One of my favorite memoirs is Jeannette Walls’ The Glass Castle. Eleanor Ramrath Garner’s memoir, Eleanor’s Story: An American Girl in Hitler’s Germany (Peachtree, 1999), is just as incredible.
This memoir tells the story of nine-year-old Eleanor, an American girl of German immigrant parents. Unable to find work during the Depression, Eleanor’s electrical engineer father is finally offered a good position working for a German company. Decent pay, a chance to return and visit family. Eleanor’s parents decide to take the job–just for two years, they tell her.
On August 29, 1939 Eleanor’s family–her mother, father, and older brother Frank–board the SS Hamburg, a German luxury liner, and head to Berlin. On September 1, the captain announces that Germany has declared war on Poland. Two days later he reports that France and Britain have declared war on Germany. The nightmare known as World War II has officially begun and Eleanor’s family is heading straight into its center.
During the Atlantic crossing, the ship stops so the crew can paint over the ship’s German flag, first to French then Norwegian colors. Eleanor’s family makes it across the Atlantic without being torpedoed but is trapped in Germany. Return passage is available only for those with US dollars-Eleanor’s father has already traded their dollars for marks. Another chance to return fails because Eleanor’s mother lacks US citizenship. The rest of the family could leave but that would mean abandoning their mother. Eleanor’s family is trapped in Germany for the entire war.
Eleanor’s Story offers a different perspective on World War II, a sort of flip side to Anne Frank. The dichotomy of being both German and American conflicts Eleanor. As the US enters the war, she thinks, “The soldiers of the country where I was born, the country I love, will be told to kill me, my family, and my new friends. And the soldiers of the country of my ancestry, of my beloved Omis [grandparents], the country where I live, will be told to hate and kill Americans. Where do I stand in all of this? Who should I be loyal to? (p. 68).
Ironically this dual status also protects her family. Her father and brother are not drafted into the German Army. As Berlin falls to the Russians, American passports save Eleanor’s family from execution and save her and her mother from rape. When US soldiers enter Berlin, Eleanor’s father gets a job as a translator for a colonel in the American Command Post and these connections ultimately help the family return to the States.
Be aware, this is a pretty adult children’s book. Although Eleanor’s Story has won several children’s book awards, you should read it yourself before handing it to your precocious second grader that just finished Twilight. The book is explicit. Face it, you really can’t write about the horrors of war and leave out all the horror.
Death and violence surround Eleanor–a soldier who beheads himself on the train tracks rather than get sent to the front, bodies stacked in piles in cellars because there is no time to bury them during bombings, a girlfriend shot randomly by Russian occupation soldiers.
Eleanor waits in terror during bombings:
Lights in the cellar suddenly flickered, followed by a piercing whistle and a deafening blast. I placed my forehead on my knees and wrapped my arms around my legs. Screaming bombs and explosions erupted all around us. The whole foundation of the building shook. Plaster rained from the ceiling, enveloping us in ghostly white. The pole in the center of the room shook. It had just been pushed under the ceiling and wasn’t attached to anything. Please, please, I begged the Invisibles, [the angels to whom she prays], let it hold up the ceiling (p.106).
Through it all, Eleanor’s mother remains the stable force that holds the family together. Mother insists they sweep and clean after each bombing. She makes them bathe and use a tablecloth, and it is precisely these small, mundane routines that anchor the family through the terror, chaos, and uncertainty of war. Little things comfort Eleanor tremendously: a small Boticelli Madonna that hangs above her bed, images of her peaceful home in Philadelphia that she replays one by one in her mind during bombings so she doesn’t go crazy.
As a teenager, I vividly remember aching over my inability to have the fancy house, designer clothes, and cool vacations that it seemed like everyone else got. Eleanor’s Story is important for its history, but it will also give your teen (and you) some perspective. There are a lot worse things in life than being the only one at school who doesn’t have a real Coach purse, Ugg boots, and a car. Many people long simply for a safe home and enough to eat.
Eleanor’s Story also offers compelling proof of the strength of the human spirit. People are able to endure unbelievable pain and survive. It made me reconsider my own challenges, trivial by comparison. Eleanor’s Story’s offers readers both the worst and best of what it means to be human.
Read Eleanor’s Story and post your opinion.
