54 Years Ago Today... ✈

Two children, four suitcases and $400.00. We risked everything (there was no safety net), and dreamed the American dream; sometimes dreams do come true.

We took a chance in a million with no guarantees, but the fates were kind and our little family was blessed. Mom gave up her beloved bungalow to help me fulfill a life long dream and without her we wouldn't be here today.
We did it, old love, and we did it our way!

Taking the train from Wales to London.

Nana, Pop, Annette, Mike, and two week old baby Claire were there to see us off.

Peter was eight and Astrid was two.

My friend growing up, Sydney, saw us off at Heathrow on August 14, 1968.

Letter from the Bank 1969 🖃

 Flying home from Pittsburgh on August 16th, 1968; little did I know we would be moving to the USA at the same time next year.

Phew.... I just had my last interview in London for the World Bank with Lacey Carter; she was tough!

A letter arrived from the World Bank early August 1969, advising me to report for duty.

That evening I called Ulrike in Frankfurt and said we had to be in D.C. within ten days! She rushed home with Peter and Astrid, sold up the contents of the house, put the bungalow on the market, and we flew out August 14th. It was a rush!!

The day before leaving Germany for London in August, 1969, to obtain visas. Ten days later we would be in the USA.
Peter and Astrid with Großmutter.

Dad's birthplace in Wales

 A few minutes past night, I was born in this little house on the far right on Bridgend Road in the village of Garth, Wales. My great grandfather had built the houses for his three daughters and at the time of my birth, Auntie Maggie (a feisty old gal you would never wish to cross), lived at the other end. The houses were sandwiched between the library and chapel but both have regretfully been demolished. Sadly, the awful Crittall & Winter replacement windows detract from the simplicity of the granite and slate tiles.

In this little house (with just three bedrooms and outside privy) my grandparents raised their seven children with strict obedience to the sabbath.

My mother, who had come down from London to give birth, witnessed a tragic accident that afternoon when a little boy was fatally run over by bus outside the house and she went into labour from shock. I was born in the same bed as my mother, and in the same bedroom where all my aunts and uncles were also born.

Great Grandfather in Germany

On Mom's side of the family - 

Hereunder, pictures of your great grandfather, August Ferdinand Julius Neth who died in France

during World War I on 21st March, 1918 at Lanicourt between Arras and Cambrai. Important for you

to be aware of your family tree.

Uncle Uli spent one summer in France hunting for his grandfather's grave as nobody knew where it was.  As

you can see from the second picture, he found it and was able to take pictures back to his mother, who

was nine years old when her father was killed. 

A Promise Made is a Promise Kept

A promise I made to myself in my teenage years,  should I ever have a family, they would never lack photographs. A promise that has been kept, but so many taken over the years I doubt the children will see them all. 

What fun it as been and so many memories which otherwise would have been lost. All the family photographs required a tripod and the patience of Job, as our children, not forgetting the grandchildren, were not always cooperative!

We loved, we wed and lived happily ever after 💒

Astrid has asked me if I would put into the written word how I met Mom and our subsequent marriage which I shall endeavor to do to the best of my knowledge. Something I dread as it will bring back so many memories of what was and is no more, but I promised Astrid and a promise is a promise.

I probably saw Mom from afar a few weeks before I actually spoke to her at Black Notley Hospital where we both worked. Being the youngest in the administrative office, it was my  job to walk down to the hospital canteen and bring back a large jug of freshly brewed coffee.

One particular day walking back with coffee, a group of German girls finishing their shift passed by on their way to the nurses’ home. I said hello and they laughed and talked in German, and for a week or so this routine would continue. Mom was the friendly one and when she smiled I was smitten and when she talked I was bewitched as she had the gentlest voice and most perfect accented English. Mom and her friends always amazed me as they wore no make-up, were athletic, and had such class and style.

Nurses Home at Black Notley Hospital in 1960

The hospital had a large recreation centre for staff and every fourth Friday night, a dance was held. I escorted Barbara Jaeger, a German girl who was dating my friend, Brian, who had the flu and I would be her partner that evening. As usual the hall was jam packed when after a dance with Barbara, the Master of Ceremonies requested everyone leave the floor immediately and sit down no matter where. All seats were taken when my boss grabbed me to sit on his lap, (he was married with seven children I hasten to add) and I remember his wife giggling at the look on my face. Directly across the hall sat your mother and turning to Mrs. Wellington, I said if I married it would be to a girl like her. Mom was vision of loveliness and I was bewitched!

I wasn’t much of a dancer and it was with great relief when THE GAY GORDONS was announced, whereupon I quickly went and asked Mom if she would be my partner. I remember Mom was very shy but she agreed and boy what a dance that was.  I couldn’t waltz for toffee and had never done so in my life and THE GAY GORDONS became our favourite dance. Later, Mom would teach me to waltz but suffered in the process.

Unbeknownst to me, Barbara Jaeger told her friends she would break off her engagement with Brian and marry me. That night Ulrike “looked me over” and thought I had beautiful eyes and was far  too nice for Fraulein Jaeger. Later when I asked Mom for a date, she agreed.

The following evening we went to the Embassy cinema, but I know not what movie played other than we were in the 2/3rd seats! Mom asked me if I would like something to eat which I assumed to be chocolate. Never assume anything, and I was offered a carrot!

The next day I asked Mom if she would go on holiday with me to Wales and stay with Grannie Loughor for the August bank holiday weekend. To my delight she agreed. A quick note was mailed to Loughor and by return of post Gran affirmed she would be delighted. However, was the young lady a Catholic or English? Mom passed 100%.

The distance from Braintree to Loughor is 254 miles and today with motorways and the Severn Bridge, a drive of four and a half hours. However, sixty odd years ago it took six to seven hours on the Vespa passing through town after town and I remember Mom fell in love with the Cotswolds. The Vespa was heavily laden with a suitcase and panniers and at Chepstow we stopped at a little park for a sandwich and flask of coffee. Upon leaving, I managed to drive between two young Silver Birch trees with the Vespa well and truly stuck which took all our strength to get it free. We travelled through the night reaching Loughor early morning and going up Penna Bank, (an unpaved road) the Vespa’s front wheel hit a small rock and we were up ended into a bank of stinging nettles but otherwise fine.

A warm welcome received at Gwyder Place with breakfast and endless cups of tea before we unpacked and with a picnic prepared by Grannie Loughor, headed for Three Cliffs on the Gower. At the end of our journey the clutch burnt out on the Vespa!! There we were with a hamper, blankets, and Lord knows what having to trek across sand dunes to the ruined castle which we made our base.

We basked in sunshine with the castle to ourselves and the Atlantic below with enormous waves crashing down on the shore. A fantastic day, but with no Vespa, trekked back to the main road and queued in a long line for an eventual bus to Swansea where we waited an hour for the Llanelli bus and it was 10.00 p.m. before we returned to Gwyder Place.

The local garage collected the Vespa and it would be five days before it was road worthy. The second day Ulrike charmed the socks off the Loughor relations who adored her. The third day we headed to Maesteg on three different buses and were treated like visiting royalty at Alfred Street by Auntie Blod and family where we stayed two nights.

Vernon and Margaret drove us to Porthcawl that afternoon and Margaret, seven months pregnant, went on THE ROCKET at Coney Island with Ulrike, much to Auntie’s Blod’s displeasure. I refused to go as I do not care for heights! We took the bus to Porthcawl on the second day and was befriended by a Welsh Corgi on the Promenade whom Mom wanted to take back to Braintree on the train but thankfully was discouraged.

The third day we returned to Loughor visiting other relations as Gran was one of seven sisters and two brothers. On Saturday the Vespa was ready for the road and on Sunday we reluctantly headed back to Braintree after a fantastic week when Ulrike truly fell in love with Wales. Little did we know two years later we would return to start a new life there,

Six months before meeting Mom I had applied to the New Zealand Civil Service and was accepted to work for the Ministry of Agriculture and told to await my sailing date. A few days later, I asked Mom if we could pretend to become engaged to make the journey together and when we reached New Zealand we would still be friends. New Zealand had fascinated her father from what she had told me and after showing her all the brochures Mom thought about it and agreed.

However, the next night I took Mom to the Queen Anne’s Castle at Great Leighs, a pub dating back to medieval times, and I confessed the “proposal” made earlier was untrue, inasmuch I didn’t have the courage to ask her to marry me and proposed there and then and I think on bended knee. Tears from what I recall, but no immediate answer and her gin and tonic remained untouched! Mom wrote to Germany telling her parents all about me and love prevailed.

I knew Mom had gone to London to see HG (her old boyfriend from the Sports Club in Frankfurt) a week before, but I didn’t know he had proposed to her whom she turned down. HG blotted his copy book by sending Mutti & Vati a postcard from London and signing it, their future son-in-law, which outraged Vati which turned out favourably for me.

HG went on to become a highly successful lawyer. Eventually, we became friends and one summer when Mom and Peter were in Germany, HG and his sister, Christa, came to Wales and stayed with me for a week.

Ulrike’s family, so to speak, were the German girls who had divided opinions as to my suitability. Mom’s Tante Doreen, whom Ulrike saw from to time but not a close relationship, was married to a British soldier based in Colchester. I did not meet her until the wedding where I was to earn her life long enmity after deftly placing the wedding cake decoration atop her head whilst posing for a family photograph, and for which she never forgave me. Methought it gave the lady style and a very à la mode hat. For my sins I would be described hereafter to everyone as A VERY, VERY WICKED MAN. I digress and back to the engagement.

A definite improvement to the hat she wore which looked like a tea cosy!

Not a feather to fly with and of course an engagement ring to be bought, I found a heart shaped ring with the tiniest diamond. Mom loved it on sight and years later gave it to Astrid, together with her wedding band and eternity ring. Arthritis in her hands had made it impossible for Mom to wear. Astrid had it restored in the spring and it looks exquisite. 

We spent most of our free time at Mersea Island where we would decamp after I finished work (Mom had the early morning shift) and return late in the evening past the hospital curfew. I knew where the fence could be lifted up and Mom safely deposited on the other side.

It’s a long, long time from August to December (with apologies to the song writer) and Mom attended English lessons every Thursday evening at the Braintree college on Bradford Street. I was taking her there one Thursday evening and suggested I would be a better teacher and talking with my friends, Mom would have a much better appreciation and exposure the English language and she agreed. That evening we headed to Phyll and Bob’s farm house near Wethersfield to talk up a storm with endless cups of tea.

My father did not approve of Mom being German and his subsequent action advanced our wedding date to December. We never had a good relationship and when offered a teaching job at Saint Athan’s Air force in Wales, my parents and Annette left Braintree.

I received a phone call at the hospital one morning from Vati who was flying over shortly to meet with me and he was not happy. I was to meet him at the airport when he would call again. The moment Mom got off her shift I gave the news but she couldn’t understand as her father, as best she knew, only spoke French as a second language. I explained he spoke it well enough to leave me in no doubt how he felt! The day dragged on and I was on pins and needles when late afternoon a German porter inquired how was I preparing for Herr Sturm’s visit!! The penny dropped and he had called impersonating Vati but I was so relieved gave him a big hug.

I went to live with Betty and Dave after my parents left for Wales and Betty hosted a tea for my 20th birthday where Mom surprised and amazed me with a beautiful watch, and a forerunner of the years to come when Mom put our birthdays paramount. Mom visited Chapel Hill constantly and so began a firm friendship with Betty, and of course Dave, who became my family, not forgetting Sian who was born the year before my 20^th birthday. This lifelong friendship has lasted to this day although Dave is sadly gone. Betty is Astrid’s godmother.

The day before our wedding we had a rehearsal in the chapel which I barely remember other than ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS, which I had requested but was deemed inappropriate for a wedding and the Reverend Davies picked suitable hymns. At the Celebration of Mom’s Life, ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS would be played sixty one years and three months later!

Mutti and Vati arrived on Braintree on December 9^th, booked into the HORSE & GROOM HOTEL where with great trepidation I went to meet them for dinner. They were fabulous and whilst they spoke no English, and I no German, it was a wonderful evening I shall always treasure with two dear people who I grew to love very much.

Ulrike spent the night before the wedding with Mr & Mrs.Holloway, our first neighbours upon arrival in Braintree. Saturday morning I was passing through Braintree market when Mrs. Holloway appeared out of the blue hustling me into a shop doorway. Ulrike was leaving a hair dressing salon and no account could I see her.

Half an hour before the wedding, I raced to Black Notley Hospital to collect Helen, our friend from Trinidad, when the wind blew off her white fur hat and I remember cleaning it from puddle of clear water and the day was saved.

My best man was Vernon, a black GI I had met under peculiar circumstances in the spring. I had a date with Angie, a Jamaican nurse and waiting in the Nurses’ Home reception room I met Vernon who was also waiting for his date and we talked up a storm. Angie walked in, we both stood up and she had accidentally double dated! No problem as we went out as a threesome and had a great time at a TONGUES CHURCH with lots of chanting and praising the Lord followed by fish and chips. Vernon had missed the last bus to base, had no money for a taxi and so I lent him my brand new multi geared racing bike. We became firm friends and dumped Angie.

I vaguely remember our wedding service, but none of the hymns I favoured were deemed suitable. Mr. Holloway gave Mom away, inasmuch Vati spoke no English and was happy to delegate this task. Heidi from Berlin was Mom’s bridesmaid and Annette, my younger sister, the other.

The Reverend Thomas Herbert Davies in his sermon warned against about becoming lax in our standards and warned me about appearing at the breakfast table slovenly, unshaven and reading the newspaper. Mom should not present herself in an untidy manner and of course, no smoking. Oh well, we didn’t do badly and always dressed for each other in a tidy manner. I don’t recall sin or Sodom and Gomorrah being mentioned and we got off quite easily in that respect.

Our reception was in the Baptist Church Hall with sandwiches, cakes, and a wedding cake made by cousin Rita (Domestic Science Teacher at Braintree High School) but unskilled in decorating and made do with foil. Nonetheless, a rose by any other name is a rose and it was a fantastic fruit cake with marzipan and imperial icing paid for by Betty and Dave. Grape Kool-Aid was supplied from the base commissary and all done on a dime. A very untoward and poor reception by today’s standards, but regardless, we weathered many a storm where others may have faltered for all their grand affairs.

Wedding presents were frugal in those days and an electric iron would have been considered extravagant. One gift which raised eyebrows, being a pair of tea towels resembling underwear and the words printed WHEN IT COMES TO PULLING STITCHES DON’T BE AFRAID TO LOSE YOUR BRITCHES. Hmm, a few eyes were raised when it was read aloud!

No honeymoon as we had no money and after the reception the immediate family came back to the trailer where they were offered coffee. Auntie Liz was aghast and foretold without the blessed brew our union would never prosper. I hurriedly went to a neighbor and borrowed a packet of Typhoo tea and with a teapot (wedding present from Auntie Liz) the day was saved and our union prospered.

They said it would never last but here we are eight days later!

In 1988, we took our belated honeymoon with a Cunard cruise around the Caribbean and as Betty said, a honeymoon can always be delayed, albeit some forty eight years later.

We started our life as poor as church mice and looking back to December 10^th, 1960, just two innocents on the Highway of Life and in reality were nothing more than kids. Here we are approaching what would have been our 62nd anniversary and I miss Mom more than life itself with each passing day. Mom is, and always has been, the love of my life and without her my life is meaningless. However, as Queen Elizabeth said upon the death of Prince Philip, “with great love comes great grief," and to quote the old adage, “the piper must be paid”.

Thank you Ulrike for everything and without you nothing would have been possible, but you always were the wind beneath my wings and with you at my side nothing was impossible. You always believed in me when nobody else did we and really did dream the impossible dream, didn’t we my old love? God Bless and be happy and know you will be forever missed. xxx

The War, 1942

I believe these photographs were taken in 1942. The house in Carshalton, Surrey, my parents rented from a Jewish family who had fled to South Africa when the invasion of Britain seemed imminent. Look closely at the garage door where my parents tandem is visible. I think it is my father standing in the doorway. 

My mother had taken me to Wales to visit Grannie Garth only to find upon our return the front of the house had been damaged from a bomb blast, after which we escaped to the relatively safety of dear old Upper Boat.