A Time and Place - The Making of an Immigrant

by
Franz X. Beisser III

A warm and witty raconteur, Franz X. Beisser III fills his fast-paced narrative with lively vignettes of growing up in Germany during and after World War II, and starting a new life with his family in America in 1955. The 130 short stories and anecdotes allow the reader to pick it up at will. But once opened, this autobiography is hard to put down.
The young Beisser was a keen and incisive observer, storing up sharply detailed memories, skillfully picturing his family's life as refugees who moved from bomb-shattered Munich to the comparative safety of the small southern Bavarian town of Griesbach. There the little family made a home above a Gasthaus in a medieval building while his father served his country. His father was lost during the war. Beisser reports how his new step-father survived ghastly hand-to-hand combat on the Russian front. 
This absorbing tale, told with a fine sense of humor, poignancy, and inspiration, leads us through the family's return to city life in Munich, his apprenticeship as a photoengraver, his eventual immigration to America, and how he overcame the uncertainties and anxieties of living in a different culture in a strange country.
Beisser believes "anyone can achieve happiness and success in our great land with hard work, fortitude, sacrifice, and faith in God". 
Beisser is CEO of a firm which he founded in the 1980's and developed into one of the premier printers and employers of the region in which he lives. His life is proof that the American dream is a reality.

Reviewed by Revelle Hamilton

Author's Note

"The air raid sirens, the approach and roar of bomber planes, those memories came alive only, when after 30 years, I visited the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. Upon entering a wing of the museum that was dedicated to World War II, sounds of bombers and sirens were being played as a background to the exhibit. Such dreadful emotions were aroused in me that I had to leave. I simply could not cope with it."

Here Are A Few Excerpts

1943

"......Munich was always busy in 1943. The four-story row house we lived in was facing the railyard and also the south and western sun. The rhythmic sounds of the rail cars and steam locomotives became a soothing accompaniment to everyday life. It also evokes a sad and piercing memory, a feeling of sadness, to think my father shipped out to war from that same station."
"The air raids of that time made a dreadful imprint on this little fellow's mind. Often the peace of the moment was shaken by that ever more frequent piercing scream of the siren. It seemed to come through the windows, the walls, the curtains, the ears, the head - straight to the soul. This death blast would come never respecting whether you were sleeping or just swallowing your first bite of hot cereal. Instantly, Mom with baby sister and I would, in a state of highest mental and physical agitation, holding onto each other, be racing down the long flights of stairs to the basement of the tenement...."

A Soldier's Soldier

"Laying there asleep, ( I wonder if he snored even then) he was pounced on by a Russian officer. The man jumped astride Dad (Beisser's stepfather) and clamped both hands around his throat. The only thing Dad could do at that instant, was to reach up and begin choking the man on top of him as well. There locked in a life and death struggle, only a few seconds determined who was to black out first. When the Russian did, Dad completed the struggle by crushing his skull with the Teller mine (a flat, round mine with a handle like a skillet) that he later used to blow up the big gun.
Hand to hand combat was when the antagonists could see the whites of each other's eyes. To be in physical combat with the enemy for one day is demanding enough. Dad had one stretch of hand to hand combat that lasted nine straight days."

My Best Friend

"In 1945, when I was five years old, I got my very own first Lederhose. The pants
was the pig skin variety, naturally colored, with the usual trap door in front secured by two buttons at the beltline on top.........The hose (pants) was so big, that it started at the knees and nearly went up under the armpits........a set of leather suspenders that had a horizontal strip of leather between the straps to keep them from falling off the shoulders. .........the lederhose had a buttoned-up trap door that flopped down......the dropping of the trap door in front was not really the big problem. It was the spigot, that was yet too small, that just would not reach, no matter how much I pulled, trying to stretch it past the dropped flap. So inevitably most of the pee bounced off the inside and down the pant legs..........The pants were not considered broken in until they were black with dirt and grime. Anyone with a "new" pair was considered sort of green.......
as quickly as you could, you would wipe every dirty thing that needed wiping on the pants." "The pockets, one on each side of the front, were the ideal place for a little boy's treasures. All of us six years and older carried a pocketknife. Usually, I also carried some marbles with me, never all I had, just the ones I could afford to lose."

Heat

"When we set out the ashes to be picked up, it was that exactly - ashes. There simply was no trash. We, as a family bought nothing that was boxed or bottled......
We always brought our own containers, such as cloth bags or a can for milk. Some staples were wrapped by the grocer or butcher in paper which was coveted as a fire starter. Even the potato peels were either composted, if you had a garden spot, or otherwise they were let to dry to be burned with many other scraps. When we lived in the country we had access to sticks and pine cones. Now, in the city, the competition for burnables was even greater. We cooked with wood and heated water on the back of the stove. When the cooking was done, so was the heating of the room. It took more than a month to fill one of the ash containers the city provided."

All Aboard The SS America

" The storm continued. Our ship, not small by any means (35,000 tons of water displacement), was beginning to feel like a matchbox. The mountainous waves sprayed sea water onto the vacated decks."
"During the height of the storm our ship was tossed so much that the screws, the propellers which are deep in the water normally, came out of the water and caused the entire ship to shake. This shaking was accompanied by a loud grinding sound that could be heard all over the ship. 
Every time I hear people refer to March as the windy month, I think of the week we spent on the Atlantic in March of 1955."

The First Day

"The morning we entered the mouth of the Hudson River, I knew exactly where I was. As we prepared for our trip, I had checked out all the relative geographical points on various maps and atlases. The anticipation of seeing the Statue of Liberty had been bottled up in me. At last it would be for real.
It was a dreary morning. All four of us were on deck, and through the mist, we were beginning to see the skyscrapers. My eyes were focused on them. Then I heard someone say something - something liberty. I looked to where they were pointing, and lo, way over to our left was the tiniest little statue, sticking out of the water, with her arm raised to the sky. We came the year after Ellis Island was closed. We, as a family, made a pact that day that if the Lord is willing, we would visit her one day. And we did."

In America, To School

"A lot of boys packed their lunch. I noticed that on several occasions, some of the fellows looked into their packed lunch bags, wrinkled up their noses, grumbled something, then threw their entire lunch into the trash can. I was aghast. After that gesture of insolence and wastefulness, they reached for their wallets, pulled out a dollar, and bought from the cafeteria. Often I'd go over to the trash container, pick out the discarded lunches and eat what I could, especially the apples and other desserts. A little extra to eat at the after school job was always welcome.
When I first arrived at school, I was treated with silence and curiosity. After that, there was a gradual increase of picking on me as they were making fun of me. I did not understand most of what they said, but realized that the other boys were trying to get me to say, among other things, some nasty words. They even tried to convince me that my name, translated into English, was some perversion. All this bothered me greatly. I felt so much out of place." .... "Several days later, after history class, I was given a pocket size German - English, English - German dictionary. Apparently the history teacher had been stationed in Germany after the war, and was using it there to learn to communicate. This little book became my constant companion for the next two or more years.

Printing

"Looking back, I can now see that the hand of God directs everything. Just a couple of weeks into the summer recess, I accidentally spilled a six point type case onto the floor of the print shop. In 1955, type was often set one lead character at a time. The six point size was the smallest size used. It was very small, and a case held thousands of individual characters. The type case had fallen upside down on the floor. The spilled type was swept up onto three galleys ( trays that normally held set type for printing). Mr. Quoin, the teacher, just smiled. I gathered that over his many years of teaching the trade, he had seen countless spills. Mr. Quoin gave me a diagram that showed the layout of the type storage case, and gestured for me to start sorting and refilling the case......." "It took me nearly the remainder of the school year to complete the task. After that, I knew the layout of the type case inside and out. I was so good at it, that I volunteered to straighten out many other cases that were in particularly bad shape. 
The first week of the first summer in America I was offered a job at a local print shop. You guessed it, to distribute type back into their respective cases, after the printing had been completed. I have not been unemployed since that day, and still work in the printing field as we enter a new century."

Take a chance on a promise

"King Solomon said, "what has been will be again; there is nothing new under the sun." There comes a time when we as human beings have to realize this. Individuals are wrong to think they are the only ones engulfed in complex confrontations and trials. What is happening now, has happened before. Pull up your boot straps and go on! That is the spirit of the immigrant. After all, the immigrant gave up all he had, to take a chance on a promise."

These were just excerpts. Read the whole book
Inspiring reading. Send a copy to a good friend.

Many photos and drawings   9x6   281 pages. 
Flex cover   ISBN 1-883912-12-1   Price $20.00