Pokie Makes Page One
- Thread starter Okiewan
- Start date
Yeah, I'd like to hear some of those stories too. :cool:
- Thread starter
- #6
The stuff I mentioned above is cool and all, but the stories Marie (Pierre's wife) told of the days of Nazi occupation and what Pierre risked were INSANE. Maybe he'll even go so far as to tell the story about getting chocolate from the Americans when he (pokie) was kid and how it's likely, one of those Americans was his future father-in-law. Same time, same place, same memories...Spooky.
oldguy
Always Broken
- Dec 26, 1999
- 9,411
- 0
I remember shiftless telling Trudy that story about her father and Pokie the last time we had a get together at the pier. Very impressive to live in those times and survive. Just shows where his values came from. BTW We are planning to get together with Pokie and Shiftless in a couple weeks so you had better get on shiftless abut being ready for a night of dancing -well maybe just sitting and talking is more suited to me
How old is Pokie, Okie? (Yeah, I know, poetic, isn't it.)
My Dad turned 85 today; he was in Luxembourg during The War. I'd love to get him together with Pokie, sometime when I'm back there. He's reluctant to talk about his experiences, but once you get him started, he'll go on.
My Dad turned 85 today; he was in Luxembourg during The War. I'd love to get him together with Pokie, sometime when I'm back there. He's reluctant to talk about his experiences, but once you get him started, he'll go on.
Pokie
Administrator
the article mentions me and my brothers watching (from the top of our 4-story building) the US Air Force resupply the 101st Airborne that was surrounded in Bastogne during the German counter-offensive.... (where General McAuliffe gave his "nuts" answer to the German surrender demand on Dec 22, 1944).... which reminded me of the fact that at that point we no longer saw the German Luftwaffe, but we did see the V1s and V2s screaming overhead on their way to London.... V1s and 2s had that ugly "diesel engine" sound and travelled rather slowly..... but who had the weapon to shoot them down?...
I gave the GAzette the map of Luxembourg so that they could pinpoint the location of Bastogne (about 30 miles NW of Luxembourg City as the crow flies, just across the border in Belgium)... then they cover Bastogne with my mug shot...
I gave the GAzette the map of Luxembourg so that they could pinpoint the location of Bastogne (about 30 miles NW of Luxembourg City as the crow flies, just across the border in Belgium)... then they cover Bastogne with my mug shot...
Pokie
Administrator
I was born in 1939, so I'll be 69 on June 8...
- Thread starter
- #11
And you think Okie and Pokie just happened? :)
SpDyKen, about your Dad...
That generation of hero's is all but gone. "The Greatest Generation" as they're called (rightfully so). Anytime we can get the stories, spend some time with them is time that's not lost.
"Tom Brokaw wrote of them in his 1998 book, The Greatest Generation. He wrote, "this is the greatest generation any society has produced." He argued that the soldiers fought not for the fame and recognition, but because it was the right thing to do."
Pokie was 3-6 or so during that time ...
Talked to him a few minutes ago, hopefully convinced him to start posting some of those memories in this thread.
SpDyKen, about your Dad...
That generation of hero's is all but gone. "The Greatest Generation" as they're called (rightfully so). Anytime we can get the stories, spend some time with them is time that's not lost.
"Tom Brokaw wrote of them in his 1998 book, The Greatest Generation. He wrote, "this is the greatest generation any society has produced." He argued that the soldiers fought not for the fame and recognition, but because it was the right thing to do."
Pokie was 3-6 or so during that time ...
Talked to him a few minutes ago, hopefully convinced him to start posting some of those memories in this thread.
Pokie
Administrator
I try to run a video camera whenever I get him talking about his experiences. He was in the 8th Armored Infantry Division, under General Patton. He spent most of his time in a tank. I know they were in Bastogne, some. They also knocked down some of the fences at a sub-camp near Auschwitz. He does not like to talk about that, but he sure gets angry when he hears the B/S that supposedly the Holocaust did not ever occur.Okiewan said:
- Aug 2, 2000
- 13,504
- 19
Ah, but what a glorious mug it is!Pokie said:
Whilst I never got to hear the war stories first hand (those ancestors of mine who fought didn't make it back), I wish I'd been rolling tape on my grandparents when they'd tell me about the good ol' days.
way cool.
B
biglou
Pokie is definitely one of the coolest kids I know. :nod:
Pokie
Administrator
here is the full aticle ...without pics..
Friday, May 30, 2008
Surviving Nazi rule
Didier's father risked his life for risistance
by Cid Standifer
Friday, May 30, 2008
Marcel Didier's earliest memory is from when he was three years old, growing up in the capital of Luxembourg. One night he made the mistake of opening the front door of his apartment building to look outside after curfew.
"I was curious about what was going on at night," he said. "Somebody saw me. A Nazi soldier storms into my house."
The Nazi chased Didier down the hallway and into his basement, where he pointed his rifle at the child and shouted at him in German. At the time, Didier spoke only Luxembourgish-a mixture of French and a Germanic language. After a few minutes, the soldier left, and Didier ran terrified upstairs to his family.
When Didier, now a Galena resident, lived under the German occupation, curfew was written in stone. No one could so much as open a curtain for fear that light would be visible to Allied bombers and cause an air raid.
"They had rules, and they lived by the rules," Didier said. "Either you lived by the rules or you died."
He was one year old in 1940 when the Germans rolled into Luxembourg. Didier says he remembers relatively little of what happened during the ensuing four years before the Americans drove the Germans out, but he still has the stories that his father, Pierre Didier, told him when the war was over.
Pierre owned a bicycle shop beneath the family's apartments. Unbeknownst to the Germans, he spent the war years providing bicycles to transport resistance members to bordering countries, smuggling notes from France in tires and frames, selling cigarettes on the black market to fund the movement, and harboring Jews, American soldiers and other resistance members in the family's home.
The family didn't know any of this either. Even Didier's mother Marie was kept in the dark.
"She was deathly afraid of Dad taking chances," Didier said, "but she had a hunch that he was doing stuff." She kept a few bags packed in case the family was shipped to a concentration camp.
And they came close. At one point, the Nazis caught wind of the cigarette business Pierre was running. Without warning, a car pulled up with around 20 German soldiers who surrounded the house. But they found nothing.
"He had just sold his last pack an hour before," Didier said. "He was surprised that the commanding officer, the captain, seemed relieved. . .He told Dad, 'Better watch your friends.'"
"Why, we don't know, but there's humanity after all among the bad guys."
Didier's uncle, Albert New, was not so lucky. The movement was so secretive that neither Pierre nor the rest of the family even knew that he was involved in resistance activity, but one day New didn't come home from work at the railroad. His name was later found in a registry at the Birchenau concentration camp.
Not all of Pierre's secret charges made it either. Pierre told his family that he had "lost" the key to a room in the house, but after the war revealed that a steady stream of people had been secreted away there. Some were in the process of fleeing the country, so Pierre would send them off to their next destination with fingers crossed and no way of knowing their fate.
The methods were risky. A common trick was to hide people in carts of hay crossing the border. The Germans were well aware of the tactic, and rather than taking the trouble to search a haystack by hand would stick a bayonet in to see if it bled. Pierre discovered later that at least one of the people he hid disappeared in route to the next safe house.
All the while, the family had to keep up appearances of conceding to the occupation. Didier described how they would pretend to salute by waving one arm out half-heartedly. As long as there was movement, the Germans didn't notice the difference.
Pretending was harder for Lucien, Didier's older brother, who was going on 12 when the occupation neared its end. He was forced to join the Hitler Youth, and had to go out and collect donations for the Third Reich. Some people would toss in a few pennies to keep on the good side of the occupiers, and Lucien handed over his paltry earnings at the one meeting he attended.
"He always skipped," said Didier. "He didn't realize how dangerous that was, to not go to a meeting. And our parents didn't want to force him to go."
Fortunately, the Germans were too preoccupied fighting a losing war to go chasing after truant children.
Didier remembers the night, September 10 of 1944, when the city fell to the Allies.
"(The Germans) were setting up barricades right in front of the house. We were sure that they were going to make a stand there," he said. The family hid in the basement, sure that an Allied bombing would strike the area.
"All of the sudden, it turns quiet-'cause nobody sleeps on a night like that-and then we hear them rumbling out of town."
Pierre slipped out of the house and went to meet the U. S. Fifth Armored Division as it rolled into Luxembourg. He carried an American flag with him.
"How my dad got the U. S. flag, nobody knows. He wouldn't tell us," said Didier.
The liberation was young Didier's first encounter with the Americans. "I was five years old, in awe of America, not just for the sake of the liberation but for the majesty and the magnitude with which they moved around town," he said. After five years of strict rationing under the occupation, the Americans threw food and chocolate from their trucks. "It was like Santa Claus coming to town."
Luxembourg wasn't out of the woods yet. The Germans regrouped to the north and launched a counterattack in December that became the Battle of the Bulge, the most costly battle the American Army fought during the war. Didier recalls sitting on the roof of his house with his brothers watching American planes drop supplies to isolated ground troops.
Pierre had come above ground after the Americans took Luxembourg, and the family knew that if the Germans returned, they would have to flee with the retreating Allies. Fortunately, the offensive failed, and the Third Reich fell soon after.
After the war, Pierre turned to his business. He joined up with a manufacturer based in Pontiac, Mich. to make "Whizzers," or motorized bicycles. He worked in distribution until 1954, when the company decided to pull out of the business. They offered him a job in America instead.
"He asked his three boys, 'Would you like to go to America?'" recalled Didier. "And the answer was a unanimous 'Yes.'"
It took two years for the family to get visas. When they were finally approved, Lucien stayed behind in Luxembourg to make his own way for a few years, but the middle brother Paul found work in America, and Didier started attending an American high school, though he dropped back a year to work on his English skills. He then went to University of Detroit, and once he graduated was offered a job by the Chrysler Corporation.
While there, Didier met a woman named Joy who worked in a different department. The two were married in 1972.
Didier would tell Joy about memories he had from the liberation, and she would pass them on to her father, who was a part of the American Army. They began to notice strange similarities. Didier recalled sledding with G. I.s in the winter of 1944, right at the time when Joy's father was there.
Of course, there's no way to be certain. But Didier says he's 99 percent certain the two met that year. "What does it all mean? I don't know. Fate? It's just kind of a neat story," he said.
picture: Dad holding the US flag; Pokie is the middle one of the little guys up front, on the right...with my head turned toward the crouching girls...
Friday, May 30, 2008
Surviving Nazi rule
Didier's father risked his life for risistance
by Cid Standifer
Friday, May 30, 2008
Marcel Didier's earliest memory is from when he was three years old, growing up in the capital of Luxembourg. One night he made the mistake of opening the front door of his apartment building to look outside after curfew.
"I was curious about what was going on at night," he said. "Somebody saw me. A Nazi soldier storms into my house."
The Nazi chased Didier down the hallway and into his basement, where he pointed his rifle at the child and shouted at him in German. At the time, Didier spoke only Luxembourgish-a mixture of French and a Germanic language. After a few minutes, the soldier left, and Didier ran terrified upstairs to his family.
When Didier, now a Galena resident, lived under the German occupation, curfew was written in stone. No one could so much as open a curtain for fear that light would be visible to Allied bombers and cause an air raid.
"They had rules, and they lived by the rules," Didier said. "Either you lived by the rules or you died."
He was one year old in 1940 when the Germans rolled into Luxembourg. Didier says he remembers relatively little of what happened during the ensuing four years before the Americans drove the Germans out, but he still has the stories that his father, Pierre Didier, told him when the war was over.
Pierre owned a bicycle shop beneath the family's apartments. Unbeknownst to the Germans, he spent the war years providing bicycles to transport resistance members to bordering countries, smuggling notes from France in tires and frames, selling cigarettes on the black market to fund the movement, and harboring Jews, American soldiers and other resistance members in the family's home.
The family didn't know any of this either. Even Didier's mother Marie was kept in the dark.
"She was deathly afraid of Dad taking chances," Didier said, "but she had a hunch that he was doing stuff." She kept a few bags packed in case the family was shipped to a concentration camp.
And they came close. At one point, the Nazis caught wind of the cigarette business Pierre was running. Without warning, a car pulled up with around 20 German soldiers who surrounded the house. But they found nothing.
"He had just sold his last pack an hour before," Didier said. "He was surprised that the commanding officer, the captain, seemed relieved. . .He told Dad, 'Better watch your friends.'"
"Why, we don't know, but there's humanity after all among the bad guys."
Didier's uncle, Albert New, was not so lucky. The movement was so secretive that neither Pierre nor the rest of the family even knew that he was involved in resistance activity, but one day New didn't come home from work at the railroad. His name was later found in a registry at the Birchenau concentration camp.
Not all of Pierre's secret charges made it either. Pierre told his family that he had "lost" the key to a room in the house, but after the war revealed that a steady stream of people had been secreted away there. Some were in the process of fleeing the country, so Pierre would send them off to their next destination with fingers crossed and no way of knowing their fate.
The methods were risky. A common trick was to hide people in carts of hay crossing the border. The Germans were well aware of the tactic, and rather than taking the trouble to search a haystack by hand would stick a bayonet in to see if it bled. Pierre discovered later that at least one of the people he hid disappeared in route to the next safe house.
All the while, the family had to keep up appearances of conceding to the occupation. Didier described how they would pretend to salute by waving one arm out half-heartedly. As long as there was movement, the Germans didn't notice the difference.
Pretending was harder for Lucien, Didier's older brother, who was going on 12 when the occupation neared its end. He was forced to join the Hitler Youth, and had to go out and collect donations for the Third Reich. Some people would toss in a few pennies to keep on the good side of the occupiers, and Lucien handed over his paltry earnings at the one meeting he attended.
"He always skipped," said Didier. "He didn't realize how dangerous that was, to not go to a meeting. And our parents didn't want to force him to go."
Fortunately, the Germans were too preoccupied fighting a losing war to go chasing after truant children.
Didier remembers the night, September 10 of 1944, when the city fell to the Allies.
"(The Germans) were setting up barricades right in front of the house. We were sure that they were going to make a stand there," he said. The family hid in the basement, sure that an Allied bombing would strike the area.
"All of the sudden, it turns quiet-'cause nobody sleeps on a night like that-and then we hear them rumbling out of town."
Pierre slipped out of the house and went to meet the U. S. Fifth Armored Division as it rolled into Luxembourg. He carried an American flag with him.
"How my dad got the U. S. flag, nobody knows. He wouldn't tell us," said Didier.
The liberation was young Didier's first encounter with the Americans. "I was five years old, in awe of America, not just for the sake of the liberation but for the majesty and the magnitude with which they moved around town," he said. After five years of strict rationing under the occupation, the Americans threw food and chocolate from their trucks. "It was like Santa Claus coming to town."
Luxembourg wasn't out of the woods yet. The Germans regrouped to the north and launched a counterattack in December that became the Battle of the Bulge, the most costly battle the American Army fought during the war. Didier recalls sitting on the roof of his house with his brothers watching American planes drop supplies to isolated ground troops.
Pierre had come above ground after the Americans took Luxembourg, and the family knew that if the Germans returned, they would have to flee with the retreating Allies. Fortunately, the offensive failed, and the Third Reich fell soon after.
After the war, Pierre turned to his business. He joined up with a manufacturer based in Pontiac, Mich. to make "Whizzers," or motorized bicycles. He worked in distribution until 1954, when the company decided to pull out of the business. They offered him a job in America instead.
"He asked his three boys, 'Would you like to go to America?'" recalled Didier. "And the answer was a unanimous 'Yes.'"
It took two years for the family to get visas. When they were finally approved, Lucien stayed behind in Luxembourg to make his own way for a few years, but the middle brother Paul found work in America, and Didier started attending an American high school, though he dropped back a year to work on his English skills. He then went to University of Detroit, and once he graduated was offered a job by the Chrysler Corporation.
While there, Didier met a woman named Joy who worked in a different department. The two were married in 1972.
Didier would tell Joy about memories he had from the liberation, and she would pass them on to her father, who was a part of the American Army. They began to notice strange similarities. Didier recalled sledding with G. I.s in the winter of 1944, right at the time when Joy's father was there.
Of course, there's no way to be certain. But Didier says he's 99 percent certain the two met that year. "What does it all mean? I don't know. Fate? It's just kind of a neat story," he said.
picture: Dad holding the US flag; Pokie is the middle one of the little guys up front, on the right...with my head turned toward the crouching girls...
Attachments
Last edited:
- Aug 2, 2000
- 13,504
- 19
That's good stuff right there.
The only part that I can't take . . . working for Chrysler!?!? sheesh!
;)
The only part that I can't take . . . working for Chrysler!?!? sheesh!
;)
- Sep 12, 2001
- 329
- 0
I have heard these stories my entire life, and its still hard to believe that my grandfather did what he did... and that my father grew up hearing bombs go off, had suitcases packed in case of round ups for concentration camps and experienced the SS first hand. It terrifies me, but at the same time, makes me proud to have the family history I have, and such brave men in my blood.
Cant even imagine...
Cant even imagine...
Pokie
Administrator
XRpredator said:
EXP... maybe you are too young ( :) ) to realize that Chrysler was an exciting company with exciting cars. The #43 of Richard Petty was the most famous Plymouth car... I bought a 1965 Plymouth ($3000) convertible and loved Plymouth until I bought a 1970 version that turned out to be a P.O.S. ... (maybe it was the "paisley" top!? )........ courted/impressed my lady in said (topless) vehicle....
Chrysler was expanding internationally and making good money in them there days ... it was as dynamic as Detroit itself at that time.... but then...
My parents are visiting my brother, in Astoria, OR., right now. They are going to print a copy of the article to show my Dad. I'm guessing that the the 8th Armored I.D. probably followed the 5th into town.
Pokie, when I come back there this summer, I'll let you know. If your interested, I'd like to bring my Dad up to talk to you, sometime. I think he would enjoy that.
He'd love to visit Galena, anyway. He's made many dozens of trips there; both for the Boy Scout Jamboree that they have there, and for school field trips.
I'm glad someone at the paper heard about your story. I keep hoping some reporter,, biographer, or historian will sit down & get my Dad's story. He will talk to others more than he will talk to us family about his experiences.
I enjoyed reading the story, as well.
Pokie, when I come back there this summer, I'll let you know. If your interested, I'd like to bring my Dad up to talk to you, sometime. I think he would enjoy that.
He'd love to visit Galena, anyway. He's made many dozens of trips there; both for the Boy Scout Jamboree that they have there, and for school field trips.
I'm glad someone at the paper heard about your story. I keep hoping some reporter,, biographer, or historian will sit down & get my Dad's story. He will talk to others more than he will talk to us family about his experiences.
I enjoyed reading the story, as well.
Pokie
Administrator
SpDyKen...
that would be swell...visit any time... in fact I am meeting tomorrow with a local who read my story and wants to fill in some of his knowledge ....
That BoyScout Jamboree brings about 2000 of them to town, camping all over the area (but not spending a lot of money :yikes: ); they are often unlucky with bad weather... my event is the weekend before, General Grant's birthday, and we usually have good weather... April can be unpredictable...
looking forward to hearing from you or seeing you in town...
that would be swell...visit any time... in fact I am meeting tomorrow with a local who read my story and wants to fill in some of his knowledge ....
That BoyScout Jamboree brings about 2000 of them to town, camping all over the area (but not spending a lot of money :yikes: ); they are often unlucky with bad weather... my event is the weekend before, General Grant's birthday, and we usually have good weather... April can be unpredictable...
looking forward to hearing from you or seeing you in town...
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