Posted on 07/04/2004 11:51:57 AM PDT by wagglebee
The daughter of Albert Speer, Hitler's friend, architect and munitions minister, has been honoured for her work in supporting tolerance and forgiveness among Berlin's Jews.
But the award provoked controversy when the Jewish community banned Hilde Schramm, 68, from receiving the award at a synagogue.
The fight has forced Mrs Schramm to face her family's past, having spent her adult life fending off questions about her father and working instead as a Green politician and setting up funds and foundations to help disadvantaged Jewish woman and former slave workers.
The Berlin city senate had planned to present the £6,700 prize in memory of Moses Mendelssohn, considered to be the father of Jewish enlightenment, to Mrs Schramm in a synagogue at the opening of the annual Jewish Culture Festival in November.
But Albert Meyer, the chairman of the city's Jewish community withdrew the invitation after hearing who was the recipient.
Some of his members had been made slave workers by Speer, he said, and, despite his respect for Mrs Schramm, it would be an affront to honour a Speer descendant in a synagogue. Mrs Schramm says she supports the decision, telling the German magazine Der Spiegel: "I am now in the funny role of defending Mr Meyer."
She said the Berlin authorities were trying to act as if relations between Germans and Jews were normal "but it is not so".
Instead the award will be presented to Mrs Schramm at a Berlin church in September.
Her work was funded by selling her father's art collection, most acquired between 1933 and 1943 by buying works from Jewish owners forced to sell at knock-down prices.
Mrs Schramm raised £67,000 and used the money to set up a fund to give financial assistance to Jewish women wanting to undertake artistic or scientific projects.
Her other projects include one that helps former slave workers and other Nazi victims in the former Soviet Union, where other aid is not available.
Only now, retired from political life - she was twice a city councillor - does Ms Schramm feel ready to talk about her father.
"One question will trouble me to the end of my life," she said. "How could such a sensitive, basically kind, person like my father, who had irony and humour and in my experience was not particularly authoritarian, how could such a person find his place in this regime and continue to take part until he became entangled in inexcusable crimes?"
Speer became a personal friend of Hitler, admired by the Fuhrer for his architectural designs. He designed the stadium for the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
He was made minister for munitions and war production in the 1940s, and was responsible for slave labour.
He survived the war and was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment at Nuremberg. On his release he lived in Britain until his death in 1981.
This woman does not deserve to be punished for the transgressions of her father. Whatever views her father may have had, she surely does not share them.
Speer paid for his mistakes and they were many, yet how easy it is to forget
that without him Germany would have been laid waste at Hitler's orders.
She is not responsible for her foather's actions. As long as she has condemned them, she should have a blank slate. I am much more concerned with her Green politics.
"working instead as a Green politician"
Sounds like insanity runs in the family.
I read Speer's book when I was in high school. I think he was taken in by Hitler's charisma and from there the problems escalated as he was drawn into the "inner circle." I do think he was truly repentant for his crimes. And I think this synagogue's stand on his daughter's presence is a "slap in the face" for the work she has done.
I think it is perhaps a little harsh to ban her from a synagogue. It appears that Schramm has contributed to several worthy projects on behalf of Jewish women and Nazi victims.
Hey, the Nazis were tree-hugging socialists. No dif.
Back in the Reagan-bashing German Green Party heyday of the 1980s there were some old neo-Nazis who were involved with the party. Most of them have died off, but there were some real fascistic tendencies in the organization.
I'm a little rusty about Speer. Could you elaborate on your comment?
Huge difference. Nazi's were not whale loving peace-activists. So there are different brands of socialists just like there are different varieties of conservatives and liberals.
Let me know when one of Osama Bin Laden's many children are invited to the White House.
Socialism is an end. There are different means to get there. The smiley way a la the Greens (and Democrats) or the not-so-smiley way a la the Nazis.
Yep thats right it was Joey Kenndey who was the hitler supporter.
The copperheads don't want you to know that.
Maybe they will be if they renounce their father's deeds and spend their lives trying to atone for his evil actions, just as Speer has done. Pretty simple.
On the other hand, I'm sure that many early Christians also had the same view of Saul of Tarsus.
Yes, her Green politics are her only stigmata.
Speer's daughter is like the daughter of a killer who mourns the loss of life, her father's guilt, and does what she can to ameliorate tragedy. She knew one side of her father, the world and Jews had to deal with the other side. She's displayed remarkable sensitivity and integrity. Not an easy life.
She has not "spent her life trying to atone for his evil actions." She cannot atone for his sins. She did inherit his blood money though. It sounds like she has been trying to wash some of that off her hands. I wonder why she kept any of it. Do you know ?
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