russian domination, since they came a day before the forced evacuation of the Jews, and instead of them the Russian administration fled to the north. The Germans soon showed themselves in all their ostentation. Life was difficult during the occupation time. Papachen remained a Russian patriot and invested his earnings in czarist rubles. When these then dropped down to nothing, he invested in Reichsmark, and so he also lost this portion.
The firm stayed in business, one lived, and not so badly, since the bread and fat ration cards, and the scarcity of meat and fish was not known in Kurland itself during the occupation. [128] But after Latvia became an independent state in 1919, freed of Russians and Germans, Papachen did not become a "noveau riche." During the inflation time he had helped many, but remained the same person who tenaciously fought for his existence. Now he had become the leading personality of the Jewish community. All those who towered over him in education, riches, and position had died or been ruined in Russia. He was always reelected to his position in the community, and one year before his death he was named an honorary freeman (citizen?) [eherenburger]. So, after Mamachen's death he lived in company with uncle George in the beautiful home [wohnung] at Gymnasiumstrasse-4. I was there in November 1918 when Germany surrendered in the first world war, in 1923, after Mamachen's death, in 1925 before emigrating to Bolivia [129], and last in 1930 during my European vacation. Papachen lived quietly and withdrawn; he was not a misanthrope, but was disinclined toward any turbulent gathering. He lived esteemed and loved by the congregation, the city, and with few friends from the old guard of his youth. He lived as he wanted and as he believed was right. Unfortunately he lacked Mamachen's nurture. He had already suffered from a kidney ailment earlier, which kept getting worse over the years. He rarely traveled to the German baths, about once every ten years. Shortly after my last visit in 1930 he became severely ill from kidney stones. Once in a while he had some relief, and then he worked resolutely in the business and the congregation. Finally the crisis came in July 1932. He was transferred to a clinic, but there was no help. He suffered with horrible pain, and succumbed to Uremia on the 12 Tamuz (15 July 1932). With him were uncles Erich and George. [130]
I was here in Oruro, I had just gotten a letter from him written in good spirits, since an improvement in his condition had occurred, when the telegram with the sad news arrived. I had lost not only my father, but also the best friend on earth, and the most noble person I ever knew. Papachen's funeral in Libau was exceptional, the coffin was kept in the synagogue, and there the memorial orations were given, Now he rests in the south cemetery next to Mamachen, grandmother, and uncle Joseph. The only good thing is that he did not experience the collapse of everything he loved esteemed, the whole Hitler plague and its consequences.
[Hebrew script notation]
[marginal notation:] my father's grave inscription[ followed by several lines in Hebrew script]
[130 - 133: Ehrenburger certificate, newspaper clippings of memorial items from Leonhard's death]
MY ChildHOOD [134] I was born on 6 September 1885, in Libau, Kurland, in the upper story of the south west corner of the intersection of Julianen and Ludwig streets. It was 6 Sept, Russian style, where the Julian calendar was still valid. In the western world one was then 12 days ahead and wrote it as 18 September, but according to the Jewish calendar it was 9 Tishri, eve [erev] of Yom Kippur, and as long as my father lived that day was treated as my birthday. Thus my birthday was never celebrated, since on the eve of the day of atonement one had other thoughts in an orthodox Jewish household. One started in the morning with an atonement ritual [kapores-schlagen], in which ones sins are transferred to a sacrificial animal or to money given to the poor. My father had a full grown rooster, we children copper coins, (the Russian 5 kopek piece was the size of a [taler]). The copper coins were distributed to the beggars [schnorrergilde], the rooster however we consumed [verzehrten] in the afternoon before going to the synagogue [135]. Then in the morning a flower pot would be filled with sand in which the meter-long memorial candle for my mother would be placed. So the day already started under gloomy signs, and my birthday was never a happy day.
At my birth my mother got Childbed fever. She got through it, but lost her milk and I was raised with a bottle. When we left this house, I do not know. Probably after my mother's death. At that time we lived on the corner of Seestrasse and Schifferstrasse. About 100 meter west of the Seestrasse one came to the beautiful avenue of chestnut trees leading to the spa [kurhaus] and past it directly to the sea. The Schifferstrasse, after about 150 m toward the north, led to the harbor with its warehouses, steamships, and lively activity. There were two apartments on the ground [parterre] floor, and the same in the next floor. Our apartment consisted of a living room, a bedroom, a dark [36] room where aunt Fanny, and later I and cousin Julius slept, a kitchen, and a tiny garden of about 3 x 3 m. Next to the kitchen was the privy. Libau had sewers later, but no water lines. A W.C would not even be imagined. More of that later. Next to us on the ground floor lived the carriage owner [fuhrhalter] Abraham Lowenstein. In the courtyard [hof] stood his carriages, in the stable the horses. On the upper floor lived a small grain dealer Frank. Behind the fairly large yard there was a neglected fruit garden of the owner Schwerderski. We children would play in the yard and the garden; a ripe berry, pear or apple would never get into the hand of the owner; we finished everything in the unripe state; it is a wonder that we stayed alive.
Since I was motherless, and the pretty aunt Fanny [137] was out of the house a lot, I would be left with Lowensteins, or with Frank, and when that did not work with the cobbler Bansemier across the street, with all of whom I spent more time than I did at home. Toys I had none; I played with thread spools and empty boxes. Once a year there was the great annual market in New Libau, and then there might be a wooden horse or some such. Later soldiers were cut out of picture sheets and pasted on cardboard. But I was left to myself, and the whole memory of Childhood is very pale. I had measles, scarlet fever, diphtheria, whooping cough, but do not remember any of it. When I was about 4 cousin Julius Bernitz, who was two years older, was brought into the house. His father had died, his mother had stayed with the younger children Hemske and Frieda at my grandparents in Goldingen. I grew up together with Julius, and we lived in one room until I left home in 1902. [138] I am conscious of very little of my first years of Childhood. I do not know what my age was when my father decided to enroll me in a kindergarten, the only one in Libau, which at that time must have been seen as a daring novelty. Children were raised at home, then went to the cheider, or else the German private school, and from there either in to a yeshiva or into the business.
The awareness of systematic learning in preparation for [university] study occurred only in a later stage of my life, in the 90's. I came into the kindergarten of Miss Rosenpflanzer, an old, white-haired lady, always in a cheerful, happy mood, with rosy cheeks. It was a [Frobel?] kindergarten, with about 20 Children, mostly of Baltic parents; we were only a few Jewish children among them, an naturally no consideration was given to that. [msp 139] Instruction was in a pure Lutheran spirit, and I knew, and sang, several German church songs, to which my father apparently did not object. Emil, the oldest brother of Grinja Falk was in the same kindergarten, and also later his future wife, Manja Pines, but then she was very small. From there I went in to the private school of Ansitt. It was run by two old, haggard, and quite ugly spinsters. There I learned the beginning basics of the Russian language. I was in this school only a short time and came into a further private school of Miss Schafer in the Waisenhausstrasse, a fair stretch to walk, which was not at all nice in winter and in the morning. Aside form Miss Schafer, a broad [breite], older and very energetic lady, two Russian ladies, Krefowt and Hubenet, worked there. Instruction was stern and hard, I was not taken seriously [man nahm mich nicht fur voll], because of my Jewishness, which I did not understand yet.
[Letter attached on these pages] [140]
I only have unpleasant memories of these two private schools, but in the last one my first friendship was made. In class with me there was a blond boy, Kurt Bonitz, the son of the confectionery [conditorei] owner Bonitz. Kurt would invite me over on occasional Sunday afternoons, there was chocolate, and cake, and ice cream, as much as I could eat. I had a sweet tooth [vernascht war ich damals] then, and still have it. In exchange I would tell fairy tales. We soon came apart. So ended the year 1894. At that time a preparatory class was added to the Realschule. I was enrolled in it, passed my admission exam, and was dressed in the black uniform that I wore until the summer of 1902. It consisted of black long pants, a military shirt, also black, with an attached black high collar [stehkragen] that closed with a hook. [141] Then there was a black patent leather belt [lackledergurtel] with a brass buckle on which the black letters .... were embossed. The initials stand for [Russian words], Libau City Realschule. The cap was black, in military style, with yellow [passbole?] with black patent leather visor, and again the initials embossed in the "golden" oak leaf cluster. In winter there was also a coat, black with "gold" buttons. There was another high school in Libau, the humanistic Nicolaigymnasium, named in honor of Czar Nicholas I. At that time in czarist Russia, except for a few military highschools, there were only the two kinds of highschools. Realschulen that gave the right to enlist in voluntary military service for a year after 6 years, also gave the right to study in the commercial section of the polytechnic university, from which one could graduate in 3-4 years. Realschulen also had a supplementary [ergantzungs] class. [142] After graduating from this seventh year one received the leaving certificate that entitled one to study at Polytechnic university, but not at a regular university, unless one also satisfied the requirements of the Greek and Latin curriculum.
Attending the humanistic gymnasium required eight years, where Latin and Greek and a choice of German or french were taught. There was no natural science, and little mathematics and physics. Graduating from the gymnasium opened doors to many universities. They had the same uniforms, but the [passbolen] were white, and "silver" instead of "gold" for buttons, etc., and the winter coat was a light gray. In summer one wore the same style uniform, but made of linen, which was very pleasant in the heat. The great advantage of the uniform was that from the outside [143] there was no indication of difference in wealth between the students in all of Russia. The son of the richest man, while attending school, both in and out of school, wore the same, simple, black clothing as the son of the poorest widow. The girls in the state schools also wore uniforms, although a little room for individuality was left in choice of hair ribbons and lace trimmings. In old Russia everything was uniformed, not only military, navy, police, and customs, but also any government employee, wore uniforms, and not only on duty, but also otherwise, and of course all school pupils and other students.
Realschulen and Gymnasiums were under the ministry of popular education [volksaufklarung], as well as most universities. However there were some in the road construction ministry, and others in the mine construction ministry. Later a third kind [144] of higher schools was established (known as middle schools in Russia) in the commercial schools. These were modeled after the Realschulen, but had English instead of french, and subjects such as political economy, bookkeeping, etc. They had the same rights as the Realschulen, the same black uniforms, but with green [passbolen] since they were under the finance ministry, which also was in charge of its own Polytechnic schools, such as those in Warsaw and Kiev, and the mining school in Jekaterinslav (now Dnjepropetrovsk).
When I spoke above of the rights to study that these highschools provided, it was to be understood that applied to all non-Jews, [selbst fur judische sectierer wie karaer oder Karaimen die nur die torah aber nicht den talmud anerkennen]. For Jews there was a Numerus Clausus (quota) that limited the number of Jewish students. [145] In Petersburg and Moscow this quota amounted to between 0.5 and 3.0 %, in the inner lands around 5%, and in the rim states and in the settlement districts up to 10%.
The quotas were also used in the highschools. Even in the lowest grades there was not always room for every Jewish child that applied. Sometimes the quota was calculated for an individual class, so in a class of 17 students only a single Jew would be allowed, but in my Realschule the whole school was used, and in the graduating class we were fewer than 20 students, and among them 5 Jews.
Every Jewish father endeavored to make a university education possible for his sons, since the diploma obtained there gave them residence rights in all of Russia. Jews in Russia were second class citizens; the quota applied not only to the schools, but for the whole country. The Jew could live where he was born, and [146] other than that in the cities and places where the settlement district to which the Czar province of Poland and a few neighboring governments of the Ukraine and white Russia belonged. But not in the country or the villages. I was born in Libau, and was not allowed to live in Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev, and even Riga. When we went to the country for vacations in summer there were always difficulties with the police. Since they were always poorly paid, and thus easily bribed, usually one could get together. But on the whole it was an unbearable condition. Your grandfather Samuel lived in Moscow for a few years, until finally the expulsion reached him. These conditions lasted into the world war 1914/18. It was grotesque that Jewish soldiers who were brought to Moscow with wounded transports, were expelled from there. No words from the allied French or English [147] did any good, it was said that one could not change the Jew laws in the critical time of the war, and so these did not fall until the collapse of czarist Russia.
So, to obtain residence rights for all Russia, one had to study in a university, and to do so one had to attend the high school that gave the right to study in a university. In order to get into high school, due to the quota, even young children had to take competitive exams and certification tests. Already as 8 and 9 year olds we knew that we were Jews, and that because of it we had to suffer and struggle. When Germans, Letts, poles, or Russians needed only a 3 to be admitted, among Jewish children with the highest scores lots would be drawn to determine who was worthy of attending high school. And so it went through university; thus it was not surprising that only the most talented, able, and diligent Jews reached university and [148] in later life accomplished accordingly.
Naturally there was a way of easily overcoming all these difficulties, a magic wand that opened not only highschools and universities, but highest society, the highest government positions, a handful of water: baptism. But the abhorrence of desertion from the faith [Meschumod] was so deep that the remedy of baptism was grasped only in the rarest cases, and then only in people with no character who were surely no loss to Judaism. How different from western Europe where baptism and mixed marriage contributed throughout to the good tone [?][ton] of the [arrievierten] Jews. In the east, in spite of repression and persecution, pogroms and lack of rights, even the atheist would never think of repudiating Judaism; in the west the attraction [locken] of a lieutenant's uniform was enough. In Russia, when Zionism had not even been thought of, the Jews [149] always considered themselves a people, and were treated as such by the government. One was a Russian subject, but for centuries along with that one was a Jew as one might be a Pole, a Finn, or member of another of the 100 nations that constituted the Russian empire.
LIBAU, MY NATIVE City
[149] Libau, a fishing village in the 13th century, became a city in 1625. Libau lies on a 2 km wide tongue of land. West of the city the Baltic sea spreads out, on the east the Libau lake, which is 2 to 3 km wide, and 15 km long. In the north of the Libau lake there is a connection to the Baltic which is widened by dredging. That is the Libau harbor, about 80 m wide and 6 m deep, protected from the Baltic sea by breakwaters and seawalls with only narrow openings for ships. The outer harbor is 8 m deep. The harbor is ice-free almost the entire year, and before the world war [150] it was used by 1500 ships a year. Libau had 17 consulates, was the biggest emigration harbor of Russia, and had lively industry - linoleum for all of Russia was made in Libau. The castor oil for all Russia was pressed in Libau, and the herrings for all Russia were imported, sorted, packed, and shipped to Russia. Wood, grain, oil-cake were exported.
Libau was called Libava in Russian, Liepaja in Lettish - the Russian "Lipa" means linden, and the coat of arms of Libau has a linden on a blue field with a red Kurish lion leaning against it.
Libau was connected to inner Russia by the Libau-Romnyer railroad. A narrow gauge line connected with Hasenpoth via Grobin. After the world war this line was extended to Goldingen, and a line to Riga was also built, since the old connection [151] ran through Lithuania in places, which had become a foreign country. So the new line was built on Latvian ground.
The city was initially built up only south of the harbor, and spread west almost to the Baltic. In the east the shore of the Libau lake was swampy and unhealthy, and the burgers did not settle there. In the west the Kurhausalle ended at the Kurhaus, where concerts always took place on summer evenings. The Kurhaus stood at the end of a residential district. A wide outside staircase led to the beach. The Libau beach is the most beautiful beach I have seen in all my travels. The Baltic knows no tides, and except for storms when the waves came up to the Kurhaus, the beach was almost 200 m wide all year, the purest, white, flour-fine sand, no pebbles, no piece of wood. The wide white stripe ran from the seawall until Germany, a marvelous street for wandering. [152] Then the westerly storms would come and cover the beach with waves, which on their retreat would leave a foot-high layer of dark brown seaweed. The latter did not lie long though; a large part was collected by peasants for fertilizer, and the sand would cover the rest without a trace. The seaweed also brought a lot of amber to the shore, and as children we would collect it eagerly; I had boxes of it, naturally mostly hazel-nut size pieces. To the north the beach ended at the seawall on which one could walk 500 m into the Baltic sea. 1500 meter south of the seawall was the men's bathhouse and another 500 m the women's bathhouse. Further south was an open air swimming pool where anyone could bathe as they liked. The bathing establishments had 3 classes in each. In the first class one stepped directly [153] into man-deep water, the second was built on the beach and one had to wade for 100 m through shallow water before one got neck deep, and the third one was built further back, so one had to walk through sand for 100 m before getting to the water. In summer one would bathe daily, from mid June until September, and we children would bathe 2-3 times a day and romp around in the water for hours. In spite of the fact that I spent a lot of time in the water every summer, I never learned to swim. My father was a good swimmer, but apparently he placed no value on having me learn also; actually I was fearfully [aengstlich] kept away from water sports; later, when I was 14 I was allowed to row, but not to sail. In contrast, your uncle George was an enthusiastic and very able sailor. One would bathe without any bathing suit; when someone wore bathing trunks, there would be whispers of a disorder of his sex parts.[154]
Libau is a marvelous sea-side resort, much better than those on the Riga beach. In summer bathing guests would come from Russia, especially when the Russian court visited the resort for a time. Libauers preferred to spend the summer months in the forested area inside Kurland, but most stayed in the city where they could mind their businesses, and enjoyed the resorts, water sport, and the rather good concerts at the Kurhaus. At my time the popularity of Libau as a resort had largely declined. The Baltic idyll was made into a fortress and military harbor. Alexander III had decreed that the main Russian military harbor would be built in Reval. In spite of the freedom from ice, and the good location, he did not want a war harbor in Libau due to the danger of the proximity of the German border. In spite of it the grand dukes persuadedNicholas II that a war harbor [155] be built in Libau, along with a fortress to protect it. So the construction began feverishly. Directly north of the Kurhaus the large shore battery was erected, which continued until the seawall. There was barbed wire and trenches, which do not suit a modern resort. When my uncle Jacob gave me my first camera, a Pocket Kodak, I went to the shore to snap pictures. I photographed the lighthouse, the pilot tower, the seawall, and so on, and was promptly arrested, led through the whole town, and delivered to the gendarmerie. I was then a pupil in the 7th grade, 15 years old, and unaware that I had committed a state crime. At that time I was tutoring for the family of the fortress commander, general Petrovich, who spoke up for me and effected the return of the camera, but the roll of film was confiscated, who knows why, since one could buy all the pictures cheaper and better as post cards. [156]
The resort declined, but the city blossomed. In addition to the harbor and commerce activity came the construction of the war harbor and fortress. Officers and engineers with families streamed into Libau. There was an boom in every respect. And that went on till the outbreak of the world war. At that time Libau had a population of 100,000. A strange city, but not an exception in the Russian rim countries. The population consisted of German Balts, Russians, Letts, Jews, and Poles. Added to that the many foreigners, Reichs Germans, Danes, Swedes, English, French, etc. Each of these national groups led its own life, had its own associations, festivals, amusements. These circles did not intersect, either socially or culturally, even though they were all loyal subjects of the Czar. The Russians consisted of the government employees, military, police, and navy. [157] Then there were all the lower employees, priests, a few businessmen, entrepreneurs, etc. They clustered around the Russian church in the Waisenhausstrassse, then the garrison church was added. In the war harbor a pompous cathedral was erected, another one was started near the Kurhaus, but was never finished. The Russian "society" was exclusive to uniformed employees, both civil and military. They never learned German, and for them the others did not exist. The German burger, merchants, craftsmen, factory workers had the trinity church on the main street as a center. It was beautiful, large church, with what at that time may have been the largest organ in the world, having over 10,000 pipes. I was never in a church in Libau, not even for a church concert. The German Balts enclosed themselves culturally with the equally Lutheran Swedes, Danes and naturally also the nobility, though few of the "Barons" lived in the town: Vietinghoffs, [158] Behrs, Ostensacken, Borners, who though Lutheran, held themselves apart form the German Balts.
The Jewish community, of about 20,000, were also divided into several groups. The main group was the Baltic Jews, with German spoken at home and in the community. Yiddish was understood, but they could not speak it. Hebrew was hardly known. Culturally we belonged to the German middle class, and were closer to the German burger group than to any other national group, and read the old "Libausche Zeitung." This Jewish group would not have survived, however, without the rich Jews from white Russia and Lithuania having automatically joined it. These not only gave the group great capital strength, but they were people with immense Jewish and other knowledge and education. These were the Minsk-Pinskers: [159] Halpern, Luries, Eliasberg, Katsenelsohn, Weisbrehm and so on. The Kurhausstrasse was an avenue of Jewish villas. One lived well, ate well, but also had an open heart and purse for every artistic activity. No musical or literary greatness, or dramatic troop would miss visiting Libau, and at all such occasions the Jews were present in greater numbers than their proportion of the population would have indicated. This Jewish group had the large synagogue across from the local court [bezirksgericht], the "Choir-schul." Since this synagogue was already so westernized, that he prayer leader, the Chasen of my Childhood, Rabinovitsch was accompanied by a boy's and men's choir of 10-20 voices in four parts. The services were very beautiful, but usually Rabinovitsch sang himself hoarse during rehearsal for the festivals; since the choir could not accompany any other prayer leader, the Choir-schul stayed without Chasen and without Choir. In spite of the choir the synagogue did make an impression [160] of a purely eastern Jewish congregation. Later though, after I had already emigrated, and my father had become the leader, he made a great effort to introduce the Prussian custom and tradition that the synagogues in Germany had adapted him to. The other Jewish congregation jokingly called itself the "Velvet Schul" [Sammeter Schul] (though it has nothing to do with velvet [sammet] - this northerly part of Latvia was called [Russian word = samogitien] and the inhabitants were "sammeter"); it was located near the east harbor and the Weissenhofstrasse. Its members were the poorest circles of the freshly immigrated, as well as established Latvian Jews, with Yiddish as a mother tongue, real [Golus Juden] who tolerated no western affinity. They had their own [Rom?] and the two groups came together rarely. The Jewish community was quite self-sufficient [autark]. One could go through ones whole life, and except for the government, never have to deal with a non-Jew. There were Jewish servants, carriage drivers, hand workers of every kind, and naturally innumerable businesses, schools (without rights), etc. [161]
The letts were a group wholly to themselves, with the gothic [Annenkirche] at the hay market. In school there were fewer Letts than Jews, we were good schoolmates [kameraden] but there was no closer contact. Yet another isolated group consisted of catholic Poles and Lithuanian, who flocked to the catholic church and the parsonage. But each group lived by themselves, married among themselves, had their own cemetery. However there was no Lettish cemetery, because they were considered Lutherans, and only the faith counted in the Russia of that time. There was no civic registry [standesamt]. Marriage, divorce, birth and death registration was performed by the registrars of the various cultural communities, and only in them. One lived quiet and secure. The special distinguishing feature [characteristicum] was the stability [bestandigkeit] of the world. Who could doubt the permanence of the Romanows, the Hohenzollern and the Habsburger. One was patriotically minded, there were no revolutionary ideas, socialism [162] was considered a devil's concoction [teuflisches machwerk], and one had very little sympathy with the politically active students who wanted to introduce a different world view and then were banished to Siberia. The Ruble was worth two mark and 16 pfennig. The frank was 40 kopecs, the crowns 55 kopecs, and the dollar two rubles. There was much gold coinage (10 and 5 ruble), silver coinage (1 ruble, a rather large coin, 50k, 25k, 20k, 15k, 10k, and 5k), copper coinage (3k, 2k, 1k, ½k, ¼k). Naturally one preferred paper money for larger sums, such as travel, since gold was very heavy. And what madman would have doubted the security of paper money. One learned of "drafts" [assignaten] and their collapse, but that had been long ago and could not happen again. One lived in friendship with all neighbors, no-one thought of war, or revolution; and yet my generation was to experience so much more war, revolution, [163] state destruction, than hardly any other. But in my youth nobody thought of that, and there were no prophets to predict the uncanny [unheimlich] future. Life was beautiful [shoen] and one had everything. Foods were especially cheap; a full grown goose cost one ruble, pork was 10 kopecs per pound. We had to eat the expensive kosher beef and lamb, which cost 18-20 kopecs per pound; part of the expense was the "Korobka" tax. Fish was available in great quantity; every day one could buy live carp, tench [schleie], pike. The ocean shipping brought salmon, flounder [butten], [stromlinge] (which, thanks to the low salt content in the Baltic sea are a pathetic kind of herring), smelt [stinten], and [dorsche] (a miserable north sea cod-fish). Then there were smoked sprats, herring, flounder, and salmon. In winter only the latter were available, but in summer the market was flooded [164] with the best and cheapest berries and fruit. [Johannes], [stachel], and straw-berries from the garden; blue-berries, [preissel (Krons) ] berries, and strawberries from the forest, mushrooms, predominantly chanterells [pfifferlinge] but also stone yellow boletus [stein-pilze] and champignions. Apples, pears, nuts, cherries, etc. The time for making preserves came in the fall, and for weeks there was cooking of juices, and preserves for the winter, since until early summer there would be nothing fresh except potatoes and beets. Foodstuffs were plentiful and cheap; there also were delicacies from the entire Russian empire, from the white sea to the black sea, from the east sea to Vladivostok. Never again have I experienced such marvelous fruit, confections, and preserves. Unfortunately we were not allowed to eat caviar, since it came from a non-kosher fish without scales, but in the shops [165] the following kinds were available: [malsool], [payusnaya in fusschen].
Clothing was expensive, since there were no ready-to-wear items. The tailor measured for everything, one bought the cloth and accessories, and so the clothing was made. As long as I was in the parent's home no ready made shoes were bought either; the shoemaker came to the house, took measures, then all supplies needed would be bought from the leather dealer. I knew only rubber boots at that time, no laced ones.
The winters were quite cold; already in the fall one would buy several cords [faden (ca 2 meter)] of birch wood. Then one would rent inmates of the prison, who would come into the yard with an overseer, and saw, chop and stack the wood. The large tile-stoves [kachelofen] would be fired with this in the morning in winter and stay warm for 24 hours. Before the beginning of winter all windows were fitted with storm windows, the cracks sealed with paper strips, [166] and a padding layer in which colorful corn-flowers and paper rosettes were placed would cover the window-bench. Only in the spring would the storm windows [winter rahmen] be put away again. Regarding lighting, I experienced the whole development. First we had quite miserable petroleum lamps, then came the lightning burners [?][blitz brenner]. When we moved from Seestrasse 32 to the Tieletz house Badestrasse 32 we got gas lighting, already with glow-mantles. Only shortly before I left home did we get electric lighting.
Libau is not on any river, the water in the Libau lake is not fit for drinking. Two water tables [grundwasserspiegel] supplied the city. The first one is only about 10m deep, but the water is infected [verseucht]. Each house has a pump in the yard [167]. The second water table is about 100m deep, wonderful, pure drinking water, only a little hard. But only richer house owners could afford such a well [bohrung]. The water rose so high artesially that one could obtain it with a hand pump; later every house had either a wind motor or electric pumps that pumped the water into a tank on the ground floor [hausboden].
The waste water arrangements were worse however. There was a sewer system that led waste water into the harbor, but only the fewest modern houses had water toilets. Every house had a waste pit that the toilets emptied into, where all the waste collected. Occasionally a steam pump came by with stink-vessels [stinkfassern] and pumped it all out and dumped it somewhere far out of town. When this work happened the whole house and neighborhood would be filled with a horrible stench.[167]
MY SCHOOL TIME
[168] In august 1895 I came into the 1st grade of the Libau [statrealschule]. It was a large class, with over 50 pupils in three rows of school-benches with two places each. There were place numbers and I was 53 or 54, that is either the second worst or third worst pupil. Why? I don't know. I was very distracted, indifferent, careless; at home nobody minded me; mother was ill often, your uncle Erich was a difficult, sickly, child. I did what I wanted, and nobody cared about my schoolwork. When the year ended I was promoted to the 2nd grade, subject to passing three make-up exams, in arithmetic, drawing, and calligraphy. I received tutoring during the summer from a student named Falk, son of the cap maker Falk on the large market, and was promoted. In the 2nd grade (the numbering went up to the 7th, where we would receive the maturity certificate [rife-zeugniss]) [169] I was a normal pupil, that is, I was promoted without make-up exams. I was never held back during the whole school time, but by a narrow margin. The best pupils were promoted without exams. The next best only had to pass the written exams, and were excused from the oral ones. I, however, got nothing for free, but always came through. In 1st grade we had a Russian teacher, A. P. Mossakowoski, a seldom loving, very decent [selten lieben hochanstandigen] person who went to Riga later and died there shortly before WWII. The math teacher was Friedrich Demme from the Dorpat University, a very able mathematician, a fellow student of Wilhelm Ostwold, both of whom were university assistants at the same time. The latter was also librarian for the quite notable Libau city library in the attic of city hall. Our drawing teacher was Sallos, Leonid Ivanovich, of Greek descent. Not only a good teacher [170],but also a productive artist. Geography was taught by Dokrenko Muxaure Ubanoburr, a pure administrative soul [reine beamtenseele], who also taught history in higher grades; I can't thank him for any inspiration. He was head of all the classes.[?] [Er war bis zum einjarigen der klassen vorsteher]. German was taught by old Baumgaertel. He had been director of the Realschule; after Russification he was still tolerated as German teacher. He died soon thereafter, when I was still in the 2nd grade and a German-Russian, Freiberg, with a napoleon beard became my German teacher. From the 2nd grade on [Russian name] taught Russian. The school inspector was F. Ivan Netchaev. As such he was in charge of all school discipline. He was hump-backed [p(b)uckelig], so his nickname was "hump" [puckel]; how cruel children are. No one pitied him, he himself was embittered, strict, and overall not pleasant. He was the nightmare of my schooltime, and remained my Russian teacher until my [171] graduation. Aa a teacher he was outstanding.
In the 3rd grade we started french with Bastin. We hook it for 4 years, but my success was less than great. Although he spoke french fluently, he was not much of a teacher. What I do know of french I learned by myself in later years. Then we started on algebra, which was also taught by Demme. I again failed totally. Place numbers were not used any more, but I would have been one of the last. But instead of place numbers a system was introduced in which the smallest and worst behaved, that is the liveliest pupils, were seated in the first row, under the watchful eye of the teacher. There I sat till the end of school, close to the teacher and the board; perhaps that is why I did not discover until later that I was shortsighted; since I traveled around in the world without glasses until 1907, I must have missed many beautiful sights. I was promoted conditionally into the 4th grade, again with three makeup exams, in math, [172] french, and drawing. Actually, if one had three makeup exams one was kept back, but drawing did not count as a full subject. This time my tutor was again Falk, and I was promoted. After that I had no further makeup exams. From the 4th to the 6th grade I was an average pupil; in the last two years I was a good pupil, but I was never one of the best, the pride of the class, because I was always lacking in the most important subject: Russian. Although I had contact and friendships with 100% Russian school mates, in the home, in the family, and in the city one spoke mostly German, and Russian was the foreign language. In August 1899 I came into the 5th grade, during which I became 14 years old, and my learning started to have sense and purpose [sinn und zweck]. In 5th grade we started with chemistry and mineralogy as natural science subjects, after we had started with biology and zoology and botany in the earlier grades.[173] As teachers we had first [Russian name] (jagodowski) and later [Russian name] (Roshdestwenski) (like the Russian admiral in the battle of Tsusima). Both were Russian intellectuals, but neither was a model of either teaching skill or character. I was very friendly with both of them. They had studied natural science, but had hardly any knowledge of the chemistry and mineralogy they had to teach. And there my schoolwork finally got sense and direction. I built all the apparatus for demonstration of chemical experiments, and made all the experiments, since the teacher had two left hands. These experiments I also had to demonstrate at the girl's gymnasium, and wherever Roshdestwnski gave chemistry lectures. I got practice in glass blowing and experimenting that would later be very handy. The school also had a small mineral collection [174] that nobody took care of. I organized it as well as I could. I was excited and eager, what nonsense I did there; since no one gave me any direction, I pasted together a collection of crystal models, among which I still remember a marvelous Pyramid-otahedron (Triakisoctahedron) with in-going [einspringenden] angles. No one was there to tell me that such a thing could not exist in nature; that the axis sections [axenabschnitte] 1:1:n, even with n=infinity, could give a rhombus-dodecahedron only in the limiting case. However, my miss-form was unhesitatingly and admiringly pointed out [eingezeiht] in the collection.
In any case, from 5th grade on it was clear to me that I would study at university level, that I would study chemistry, and since universities were closed to Realschule students, I would study for "Chemical engineer" at a polytechnic (as the Russian technical [175] universities were called). I had no idea at that time of what a tangled thread my studies would follow, that I would indeed study chemistry, that I would become an engineer, that my study and occupation would finally peak on chemical mineralogy. More of that later. I was promoted to the 6th grade after the usual examinations, then took the maturity exam [Reifeprufung], that gave one the right to volunteer for service in the army for a year. Then I went into the 7th, or completion, grade, which one left with graduation and then had the right to attend a technical university, with the constraint of the quota. I was no longer the bratty rascal of earlier times, but still rather childish (immature[?]) [kindlich]. In all classes I was the second youngest; only a Russian schoolmate was a few months younger. I passed my exams well, though not with brilliance, but [176] still with the hope of university study. I carried on with chemistry at home through self-study. The room in which I and cousin Julius slept was my realm. Occasionally something [knallgas] would explode, or I would stink up the whole house. I had a lively interest in pyrotechnic, made "Bengal Matches" (matches that burn with a colored flame) [bengalishe lichter] and similar things; I still wonder that I did not fly up into the air along with the whole house with the abundance of mixtures of potassium chlorate that I handled. But this was no longer part of the school requirement; neither was my activity with astronomy. I studied the star charts diligently, and am still rather familiar with the starry sky, though I am less current with the southern sky which I was not used to. My pride was that I turned to Camille Flamarion and applied for membership in the Societe Astronomique [177] de France, and he answered in a friendly way and I became a member. I received the yellow journal every month felt my membership and felt great. Even in later years I would observe the stars whenever I could [sternwarten besichtigt]. With school subjects it was different. In mathematics and physics, which the school director Dobrosrakov taught (a wonderfully good person with a weakness for the soul catching (evangelism) [seelenfang] for the Russian orthodox church, in whose house I spent much time) I was above average. I was always in a struggle with the Russian language; school compositions were always a horror for me. In drawing I was always weak, and though I had a great longing to be able to draw well, it did not work. While many schoolmates were doing figure drawing, and some where working with clay, I kept bungling with ornaments. In contrast I was so much the better in singing class; unfortunately my good memory [178] let me sing faultlessly by ear, and so I never learned to read notes, since that was not actually taught.
Sport was hardly known then. I also had no interest in it; I have never attended a football game or anything similar. In school there was gym [turn] instruction, for which we were led to the city gym [turnhalle] next to the old German theater on the Herrenstrasse. I was already rather corpulent during my school time, and had exceptionally weak arm muscles, so I was good for nothing [taugte ich zu nichts]. I could not do the simplest thing on any apparatus [gerate], and also never learned to climb [klettern]. I was the shame of Knigge, the gym teacher. When I learned to ride a bicycle skillfully he got reconciled with me. So there was little bodily activity for me: rowing and bicycling. In winter even these disappeared, and I never could learn to skate. [179] No other ice sport was known then. The gymnasts [gymnasiasten] leased the swan pond each year, which became a great skating rink in winter. We Realschule pupils made a competing rink, but it was always a deficit enterprise; I was steward [ordner], but as soon as I put on skates I'd be sitting on the ice. I stood out from my age mates, I was no gymnast, no skater, no dancer; always very busy, I also did not participate in afternoon walking around and flirting on the Kornstrasse and the Kurhausprospect; In the world of girls I was never even noticed, and in the family people shook their wise heads [weisen Haupter] thoughtfully about this strange [aus der art geschlagenen] boy who made powders, swallowed [schlukte] stars, did not care for any girl friend [um keine freundin kummerte], and busied himself with the strangest [ausgefallensten] things.
During the last school years, when I was in the 5th - 7th grades, I had every Sunday afternoon set aside. [179] At that time there was in Libau a Commission for Popular Lectures: [Russian phrase]. Every Sunday afternoon there were popular lectures on science, literature, and occasionally Russian holy legends, illustrate with slides. I was the projectionist, so I had to set up the projector, set up the screen, since the slides were projected from the stage, and after the lecture put everything away, all without compensation. When I left the school I received certificate of thanks, with a silver [Teton?] as memento. Naturally I was considered an expert for slide projection, and whenever a slide lecture took place, whether it was in the war harbor to fight alcoholism among the sailors, or in the imperial technical association, [181] the projector and I were a permanent fixture [Unentgehrliches Factotum]. Those Sunday afternoons, and the Saturday afternoons also, were occupied with such useful [nutzbringender] activity. Libau had a rather nice city library, located in the attic of city hall. Mostly there was old German trash that no one took care of, but there was also a modern section with literature, travelogues, etc., which were loaned out quite a lot. The city librarian was my math t
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Chris & Julie Petersen's Genealogy
1885 - 1955 (70 years)