{"id":2700,"date":"2019-03-25T19:41:48","date_gmt":"2019-03-25T19:41:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/?p=2700"},"modified":"2019-03-25T19:47:34","modified_gmt":"2019-03-25T19:47:34","slug":"more-than-a-name-learning-from-history-in-minnesota","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/more-than-a-name-learning-from-history-in-minnesota\/","title":{"rendered":"More Than a Name: Learning from History in Minnesota"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In the woods of northern Minnesota, tucked along the shores of Turtle River Lake, is a small German village called Waldsee<\/g><\/em>.<\/g> Waldsee<\/em>, which translates to \u201cforest lake,\u201d is home to Concordia Language<\/a> Villages\u2019 (CLV) German-language isolation-immersion programs, one of fifteen<\/g> such language villages sponsored by Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota. Each summer, hundreds of staff and students pass through<\/g> the village\u2019s main building, dubbed the \u201cBahnhof<\/em>,\u201d or \u201ctrain station,\u201d to spend two or four weeks fully immersed in German language<\/g> and culture. Until recently, most were completely unaware that the<\/g> Nazis once used the name Waldsee<\/em> as a euphemism for Auschwitz. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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The \u201cBahnhof<\/a>,\u201d or \u201ctrain station,\u201d at CLV Waldsee<\/em> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, it wasn\u2019t until 2017, when\nAlex Treitler stumbled upon references to the Nazi Waldsee<\/em> while researching the CLV immersion program out of\ncuriosity, that the issue was brought to the attention of the village\u2019s\nleadership. In an article<\/a> in the Minneapolis Star Tribune<\/em>, Dan Hamilton,\ndean of CLV Waldsee<\/em>, was quoted: \u201cFrankly, we were just not aware\n[\u2026] I\u2019m a professor of international relations, so we were a bit embarrassed.\u201d\nDespite this initial embarrassment, CLV quickly convened a twenty-member advisory committee<\/a> made up of academic and\ncommunity experts to examine the issue and make recommendations<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\na recent presentation at the University of Minnesota\u2019s Center for Holocaust and\nGenocide Studies, “A Tale of Two\nCities: Concordia Language Village’s ‘Waldsee’ in the Crucible of History\nand Memory,\u201d* Sonja Wentling<\/a>, Professor of History and Global Studies at Concordia College\nand a member of the advisory committee, shared the story of the two Waldsees<\/em>. Wentling presented alongside\nfour of her undergraduate students, Allison Hennes, Samara Strootman, Jarret\nMans, and Colleen Egan, who had taken part in Wentling\u2019s\nfall 2018 \u201cIntroduction to Historical Thinking Class,\u201d which specifically took\nup issues of historical memory around the name Waldsee<\/em>. The class was part of Concordia College\u2019s PEAK<\/a>, or Pivotal\nExperience in Applied Learning, Program, in which students apply classroom\nlearning to real-world issues. As a part of the class, students conducted historical and archival\nresearch, spoke with Treitler and advisory committee members, and interviewed\nstaff and students at CLV Waldsee<\/em>.\nDuring the presentation, these students shared their experiences of \u201cdoing\nhistory,\u201d rather than merely learning about history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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During\nthe presentation, Hennes shared how the iso-immersion camp program was the\nbrainchild of Concordia College professors Gerald Haukebo and Erhard\nFriedrichsmeyer, who initially chose the name Lager Waldsee<\/em>, or \u201cCamp Forest Lake\u201d (the term \u201cLager<\/em>,\u201d also evocative of Nazi\nConcentration Camps, which, in German, are termed Konzentrationslager,\n<\/em>was later dropped from the\nname). The camp\nfirst opened to students in the summer of 1961, the same week that the construction\nof the Berlin Wall began and in the midst of the trial of Adolf Eichmann, one\nof the architects of the Holocaust. Though seemingly secluded in the Northwoods of Minnesota,\nWentling said that she and her students soon discovered that Waldsee<\/em> \u201cwas not isolated from the\nevents that took place thousands of miles away in Germany and Israel.\u201d While\nthe division and reunification of Germany have loomed large at CLV Waldsee<\/em>, the Holocaust has not been a\nregular aspect of the village\u2019s programming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strootman\ndiscussed how the term Waldsee<\/em>, used\nas a euphemism for Auschwitz by the Germans during the deportations of\nHungarian Jews, was mostly unknown in the West due to Cold War-era divisions.\nThough, its use was undoubtedly known to many academics and survivors and\nstarted to emerge in more popular works by the mid-1990. Indeed, Imre Kertesz,\nthe Hungarian writer and Holocaust survivor who won the Nobel Prize for\nLiterature in 2002, referenced Waldsee<\/em>\nin the opening pages of his semi-autobiographical novel Fateless<\/a>, which, though published in 1975, first\nappeared in English translation in 1992). Kertesz wrote: “I am completely\nignorant how (but some adults did discover it) we learned that our journey’s\nend was a place named Waldsee<\/em>. When I\nwas thirsty or hot, the promise contained in that name immediately invigorated\nme.” An\nexhibit created in 2004, \u201cWaldsee 1944,\u201d<\/a> put the Nazi\ndeception on display, showing postcards that Hungarian Jews who were deported\nto Auschwitz sent back to relatives postmarked \u201cWaldsee<\/em>.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Postcard sent by Simon Sandor Steuer from Waldsee<\/em>, Germany to Nandor Steuer in Budapest on June 14, 1944 (Yad Vashem\u2019s Digital Collections<\/a>) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The\nlecture concluded with a discussion of CLV\u2019s ongoing and future efforts to\naddress the Waldsee<\/em> name. Egan\ndiscussed how the \u201cWaldsee 1944\u201d exhibit was prominently displayed at Waldsee\u2019s <\/em>Biohaus<\/em><\/a> during the summer of 2018, may become a\npermeant feature of the camp. Mans spoke about the possibility of including an\nempty postcard rack in Waldsee\u2019s<\/em> Laden<\/em> (village store) with a sign that might\nread \u201cask us why we don\u2019t sell postcards here.\u201d It would seem, however, that\nthere is some trepidation around changing the name of the village. \u201cWe have begun pulling at a loose thread\u2014and that\u2019s been\ngood\u2014but we don\u2019t want to unravel the whole cloth,\u201d says<\/a>\nCLV Executive Director Christine\nSchulze. Though CLV Waldsee<\/em> will retain its name, efforts will be made to ensure\nstudents and staff are aware of the history. Wentling\npraised CLV\u2019s \u201ccommitment to address history rather than run away from it.\u201d\nIndeed, in a second statement<\/a> to the community\nof current and former staff and students, CLV outlined several steps that will\nbe taken in the coming year to address the Waldsee<\/em>\nname and Holocaust education at the village and within the programming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nworked as a credit instructor at Waldsee<\/em>\nin the summer of 2008. At the time, I remember being surprised by this\nauthentic-seeming microcosm of German culture in northern Minnesota, including\nlistening to the German-language\nradio station<\/a>,\nusing Euros at the camp\u2019s\nbank and store<\/a>,\nand eating European-style\nbread<\/a>\nmade by German apprentice bakers at each meal. In retrospect, however, Waldsee<\/em> seemed to lack the notion of an Erinnerungskultur<\/em> (Culture of Memory<\/a>),\nwhich is often used synonymously with Holocaust remembrance in Germany and\nAustria. At CLV Waldsee<\/em>, where simulations<\/a>\nare often used to help students understand a divided Germany during the Cold\nWar or the current refugee crisis facing Europe, no one seems to want to\nundertake simulations of the Holocaust, nor should they<\/a>! Though\nWaldsee<\/em> presents students with a rich\nacademic experience, it is also a summer camp, which makes discussions of the\nHolocaust seem somewhat out of place, albeit necessary. Hopefully, what began\nas a discussion over a name will lead to a meaningful look at how to best\nintegrate Holocaust education into the Waldsee<\/em>\nexperience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wentling\nand her students\u2019 presentations brought together an audience of students,\nprofessors, and community members, many with ties to CLV Waldsee<\/em>, at a moment when the University of Minnesota community is debating<\/a> changing the\nnames of several buildings on its Minneapolis campus. One hopes that such\ndebates, while necessary, similarly extend into conversations around learning\nabout and from the seemingly absent episodes of the United States, Minnesota\nand the University\u2019s difficult history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

* The lecture was sponsored by\nCenter for Holocaust and Genocide Studies with support from the University of\nMinnesota\u2019s Institute for Global Studies, Center for Jewish\nStudies, Center for German and European Studies, Center for Austrian\nStudies, Department of History, and Department of German, Nordic, Slavic, and\nDutch, as well as the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the\nDakotas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

George D. Dalbo<\/em><\/a> is a Ph.D. student in Social Studies Education at the University of Minnesota with research interests in Holocaust, comparative genocide, and human rights education in secondary schools. Previously, he was a middle and high school social studies teacher, having taught every grade from 5th-12th in public, charter, and independent schools in Minnesota, as well as two years at an international school in Vienna, Austria. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the woods of northern Minnesota, tucked along the shores of Turtle River Lake, is a small German village called Waldsee. Waldsee, which translates to \u201cforest lake,\u201d is home to Concordia Language Villages\u2019 (CLV) German-language isolation-immersion programs, one of fifteen such language villages sponsored by Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota. Each summer, hundreds of staff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2081,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48170,142],"tags":[96805,2846,14568],"class_list":["post-2700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-event-reviews","category-news","tag-auschwitz","tag-holocaust","tag-minnesota"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2081"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2700"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2711,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2700\/revisions\/2711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/holocaust-genocide\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}