One of my mother's favorite chores is doing laundry. She is in seventh heaven now because she lives with my sister, her husband and their 4 children. She just keeps doing laundry. She even irons underwear, t-shirts and all the bedding.The picture on the left is of our little garden with the ever- present clothes line. The picture on the right is of washday. I'm guessing it was taken around 1962. All the laundry was put into a large metal tub that was filled with water. On the bottom was a compartment to make a fire in. You added detergent and bleach and waited for all of that to boil. While you waited you stirred everything occasionally with a huge wooden spoon. I'm certainly glad that they (and we) have washers and dryers now.

These are pictures of the street that I lived on. The one on the left is from 1962,taken by Bill Titford, one of the G.I.s stationed with my husband. Our little house is the one in the foreground. The picture on the right was taken in 1995.
Wow- what a difference. I left Germany in April of 1962.(Yes, Don robbed the cradle) We did not go for a return visit until 1991, preferring instead to have my mother and sister visit here. Now we go back often. At least every 2 years or more. It's always nice to see how everything has changed for the better.

These pictures show the area down the street from our home.In the winters we would go down that hill on our sleds. We'd start further up and go faster and faster until we got to the bottom. If you did not veer off in time- you would wind up in the river. Needless to say we were pretty good at making that turn. The one on the left was taken when my sister was christened. Yes, that's me next to her Dad and my Mother. The building you see behind them was demolished and a large house was put up in its place. In the picture above on the right and the one on the right you can see that our little house was also torn down. When my Mother moved, our next door neighbors bought it, took it down and put a garden in its place.

These are pictures taken of the Rathaus or City Hall. In front of the building is a small area. We used to assemble around that square for special occasions. The Blaskapelle (Band) would entertain us by playing lots of stuff- mostly marches.I have great memories about that.In the summer the missionaries would visit us and show us movies of the starving children in Africa. We would sit in the big square between the Town Hall and the Church. They would put up a big screen and show us movies about the small towns in Africa they ministered in. Afterwards we would donate the 10 Pfennig coins we'd been given by our parents for that purpose. Now you know why our moms always forced us to clean our plates because "there were people starving in Africa"!

My husband was one of the G.I.s with the Army in Großsachsenheim. He was with Headquarters, 3rd Missile Battalion, 71st Artillery. He was lucky to be stationed with that group, as they were excempt from Guard Duty and K.P.
The picture on the left is of the Radar Hill. It's way in the background and kind of hard to see.
When Don and I re-visited the site in 1991 it had been closed down and abandoned. Some of the old rusted equipment was still there. Now it has all been cleaned up and there's only farmland left.

It used to be a lot of fun visiting Don at work during my 2 hour long lunches. My co-worker and friend Renate and I would walk from the Photo Shop to the base. Don would meet us by the fence and we'd spend our lunch hour together. In the evenings he would come over to my house. I still don't know if it was to see me or to have one of my mother's home-cooked meals.

Don and all the other G.I.s stationed at that base worked hard- (some harder than others) and they played hard.
One of their favorites was
the Gasthaus Eppich in Großsachsenheim.
We always partied there and had a great time.
Some of the guys would have drinking contest-
you can see the result of one of those on the right.
Unfortunately I don't remember who that was.
The picture was taken on New Year's Eve 1961.
If you know who it is, please e-mail me. I'd like to give credit to the poor man, with his pants torn to shreds, being escorted out of the bar by Herr Eppich on a cold and snowy night.
I wonder if he remembers this? He probably would rather forget it!

The picture on the left is part of the original city wall of the town of Bietigheim. The wall surrounded the entire town
when it was in its infancy.
Don and the other G.I.s attempted to drive their army trucks through that small archway. You can still see the scratches and gouges they left in its sides as they were trying to go through a gate that was barely wider than their vehicles.
The picture on the right is of the church that was next to the Rathaus. In front of it is the house that I lived in when I was born. Both of those pictures were taken in 1995.
THANK YOU, CLETE HALL, AND MR. SATTLER, FOR THIS ANNOUNCEMENT:
Subject: EuroEnglish
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 14:47:47 PDT

The European Union commissioners have announced
that agreementhas been reached to adopt English
as the preferred language forEuropean communications,
rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of negotiations, her Majesty Government
conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement
and has accepted a five-year phased plan
for what will be known asEuroEnglish (Euro for short).

In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c".
Sertainly, sivil servants will reseive this news with joy.
Also, the hard "c" will be replased with "k".
Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters
kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year,
when the troublesome "ph" will be replased by "f".
This will make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling
kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes
are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters,
which have always been a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e's"
in the languag is disgraful, and they would go.

By the forth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as
replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by "v".
During ze fifz year ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd
from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes
vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz year, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl.
Zer vil be no mor trobls or difikultis
and evrivum vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer.
Ze drem vil finali kum tru.