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AN INTERVIEW WITH GUNTER DEVRIES

Interviewer: Pat Kelly

Oral History Project

Endacott Society

University of Kansas

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GUNTER DEVRIES

Journeyman as a Joiner 1958-1961

Innenarchitect Fachhochschule Lippe/Detmold 1969-1972

Service at the University of Kansas

Senior Carpenter 2001

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AN INTERVIEW WITH GUNTER DEVRIES

Interviewer: Pat Kelly

Q: It is September 28, 2011. I am Pat Kelly, a member of the Endacott Society Oral History

Committee. We are in Lawrence, Kansas, at the Audio-Reader Studios. I’m going to be

talking with Gunter DeVries, who is the senior carpenter for the University of Kansas.

Why don’t we start at the beginning and tell when and where you were born and your

parents and that.

A: I was born on March 14, 1944, in Elblag in East Prussia. East Prussia is today Poland.

This town is called Elblag. My mother caught the last train before the Russians closed in

and got out of there. I was about four or five months old when I went back home. My

mother was there to be with my dad who was in the German armed forces at the time. So

we went back to our home town in Ostfriesland, Germany. It is a town called Aurich.

My mother was from a town that is about 25 miles from Aurich. My dad came from

Simonswolde about 10 miles from Aurich. They met when my mother was 14 and he

was 16. They were married until she was 90 and my dad was 92. So they knew

everything about each other.

Q: Do you have brothers and sisters?

A: I have one sister who is older than me. Her name is Anna. I have two brothers younger

than me, my brother Freerk, who died in a motorcycle accident in 1979, and my baby

brother Folkert, who is eight years younger than me. He and his wife live on the outskirts

of Ostgrossefehn so he is far away out in the country on a farm. They have horses and

goats and their own garden, all those things, and they are environmentally conscious.

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Germany is a little bit different these days from America because they have solar

collectors and sell excess power to their power company.

Q: Where does your sister live?

A: My sister lives about 20 miles away from Aurich in a town called Woquart. This is a

very small town in a coastal region called Krumhoern. If you want to know more I’ve

got to show you on a map, or you will find it in the northwest corner of Germany.

I went to a Volkschule (grades 1 through 9) in Germany. At the time there were

three different tracks of education. One was you went six years to grade school. Then

you went to Mittelschule to learn office jobs and so on. The third way was Gymnasium

to go on to study at a university, or you went aafter eight years the trade route. That’s

what I did. I started learning the trade of joiner when I was 14. That was 1958. At that

time you had to work Saturdays for a 45-hour week. I was in Aurich and had to go to

Emden. So every morning at five I got out of bed, had breakfast, and walked to the train

station. The train came early enough that I got to work at the right time. At night I

walked back to the train and back to my home, and so the time away was about 11 or 12

hours. A 14-year-old gets so tired doing things like that. I did eight hours of work and

on Fridays we went to Berufsschule for eight hours of school to learn the theoretical part

of my trade. All trades have their own education.

If you want to be a journeyman you do that for three years. You go to the

Handwerkskammer (a trade organization for all trades) after you send a drawing of

something you want to build, a lumber list, cutting list, and then you will show up in the

shop that is not your own, all by yourself. You can’t use any power tools. You have to

do everything with hand tools. You only have enough lumber for what you need, so if

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you mess something up, you have to ask for a new piece. Everybody knows every screw

up that you did. At the end of that I passed the practical part with a B and the theoretical

part with a C, which was very good for our shop. I was 16 at the time I finished.

Then I worked for about two years and then I joined the German Army. There

was basic training. I used to drive one of those army trucks. After that I was trained to

drive a boat that pushed the ferries across rivers. If you have seen military pictures, you

would see those ferries with tanks and a little boat pushes it. That’s what I was doing in

the army for a long time. The Germany Army was started new in 1956. Germany didn’t

want to have an army, but in 1956 they decided to have an army. So they offered three

years education if you signed up for eight years. You would serve six years and then you

would spend the next three years at the education of your choice. So I went through this.

The German university accepts a Hochschule for architecture and in

innearchitecture (interior decoration). They are not quite universities, but the degree

counts in the same way. So in order to get there I had to have a journeyman degree. It

was part of the education. During the semester break we had to prove that we had

worked at least two months as an electrician, as a plumber, and as a mason. It was all

part of the education for the university degree. So once you got your degree you knew a

little bit about all trades. I think some of the architects over here don’t know what they

are talking about because that part is missing in their education.

So I was 19. I married a woman when I was 20 and we had our first kid when I

was 20. I think they call that shotgun wedding. Back then if you did that you married the

woman. We were married eight years and got divorced. I met this American woman.

She was visiting a friend in the town where I studied. The friend was looking for a new

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room to stay. I was done with my studies so he came and looked at my room and that’s

how I met her. Later she went to the special school to learn German, and we both worked

in Wiesbaden in separate offices. She worked as a translator. I worked as an architect.

She translated American English into the German language. She got homesick and

wanted to go home. So we decided after a long debate to get married because the

easiest way to get into the United States is to be married. It was very hard to get a

permanent visa to get into this country.

So the process was ridiculous. You know, I mean I had to sign a visa paper that I

didn’t plan to kill the president. My father-in-law had to sign papers that he would be

responsible for my income so that I wouldn’t go on welfare. It was a very long drawn-

out process. Then on December 17, 1972, at 4:30 we arrived at Kennedy in New York

and then through immigration, and at the time I should say I didn’t speak English. I

knew a very few words in English, a very few sentences. I could do something but it was

a lot of hand signals and stuff.

And the thing I remember about America, I only came over here because she was

homesick. I didn’t need to leave Germany. I had a job, a good paying job. I had no idea

what to expect over here. I remember there were these doors, the doors through customs,

with the words, “The Door to Freedom” over it. I was free in Germany. I didn’t think it

was very nice. But anyway the door opened and there was Rudolph the Red Nosed

Reindeer. I had no idea who he was. I had never heard of him. A big thing on the wall

and the sleigh going from the left to the right. Under Rudolph there was a group of (I

know today) about 40 Jewish people with black coats and those black hats. I had never

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seen a group of Jews in Germany. So there was Rudolph on the left and the Jewish group

on the right. I still can see that picture.

Having been late with our plane, we missed our connections. It was not very nice.

It took us hours and hours. I remember going to the counter and there was hot chocolate.

Chocolate smells the same in almost any language. So I asked for that and she took an

envelope and shook it in a Styrofoam cup with hot water. I had never seen that in my

life. I realized at that point that everything I knew was not true any more. I basically was

like a newborn baby. I didn’t know anything about America. I knew where it was and I

knew something about the riots and stuff that you see on TV, but knowing anything about

America, no, not really.

So after two more flights we landed in our final destination in Wichita. Garrison

Keillor said one time in one of his shows, “The Prairie Home Companion,” this was

much later. He said, “If you don’t want to have any culture, move to Wichita.” Then

there was the whole family. Everybody was talking. Nobody was listening. Everybody

was talking to me and I didn’t understand a word they said. So this was at four in the

morning. We had an hour drive to her house in Norwich, Kansas. We arrived at five in

the morning. Everything was cold and we warmed up. We were supposed to be about

eight hours earlier than we were.

I tell you those impressions I had. There were seven knives and forks and there

was meat. So I took my fork in my left hand and my knife in my right hand, and that’s

how we eat in Europe, you know, with the left hand. I saw those Americans take their

knife, cutting a piece of meat off, putting the knife down, changing hands. I saw that as

handicapped, what is their problem? One of my other first impressions, I always liked to

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start on the back of a piece of cake in Germany. All those Americans turned it so the

point would face them, a typically American thing. Actually, spies are taught not to do

that in foreign countries because it identifies them as Americans. Most other cultures

don’t do that. Maybe you learn some stuff about Americans.

Then I worked for my father-in-law, my first job. He paid minimum wage, $1.75

an hour.

Q: This was in what year?

A: 1972. In 1973 too. I had two kids in Germany. I had to pay child support. As an

architect in Germany I made over $2,000 a month. So that was what my child support

was based on. So being here now, it was impossible to pay child support on $1.75 an

hour. On minimum wage back then you could buy more than you can today for

minimum wage. But still it didn’t leave anything. She had a degree in American Studies,

one of those things you can’t do nothing with, you know. She decided she wanted to be a

teacher so she studied at KU. We moved in January. She enrolled in KU and started in

January. We moved to Lawrence and I have ever since been in Lawrence.

I have an old super 8 movie that I want to transform sometime. We drove through

Lawrence and made a movie for my parents, how Lawrence looked like in ’73. Across

campus, no Wescoe Hall, no Green Hall, no Robinson Gym. All those things are not in

those movies. So it is almost an historic movie in some ways.

From those first years I don’t remember much. I was too busy trying to make a

living. First I had a German work attitude, what is very contrary to American work

attitude. We think we have rights, you know. Workers over here still don’t have rights,

you know. They are fired and hired at will, without any reason. You can’t do that in

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Germany. In Germany if you start a job by law you have three weeks paid vacation. You

have health insurance. All those things are not here, you know. Nothing was here. So

that was a culture shock too. So the first years I got fired a few times for my German

attitude to work.

I started my own business in the middle of ’73. The first job I did is still there.

It’s a house on North Oak Street in North Lawrence. If you ever drive down there it is

the first house when you go over the levee. The front porch has some cross pieces in it. I

put them in in 1973. So I must have done a good job, I guess. That was my first job with

lady Annie. She was 74 or 75 years old at the time. My hair was long, as it is again

today. She called me Boy, “Come here, Boy.” I learned a lot about Annie. She was one

of the those good people in the Depression. Nobody ever passed the house without

getting food. She started her own business back then, horseradish, strawberries. So she

would make horseradish and sell it in stores. I was supposed to finish her house, build

her kitchen and all that stuff. About once or twice a week she would say, “Come on,

Boy. We have to clean the strawberries.” She had strawberries in a big field and I would

go out with her and clean the strawberry rows. One thing, every morning when I showed

up, she had a cup of coffee with coffee grounds on the bottom and too much sugar.

Back then I didn’t have much money. I had to buy tools. So I built the house

with hand tools I could buy for 100 bucks. I cut big pieces of plywood with hand saws.

Annie and her brothers were amazed that anyone would do that. That didn’t last very

long. I started getting power tools after that. But also, we always had lunch and all that

stuff. So I thought that was American, my first job. But I was very mistaken. That was

the only job that ever worked like that.

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But from then on I continued, close to 30 years. I built furniture, anything people

would pay me for, plantation shutters, even designed and built a couple of houses. I was

very successful in building things but not a very good businessman. I charged not

enough. I felt I should never charge more than I needed to make a living. That was not

the American way either. So I didn’t get very rich. I have a house now and it’s almost

paid off. I have those things. But I don’t have a big bank account. I did one piece of

furniture and won second place in a national contest. People around this town knew me,

all those guys who do those studio stuff, you know, those guys who build jewelry boxes,

Art in the Park kind of stuff. I can build stuff like, that but I never did. I only built stuff

that people wanted. They all knew me or still know me.

I applied at KU because health insurance got too expensive. I couldn’t afford it

any more. So they hired me to run the cabinet shop.

Q: That was what year?

A: I was 61. So it must have been 2005. My foreman and I had different opinions. He

never let me run the shop. He had very little education in cabinet making. I have 50

years experience so I think I can say that. He made decisions that were ridiculous and

still does. So I had to fight him all the time until I got injured. I got a rotator cuff injury.

They had to operate twice, so it took 19 months before that was healed. I thought that I

could work for KU and after I left they would have a really good cabinet shop. But not

only my foreman, but his bosses too have no interest in quality. It makes me very sad.

During that time I filed a civil rights suit against my boss because he mimicked

the way I speak. That is illegal. That is a big no, no. I didn’t win this, but when I came

back I was sent to tighten screws. I don’t build cabinets any more. But actually I enjoy it

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much more because I talk to people. He thinks he hurt me. He did me a great favor. I

know more people. I was always by myself in the shop. Now I see people every day,

talk to people every day. So my life is much nicer than before. That was the business

part, the sad part of my life. The woman I married…

Q: Her name is what?

A: Phyllis. She is married again and is under her maiden name again. She lives in this town

and works for the Department of Education in Topeka. She was a teacher for many

years. In 1975 we had a daughter and in 1979 a son. We went at Christmas in 1980 to

Germany and I had the bad fortune to read something that ended our marriage. I tried to

hang on, but about six years later we finally got divorced.

During 1979 we had a fire in our house. She was nine months pregnant, and it

was a very bad time. So we had to move. Luckily there was a shop I bought in North

Lawrence with a place where we could live. I was renting out to students but they were

nice enough to look for something else. So we lived there for three years or so. During

those three years I would get up at 3 a.m. to go to work and work until noon or one

o’clock. Then I would go to the house and work seven or eight hours. I did that for

about five years. Like I mentioned, this bad happening. I kind of escaped that way, you

know. I didn’t have to deal with it.

I got married again to a woman 15 years younger. You should never do that. It is

too young. She does all those things. I have been there and done that, you know. She

has to go through the stages you already went through. I lost 10 years. Luckily we didn’t

have children. One thing, if you have children with a woman, she never becomes a

stranger. She’s always the mother of your children. I do not call my wives ex wives. I

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always try to think to say, “the woman I used to be married to.” Because I think my ex

wife is possessive, and I don’t possess them any more by any stretch of the imagination.

After 10 years I got divorced from the young woman. Basically, I’ve been living by

myself for the last 10 years. I must say I think I’ve reached a stage where I’m not good

for a relationship any more because you get used to living by yourself. You don’t really

want to change things. You want your peace. You want to go home and have your

peace.

In December of last year I decided to go and have a physical. And they found

blood in my urine and I made an appointment and the diagnosis was bladder cancer. It is

still in progress. They still don’t have it under control. About a month later it came on

my voice cords so then I had a bout with my intestines. I had six operations this year.

Number seven is coming October 5. So this year has been rotten. You can’t get any

worse than that.

Q: It is one to forget, isn’t it?

A: The only thing I got three years ago was I was diagnosed with diabetes. I lost 80 pounds

and I still maintain the weight today. It is not hard to do and my medicine is cut down to

very little. My doctor thinks possibly I don’t have diabetes any more, that I beat it. It is

worth the process of trying, if that is true. So for two years I was such a good guy

fighting diabetes and doing all that stuff and then nature says, can I say “Screw you?” So

this year was not very good. But it can only get better. I plan to work until I am 70. I

am now 67 and a half, so two and a half more years. I don’t know if I’ll make it that far.

Once you have cancer you have a different outlook on life. You take it one step at a time.

Q: Enjoy every day.

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A: I do more so. That’s why I drive the car I told you about.

Q: Describe this car, if you will.

A: Two or three years ago I bought a Honda S2000, a car that weighs 2,000 pounds, has 240

horse power, and runs up to 150 miles an hour.

Q: Have you tried that?

A: Only 145. The scary thing, I think, I was on I-70 out west and you could see a long way

and there was nothing. Imagine if you drive 70 and somebody passes you more than

double as fast as you drive.

Q: Oh my! Is that quite a thrill to do that?

A: It is, but it’s scary because you don’t know what those drivers do.

Q: They might panic.

A: They are not used to that speed. They look in that mirror and see a car…

Q: You’re passing, aren’t you?

A: They see the car, and they change lanes because they are not used to it. It is scary to

drive that fast if you are not used to it.

Q: But you don’t do it very often, do you?

A: No, I don’t. I race very seldom.

Q: Do you speed race with that car?

A: In the city I had a race to 35, you know, with the streets at 35. I can get in first gear in

about two seconds or less, zero to 40. I think it is about one and a half seconds. So I race

up to 35 and then I drive off.

Q: Oh, my.

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A: And you pay toll on the turnpike and then you take off. So you can race all the way out

to 70. So that is not the racing point with the cops looking out for cars like I drive, you

know. If there are 20 cars speeding, they will stop me.

Q: A red car.

A: A red car, a sports car, a convertible.

Q: A fellow with long hair, a hippie type.

A: All the wrong signs. It is time for you to ask me questions.

Q: You have four children. Do you keep in touch?

A: My daughter is here in town. She works in parking at KU and is responsible for the

buses. She has a very responsible position. If you call to complain about a bus driver,

she will answer the phone. My American son lives in San Francisco. He was here a few

weeks ago visiting. He pulled a trick on me. I knew he was coming. I was working. He

said he would come out with the bus to pick me up. I said okay. He picked me up with

the bus and so on the other side of the bus, you know that thing from TV, “Driver, move

that bus!”

Q: What?

A: There’s a show and everybody says, “Driver, move that bus.” And there is a new house.

So the bus moved. And there was my oldest son from Germany. I had no idea he was

here.

Q: Oh, my.

A: So it was fun. He spent about five days. I spent about three or four hours each day with

him. Then they can do their own stuff, you know. I don’t want to go out at night to rock

and roll music and all that stuff.

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Q: You’re not too old.

A: Not too old but I thought it would be nice to keep a little distance to do their own stuff.

They are young and they don’t need me around all the time. So my other son in Germany

he got married and divorced and married again. From him I have two grandkids. They

are the only grandkids I have. My grandson is 18 and my granddaughter is 16. I’m old,

you know.

Q: They are both in Germany, of course.

A: My oldest son is one of those flaming gay guys. If you see him you know he’s gay. He

behaves like it. But that’s okay with me. I never had a problem with gay people.

Actually, he and his partner have lived together now 17 years. I never was married that

long. So they do better than I ever did. He has a company in Hanover doing printing

services, tee shirts and stuff like that. He had at one time 20 employees. Right now I

think he has 10. So he is very well off.

My second son got divorced. He married a woman and if you didn’t know it, you

could mistake his first and second wife. She is shorter but her face, hair color and hairdo,

all the same, you know. They sometimes say if you divorce somebody, you marry

somebody like it. He sure did. They didn’t have kids together, but she had three kids.

So with her five and his two they are a big family all together. He works in a recycling

plant. They make cardboard and we use some of it. You know those wide boxes they

fold open in stores to put something in. That company makes the cardboard for those

boxes and ships them worldwide.

Q: Is this the one in Germany?

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A: Yes, my second son. If you ever get a box like that, it most likely comes from the place

he works. It’s amazing how recycling works and how they make this cardboard. They

have a giant wheel over there. That thing is 30 feet in diameter and about four foot wide.

Q: So they can cut it to the best advantage.

A: Yes, the new cardboard dries on the wheel. That thing never stops. They only stop it one

time a year for maintenance. As long as it’s rolling, it takes two or three days to stop it.

Q: You hope you’ve done it right when you’ve done it, don’t you?

A: Yes. So it is very interesting to visit his plant. My grandkids are still in school. The

oldest one is maybe pretty soon out of high school. I don’t know what he’ll do after that.

Both his dad and my other son didn’t go to high school. Both went the trade route. My

oldest son is a chef by trade. He did that, actually until he was 29. Then he decided he

was, found out that he was gay. After that he started the printing service.

Then my second son is a boat builder, a ship builder by trade. He is a

journeyman. He actually has sailed the oceans for seven or eight years, not as a ship

builder. I don’t know if you know, they have freight ships they call tramp ships. They

go from harbor and load something here and unload something there. Sometimes he

spends three years without coming home. So he has been around the world several times.

If you say anything about any harbor, he will say he has been there.

Q: Isn’t that something.

A: He settled down when he started this paper company. He got married the first time for

the same reason I did. You learned something today.

Q: Right. It is nice to learn something.

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A: Then my son over here went to TWA flight mechanic school so he has a certificate as a

flight mechanic. He didn’t like the union so he decided not to be a mechanic. He is now

in San Francisco managing a one of those long-term hotel things and does bicycles on the

side. He has been almost five years in bicycle shop and repair and stuff like that. That is

actually one of the first thing I taught him. When I was a kid, my dad bought all the parts

to build a bicycle. Then I built a bicycle, and he taught how to do all. I had to know to

do things, the spokes and everything. He never had to fix a tire, never had to adjust my

bike. I was 10 years old and knew how. So my son here the first thing he learned to fix a

bike. And for all the neighborhood kids he fixed tires constantly. Sometimes it is not

best to know something.

Q: Do you go back to Germany much?

A: I used to go back when my parents were still alive, every four or five years. I didn’t have

a close relationship with my parents, you know, the black sheep of the family. My

parents told me I would never achieve anything in my life. They told me that. Even

before my mother died, she told me that the last time when I was 59, but I went back

anyway. But, you know, the time comes when your parents die. All of a sudden you

become the parent with the kids around you. Your brothers and sisters become that pole

for their kids to come to. So for the brothers and sisters, there is not a reason any more to

meet. You know you go and meet them but to go there to have Christmas together, they

have new family groups. I think that is how it is meant to be. You know when my

parents had kids, look what happened to them.

Anyway kids want a nice story about Christmas. I don’t remember much about

my childhood. But we used to meet at my Grandfather’s house, all of my father’s

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siblings, who all lived in the same town. So we were first at Grandpa’s house and then

we went to our own house so we had two Christmases. One of our uncles would say

every year, “It’s boring. I go to the movies.” He took off and about a half hour later he

showed up in St. Nick uniform and mask and we never figured that one out. He had this

big book and he knew everything we did all year. One of my uncles, he knew things too.

He had a big sack with presents and he would take out presents and stuff. This one uncle,

he says to him, “You have been very bad. I have to take you with me.” He starts to stick

him in the sack and all the kids started crying. I remember that. They never told us that

it was my uncle. We had to discover that much later on our own.

Q: What a fantastic secret. Have things changed in Germany? Have you noticed over the

years as you go back?

A: Germany is now a tourist site. I’m a tourist over there. Then I go for three weeks. I visit

people I know from my childhood. But the Germany I knew to live in is 1973 or ’72.

Germany today has changed tremendously. I mean my old home town has nothing to do

with 1972. But I only saw in five-year steps. So do I know how to live in Germany?

No, not really. Germany today is a foreign country to me.

Q: Which hand to use with your fork?

A: My right hand.

Q: You’ve changed.

A: I don’t need a knife. Only if I need to cut something I change. It depends on what I’m

eating. Most Americans go to Germany to see things. They actually know more about

Germany than I do. When we grow up somewhere, we take it for granted. I think I know

more about Kansas than people who grew up here do. When I first came here, I found

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out about movies about Dodge City and all that stuff. The deadliest city was Wichita.

Those movie things, you know are seldom true. Later with my American wives going

back, I learned a lot about Germany that I never would have learned, not being married to

them. So there is something good in that, I guess.

Q: Have things in Kansas changed a lot since you came?

A: Lawrence is a town that has nothing much to do with 1973 any more. When you are

downtown there is hardly anything left downtown (from 1973). There’s Ernst Hardware

and the Harbor Lights, the bar, and Weavers and the bank building. Everything

else…The tire place on 10th

Street was there. The opera house was the Red Dog Inn back

then.

Q: Weavers has been around a long time.

A: Weavers was 100 years old in ’68. But everything else…

Q: The Eldridge in some form.

A: The Eldridge back then had apartments. Do you remember the bar they had down there

for years and the dining thing? They built a glass room down there. Do you remember

that glass hall? I built that.

Q: Oh, you did?

A: There is a beam over the reception desk. I built that beam. It was owned by Schwader at

the time. He basically made a bar out of it. And upstairs was the hotel and more

apartments. There were some stores and businesses there. Later somebody bought the

Eldridge House. They stripped it to the concrete. There was nothing left except the

concrete. There were no water lines, no electric lines. They had construction machines

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in there to clean out like bobcats, little bobcats. I took some photographs from the time

they took it apart.

Q: I was born in Lawrence. It changed, as you said. It changed with me as I was growing

up. Then you kind of forget.

A: I agree. Do you remember Gables on East 7th

Street or 8th

Street? I didn’t know it was a

black place. When I came over here I knew nothing about….I knew there were black

people, but I had no idea about race problems and all that stuff. So I walked in there and

it got quiet, you know. This one guy behind the bar said something to me. I said

something with the little English I could speak. When he could not understand me he

turned to the crowd and said, “Oh, one of those students. He doesn’t know.” So then it

was okay that I was in there.

But, you know, I learned from the race riots. I talked to somebody who was on

the police force at the time. They killed this black kid. They never checked the weapons

and stuff like that. They never found who shot him. I talked later at the club that was a

very conservative redneck place to somebody on the police force. “How come you never

found that weapon?” He said, “We use our private weapons, not our official ones.” So

they couldn’t find out because he got shot by some private gun. He says he knows the

person who shot that black kid. It is disgusting to learn that. I had a bad encounter in the

same place. It was 1979, this Iran thing. Some drunk decided that I was Iranian. He

went out to the truck and got a shotgun. He pointed a loaded shotgun at my head but the

bartender and other patrons talked him out of it. He was too close to grab him, so they

had to talk him out of it. Being at the end of a loaded gun when somebody wants to kill

you is not a very nice feeling.

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Q: I think not.

A: Most other feelings you can describe. It is like discovering you have cancer. You have

to have it to really know what it feels like. I can tell you all those things, but you only

really know if you are there and you experience it. I used to spend a lot of time at that

club and still today there are some old guys like me from the old days. We meet for

dinner sometimes. If they need something they call me. If I need something, I call them.

I know what they do, they know what I do. We know each other now for 35 years. So it

is kind of a camaraderie of sorts. They accepted me as being the left-wing socialist and

them being the rednecks. That’s okay with them, you know. You have to ask if you

want to know more.

Q: I have the feeling there are lots more stories you could tell. This tape is about to run out,

but we can start another one.

A: Stories I don’t remember because there are so many of them. If something comes up, I

remember them. Sitting here, I don’t remember all those stories. If you want to know

stories about Lawrence, you should contact Wayne Propst. He is the most

knowledgeable guy of Lawrence and he used to hang out with William Burroughs. He

did a lot of stuff for William Burroughs. He was here in the ‘60s and ‘70s. He knows all

of the hot guys of those days. So if you want to know some real history of Lawrence you

should contact somebody like that.

Q: Right. I think we were interested in your views having grown up in Germany.

A: One thing I want to say. I will never be an American. It is hard. I will always be

German, and I will be buried in Germany some day. My ashes will be over there. I think

your home is always where you go to grade school where you have your first experience,

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where you go on your first date, that is where your home is. Nothing can replace that.

This is a joke you learn in third grade during break. It’s like the feeling of being on the

end of a shotgun or getting cancer. That is where your life starts and that is where I want

to end my life. I like this country. It is my country, I live in now. But it is not the

country I want to be buried in. At soul I am German. At heart I am American. Does it

make sense?

Q: Of course it does. Thank you very, very much. It was very interesting.

A: You are welcome.

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