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TRACES events in Germany
TRACES, a group focussed on the history of German immigrant experiences in the U.S. announces an upcoming program on U.S. WWII internment in Germany. Michael Luick-Thrams, executive director, announces the events below. Press release: It was wartime on the US home...
History of Crystal City Internment Camp now online
Joseph O'Rourke, who commanded the Crystal City, TX Family Internment Camp, wrote this "Historical Narrative of the Crystal City Internment Camp" in 1945, as the facility was slowly being emptied. The report detailed its establishment, construction, organization and...
New Crystal City information posted
Two additional inspection reports on the Crystal City, TX Family Internment Camp, and several lists of internees transferred there during the first days of the camp are now available for viewing. The transfer lists include the first internees in the camp in December...
“History in Five: FDR’s Secret Enemy Exchange Program” video
Simon and Schuster Books posted this video in 2015, with Jan Jarboe Russell, author of The Train to Crystal City, briefly presenting five facts about Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the policy that led to the exchange of thousands of U.S. and Latin American civilians of...
February 2017 Statement
[pexblogposts pex_attr_title="" pex_attr_cat="283" pex_attr_layout="columns" pex_attr_number="1" pex_attr_columns="2"][/pexblogposts] The German American Internee Coalition formed in 2005 to educate the public about our experiences, after United States officials...
February 1944 M.S. Gripsholm manifest on-line
On February 15, 1944, the M.S. Gripsholm sailed from the New York harbor to Lisbon, Portugal, with 1,117 civilians of German descent, including children, scheduled to be exchanged for persons held in Germany. Most had been interned in Texas; many were from...
A German Ecuadorian family’s WWII experiences now on-line
Karin Harten Schramm, who was brought to the United States with her German Ecuadorian family 1944, has generously allowed us to post her family's WWII experiences, largely compiled from contemporaneous letters and diaries Gertrud Harten, her mother, kept. There are...
the Harten Family Story
By Gertrud Harten – 1939 to 1948, and Karin Harten Schramm - 2019 My parents were both from Hamburg, Germany. My father, Wolfgang Harten, born in 1907, finished his apprenticeship in an import/export company in 1927. At that time Germany was suffering under the...
WWII exchange voyages remembered
Lars Hemingstam, author and founder of a website about the ships of the Swedish American Line, discusses the exchange voyages during World War 2 between the Allies and Axis Powers using the Swedish American Line's chartered ocean liners Gripsholm and Drottningholm....
The Tenement Museum in NYC posts internees’ stories
The Tenement Museum of New York City has an online exhibit highlighting the experiences of some former German American and Latin American internees. These brief accounts were written by students of St. Mary's University, San Antonio, TX, as part of a year-long history...
Micro-documentaries about internment
As part of a year-long project (2018-19) highlighting the internment and expatriation of German American and Latin Americans during WWII, history students of St. Mary's University, San Antonio, TX, made a number of small documentary films about internment. With the...
Gripsholm event held February 14-15, 2019 in N.Y.C. and New Jersey
Twelve former child internees, as well as families and friends, commemorated the 75th anniversary of German-American prisoner exchange during World War II, hosted by St. Mary's University in New York and New Jersey on Thursday, Feb. 14, and Friday, Feb. 15,...
75th anniversary of internee exchanges to be held February 14-15, 2018 around NYC
On February 14-15, the public is invited to attend free events planned by St. Mary's University students and staff to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the M.S. Gripsholm voyage to Europe, carrying German American and Latin American internee families to be exchanged...
John Christgau, GAIC board member, passes away unexpectedly
Our good friend and fellow GAIC board member, John Christgau, passed away unexpectedly on August 21, 2018 in Belmont, California. We first connected with John through his book, ENEMIES: WORLD WAR II ALIEN INTERNMENT, one of the first definitive books about the...
SS “Gripsholm” repatriates reunion Feb. 15, 2019
A reunion for SS Gripsholm repatriates will be held Feb. 15, 2019 at 4:00 PM at Pier F, Jersey City, New Jersey, 1Harborside Place, Jersey City, NJ 07311. Planned by students of St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas, who have been studying German American and...
St. Mary’s University, San Antonio, Texas, hosts “Day of Remembrance” for German American WWII internment
St. Mary’s University, based in San Antonio, Texas, is hosting a “Day of Remembrance” in Chicago on Friday, Oct. 26, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of internment of German Americans during World War II. Three child-internees are featured in this Chicago...
St. Mary’s University, San Antonio, Texas, hosted “Day of Remembrance” for German American WWII internment
On Friday, October 25, 2018, "Day of Remembrance" events were held to commemorate the 75th anniversary of internment of German Americans during WW II in Chicago and around the country. Organized by student groups from St. Mary's University, in San Antonio, students,...
“The War Outside,” young adult novel about Crystal City, TX Internment Camp, recently published
The War Outside, by Monica Hesse, is set in the confines of the Crystal City, Texas Family Internment Camp during WW II. Teenagers Haruko, a Japanese American from Colorado, and Margot, whose German American family are from Iowa, form a friendship, even as life in the...
The Tango War: The Struggle for the Hearts, Minds, and Riches of Latin America during World War II
Mc Conahay, Mary Jo. The Tango War: The Struggle for the Hearts, Minds, and Riches of Latin America during World War II. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2018. The author is a reporter who has covered wars in Central America and economics in the Middle East. She details...
“The Tango War,” new book on U.S. involvement in Latin America
The Tango War: The Struggle for the Hearts, Minds, and Riches of Latin America during World War II, written by Mary Jo McConahay, is now available. The author is a reporter who has covered wars in Central America and economics in the Middle East. She details efforts...
Crystal City, Texas Family Internment Camp map
Crystal City, Texas Family Internment Camp map (2018) annotated by former internee Werner Ulrich—includes plot plans, drawings of building types, and location of work areas, as well as lists of internees held in the camp, births, and deaths. Staff, including teachers...