Anne Frank Web Log Blog of assorted current news and findings related to Anne and WWII Diaries

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I have been neglecting this blog lately, but I have to mention the 100th birthday of Miep Gies, who is still alive. She is the person who rescued Anne's diary (in assorted notebooks) and photos the day the hiding place was raided. If it were not for her considerate and quick thinking, these items would have been hauled off by the Nazis along with everything else. Further, Miep had been one of the most active helpers to the entire group in hiding. Anne wrote about Miep many times in her diary. Google's list of news articles

A postcard signed by Anne was discovered in an antique shop near Amsterdam. It is similar to one the Anne Frank House has (a New Year's card sent on New Year's Eve, 1937).
    The card was sent from Aachen, Germany to Anne's friend, Sanne Ledermann. Both girls were then eight years old. (Anne's grandmother lived in Aachen at the time.)
    I wonder what has been going on with this postcard for all of these years? Anything to do with Anne Frank is big news in Amsterdam. Anyone would recognize the name. Perhaps Sanne's family left their belongings with someone (Sanne and her parents were killed in the Holocaust and her big sister survived with a false identity) and perhaps the postcard landed in a big box of papers and postcards. It was a few years before the diary was published, so Anne was not a big name while any immediate sorting of belongings went on (for instance just before Sanne's sister went to America in 1947). Then perhaps the papers and the postcard went up in someone's attic, then perhaps the person died and everything was sold as a lot in a flea market to the antique shop buyer. Wondering can be fascinating.
    BBC News story
    Anne Frank House story

Also, recent news that I neglected to post is that the structure to protect Anne's tree is being put up now, or is perhaps already completed by now. The builders donated their efforts but funds will be needed to maintain the structure in the coming years (see the big yellow link below to contribute).
    You can read past blog entries about the tree's problems to learn why this structure is necessary (in short, there were concerns that the tree might fall, due to extensive fungus in the trunk, which poses a danger to the Anne Frank House, other buildings around the tree, and the lives of nearby people). The structure does not touch the tree. The structure is designed to keep the tree from falling sideways if it collapses. (Dutch news story)
    I am arrogantly and baselessly predicting that the tree won't collapse for at least five years. I wonder if anyone is running a bet on this in Amsterdam.

Special thanks go to to my NL contact for sending some of today's information.

In the summer of 1940, when Anne was eleven years old, she fell in love with a boy named Peter Schiff who had recently moved to Amsterdam from Germany. He was three years older than her and they ran around the neighborhood holding hands that summer. A few years later, while in hiding, Anne often thought of him and wrote about him. Later, she died in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp and he died in Auschwitz concentration camp.
    Until Sunday, the public had seen no photo of Peter, but a man in Britain realized that his good friend, when he was a boy in Germany, was Anne's lost love. The man, Ernst Michaelis, donated a nice photo he had of Peter (shown above) to the Anne Frank House. In 1939, Ernst was about to be sent to England for safety by his parents (via the Kindertransport program) while Peter left Berlin for Amsterdam with his parents. As the two friends parted, Peter gave Ernst the photo. The inscription says: "In friendly remembrance of your friend Lutz Peter Schiff." Above, I also put a photo of Anne (from the summer of 1940).

• The ABC News page about this includes a large photo of Peter.
  
• Another informative news article by The Guardian's Observer magazine.
  
• The Anne Frank House website has an article which includes more photos (unfortunately, not in English at the time of this writing).

Despite getting permission to cut down Anne's beloved chestnut tree a week ago, a plan has been tentatively agreed to build a protective structure around the tree. The structure should have a useful lifetime of 5-15 years. It should allow the tree to remain standing and yet protect the surrounding buildings in case the tree should fall or collapse (it is infested with a fungus they cannot get rid of).
    Reading the online translation, it sounds as if the parties involved are in tentative agreement and will solicit for money to pay for this structure. Further, if they don't make a final agreement and don't start building the structure by the end of May, they will cut the tree down.
    A team of architects and tree specialists has already designed the structure. First, the crown of the tree will be pruned (again). The flexible construction won't touch the tree. This allows it to grow and move in the wind. The plan includes monitoring the tree and the security situation (presumably this is about checks to see if the structure is remaining strong).

Dutch news story
Anne Frank House page about it
an online translation service
short BBC news story in English

Special thanks to my NL contact for sending this info and links.

Catching up on the news, there are three items I'd like to share:

One:
According to Earthtimes.org, on Wednesday, an appeals court granted the right to fell Anne's beloved chestnut tree. There is no information about when this might happen. In the past times her tree has been on death row (so to speak), it was sometimes imminent that it would be felled and sometimes months off. I have blogged about this several times before (I am against felling the tree, which looks very healthy to me, granted, seen via the web).

Two:
There is an exhibit about Anne in Liverpool, which includes a life-sized replica of Anne's room in the hiding place. It should look identical (with guesses at the furniture) to the room that she slept in, hoped in, and wrote most of her diary in. The exhibit is inside the Liverpool Cathedral and runs until February 8th. (see BBC news story)

Three:
Helene Berr was a young Jewish woman living in France during WWII who was eventually deported and died in the Holocaust. (Like Anne, she died of typhus in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.) In the meantime, living in relative freedom in occupied Paris, she wrote a diary which will be published in English soon, by MacLehose Press. (news story, and another one)

"Why ... does the German soldier whom I pass in the street not slap me, not insult me? ... They don't even see the illogical incomprehension there is in holding the Metro door for me and maybe tomorrow deporting me."

Helene Berr and a page of her diary.

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