Frankfurt - Post World War II

In Frankfurt, after World War II was declared over in May of 1945, the surviving citizens faced a city in rubble, lack of living quarters, and hunger.  Frankfurt and many German cities were destroyed, bombed and burned, the results of a horrible war brought on my horrible dictator.  The men returning from the war had to find jobs, and as American troops occupied the city, the rebuilding and reorganizing began slowly.  Families, torn apart by the war, regrouped.  Many, many had lost loved ones.  It was time to start over. 

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My mother was born in August of 1945 in Northern Germany; her brother had been born in December 1943.  After the war, my Opa had returned from prison camp; my Oma had fled her home of East Prussia and found a new place among her husband's family in Frankfurt; her parents too had fled Prussia and got stuck in Eastern Germany for some time.  Some day I need to gather the exact dates, if I can, but since my childhood I have heard the stories of this time.  At first, my mother's reunited family lived in what used to be a bathing cabana on the Main River.   What was a recreational area on the banks of the river before the war was now a thin-walled shelter divided up into small rooms for families who were homeless.

Thankfully, my Opa had family in Frankfurt; his mother and sisters had secured an apartment in the Riederwald district.  It had a few rooms and a bath with a "maid quarter" room in the attic which could also be used for sleeping.   Several of my Opa's sisters were widowed by the war; they lived there or nearby.  Cousins close in age all were cared for by the sisters and sister-in-laws.  The children helped by gathering any coal that may have fallen off the coal truck as it rumbled down the street or a random potato that might have rolled off the vegetable vendor's cart.

Sometimes they watched the American soldiers when they played baseball during their off-time.  Occasionally they got treats of chocolates or gum from them.  These are the snippets of information that I can remember being shared from that time.

As I listened to my relatives talk about that time, no one seemed bitter or angry.  I think everyone was in the same boat and had to work together to survive.  While my Oma sometimes struggled to fit in with her sister-in-laws, who were far more boisterous than she, she still appreciated them very much.  They all had to survive one of the coldest winters in a long time that came in 1946 to 1947.  They needed each other.

From this time comes one of my very, very favorite pictures of my mother and her brother, Dagbert.

Despite the struggle of having little money, the children had their coats and winter shoes and were well-groomed.  My mother was probably around 2 years old and her brother about 3 1/2.  I am just guessing, but I think at the end of a long day of working, worrying, and trying to provide food and shelter, my grandparents probably found some joy in these sweet, innocent faces who still had no idea what a struggle it was just to survive in those post-war days.