Hitler's 1936 Long Island, NY Legion

News Day ^ | 2005 | David Behrens

[esarlls3]

Hitler's LI Legion

In 1936, a seemingly bucolic Yaphank retreat makes Nazism a homegrown concern

by David Behrens (NewsDay.com, LIHistory.com)

In the summer of 1936, the still-distant threat of Nazism cast an unexpected shadow across the hinterlands of Long Island.

(snip)

On Long Island, Nazism invaded Yaphank in the form of a summer retreat called Camp Siegfreid.

Located on a wooded lakefront near the mid-Suffolk village, the camp was ostensibly a summer place for youngsters and a weekend campground for adults. In reality it was more dangerous -- a project sponsored by the German-American Bund, which had been established to promote Hitlerism in this country.

(snip)

By 1937, up to 40,000 bundists would arrive on Sundays to celebrate Nazism in America, while young Siegfrieders lined up to greet them as the train pulled into Yaphank. A large contingent of Nazis also marched through the village of Lindenhurst that year.

[See source for rest of article.]

[esarlls3]

Never heard of this before.

[Semper Paratus]

Camp Siegfreid!?

[esarlls3]

yes

[EggsAckley]

Camp Siegfried in 1937, Newsday article

Scary stuff.

[Semper Paratus]

Must have been some interesting "What I did during my summer vacation" essays that September.

[Vaquero]

yeah...its true. I believe the name of Lindenhurst was Breslau before the war and was changed to take away some of the image. I knew one of those old Nazi's who owned a tavern for clam diggers in Lindenhurst back in the mid to late 1970's. He would get drunk and feed you free shots of Jägermeister if you would stay and listen to him talk about the glory days. He reminded me of the Nazi who wrote Springtime for Hitler in the move "the Producers"(I only know the movie...never saw the play), only without the helmet(or is it Helmut?).

[Clemenza]

Being a Long Island boy, I learned about this in elementary school when we did our Long Island history month lessons. I also know that Franklin Square, a mere two towns away from my hometown, was a stronghold of the German American bund.

There was another camp similar to Camp Siegfried in Budd Lake, NJ, but I forget the name.

[WKUHilltopper]

Yep, I knew about it...and I live in Kentucky, not NY! But then again, I study history stuff.

[blau993]

A lot of this stuff is overblown. The Bund was a big organization in the 30s, and there were a number of these summer camps for German-American kids. However, while some of the top guys in the Bund were committed Nazis and either fled to Germany or were interned during WWII, there is no evidence of German-Americans sabotaging the war effort or refusing to fight because they had been indoctinated at Bund camp. My grandmother grew up in the Frankford section of Philadelphia, which was home to a big German-American community. She saw lots of neighborhood boys go off to Bund camp in the 30s, and, as she put it, she watched those same boys go off to the US Army and Navy and Marines in the 40s.

[Little Ray]

There was also a fascist movement in the US, the Silver Legion, led by William Dudley Pelley. Try looking 'em up in the Wikipedia.

[wtc911]

Very old news....known about it for years. In fact there is a Germantown Street just north of the LIE in Yaphank.

[wtc911]

I believe the name of Lindenhurst was Breslau before the war and was changed to take away some of the image.

=======================================================

Right and wrong. Lindenhurst was first called Wellwood then City of Breslau then Lindenhurst. But all of this happened in the 1800s not during the 1900s. The name has been Lindenhurst since @ 1891.

[Cougar66]

Did they run KAOS from there?

[asp1]

One of my best friends lived in Germantown, Yaphank. Her family was very from Germany and spoke very little English. They had moved to Long Island just before 12/7/41.

[asp1]

Oh, forgot to mention Camp Upton, a US Army camp located nearby.

[I'm ALL Right!]

Camp Siegfried,noted for turning normal, patriotic Americans into anti-American Nazis, relocated to the other side of the country. Now it is called "HOLLYWOOD".

[Heyworth]

I used to occasion a bar in Chicago called Laschett's, and old Karl Laschett had pictures up behind the bar of his graduation ceremonies from the Nazi naval academy. Right next to them he had a framed letter from Ronald Reagan thanking him for being a member of some Republican PAC or another.

And downstate, my Central Illinois hometown had a German language daily paper until the war.

[wtc911]

Upton was a WW1 basic training facility where Irving Berlin wrote "Oh How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" and the lesser known "Yip-Yip Yaphank".

It was/is a very pretty spot but getting too built up.

[alisasny]

Breslau Cemetary still sits in the center of Lindenhurst off of Sunrise Highway. It still has vacancies and I have noticed many children are buried there due to the lack of restrictions on decorating the graves.

[asp1]

I never knew that about Irving Berlin. I used to work at Brookhaven National Laboratory, which if I am not mistaken, was built on Camp Upton land. When I worked there it was a top secret facility and you needed a security clearance to get passed the front gate. You were expected to go to your office building and NOT roam around. Our building was an old barracks that I was told was from WWI. Many of the buildings were quite old even in the 60's.

Years later they opened up the facility and anyone could drive through and look around. I guess atom smashers aren't as top secret as they used to be. :0) I think they have closed it to the public again so I have to wonder what is going on there now?