We often visited my grandparents in Waldmünchen. They formerly had a larger general store, but after they lost much of their fortune through war loans and inflation, they had moved and lived above a smaller store across the street from a church. When Marianne and I visited there with my Mother for a week or longer, we went to the convent school, and were taught by some of the same sisters who had taught Mother and her sisters. We received colorful pictures of saints made of cellophane when we did well. Grandmother used to send the sisters samples of her cooking and baking, and the sisters repaid her in kind. After the war she sent Sister Jakobea care packages from Canada.
At first living in Waldmünchen does not seem to have been easy for my grandparents. Was it simply because they were newcomers, or because they were Jews, the only ones far and wide? I remember being told the story about a Mr. Fuss, who considered my grandparents his competitors. Grandfather saw him on the other side of the street; crossed the street, extended his hand to him, and said: “I think there is room here for both of us. I think we can help each other.” This ended all of their problems. I often thought of applying this philosophy in my own life, and decided that it is easier said than done.
Grandfather sometimes went to the local tavern to be sociable, but did not like beer and watered the potted flowers from his glass. Grandmother was more sociable and associated with the wives of officials, the pharmacists wife and Mrs. Sillberhorn who had a fabric store a few houses from my grandparents'.
For the High Jewish Holy Days they went to synagogue in Cham. Their daughters had religious instruction there, the same as Karl Stern who also emigrated to Canada and became a well- known convert to Catholicism.
Waldmünchen was only one hour by car from Teinitz, but the atmosphere was quite different. There the Catholic Church played a much greater role, and Waldmünchen seemed more old fashioned. Both towns still had night watchmen in my childhood. The Waldmünchen one went from door to door on New Years Eve, singing for tips. At my grandparents’ home he sang: “I wish Herr Ornstein and his wife and his three virgins a blessed New Year.
Grandmother seems to have been disappointed when her daughter came back with a knowledge of North German cooking, which we all considered far beneath ours, even though we did not know much about it. Therefore Aunt Martha was sent to Fraeulein Kleeblatts finishing school in Regensburg. I am sure the pursuit of a career other than marriage was never considered; when during Wold War I Aunt Irma wanted to take a job at the post office, my grandparents consented only on condition that she not accept a salary.
Mother was sent to the Lyzeum in Pilsen, graduation from which entitled her to attend university. After graduating from commercial academy in Prague, she became engaged to my father.
I was an adult when I came to realize that my status as my father’s favorite child was very hard on Marianne. I remember that when Marianne became an outstanding swimmer during our teens, I was not used to all the attention being paid to her. When in the spring of 1939 she dropped out of high school in Hamilton after only a few weeks, there was no way one could have predicted that she would become an outstanding economist and a role model for younger women far beyond her field of specialization.
Source: Wilma and Georg Iggers, Two Lives in Uncertain Times, New York: Berghahn Books, 2006, p. 10f