When most people hear about the country of Germany, disturbing images float through their minds.  They see pictures of Adolf Hitler, Nazi soldiers marching, and concentration camps.  I know that these thoughts exist because even though I am of German dissent I am guilty of stereotyping Germany too.  I can’t seem to escape the actions of my fellow Germans although during the times of both world wars I had no relatives in Germany.  Never the less,  the vicious actions that the Nazis performed seem to follow me around.  No one thinks about the great German scientists, engineers, musicians, such as Bach and Beethoven, or even the famous German beer; people are fixated on Hitler and what he did to the world.  As more and more people react to my heritage in such a negative manner, I cannot help but become a little ashamed of where I come from.  It’s difficult for me to say such a sad thing, but it’s true.  People came to the United States because it was supposedly a place where people are considered equal.  Being from Germany, a country that does not have the best standing, makes me realize that the United States is not all it is cracked up to be because of the stereotyping.  I have had to endure hurtful remarks about my heritage because I come from a German background.  The painful stereotypical comments about how I must be a Nazi simply because my ancestors come from Germany is unfair and I hate the fact that I hesitate when telling people my nationality. After two World Wars, Germany is a country that has a severely tarnished reputation.  When my great grandfather came to America, Germany was seen as a beautiful and prosperous country, especially from his perspective.  It’s a shame that the world doesn’t look at Germany through the eyes of my family, because if it did, they would only see the country’s wonderful achievements.

My great grandfather, Joseph Dommerque, came to the United States in 1906 when he was 16 years old.  He was living in Frankfurt with his foster parents before he left for America.  He immigrated to the United States because he was sent for by his mother who was already living in America.  He always thought of Germany as a wonderful and romantic country; he never wanted to leave his home.  At the time of his departure Germany’s economy was doing well.  My great grandfather never really enjoyed the benefits of the economy because he lived on a farm, but he loved the scenery and environment of Germany.  Joseph was an aspiring artist who wanted to capture the beauty of his homeland, but he was forced to leave Germany to go and help his mother.

At the time of Joseph’s departure, Germany was experiencing a significant economic change.  There were developments in industry and technology which caused a major migration from agriculture to industry.  From 1880 to about 1910, hundreds of people began to move from rural Germany to the busy cities so they could start new lives and careers.  My great-grandfather left for America in the middle of the shift towards urbanization.  It was also during this time period that the middle class of Germany was able to grow.  The middle class gained more power due to the sudden realization that living in a city was more profitable than working out on a farm.  More and more people saw that a city was able to offer several jobs and a myriad of professions.  The new growth of the middle class was obvious to those living in Germany.  “Around 1870 it (the middle-class) made up about one fifth of the population, in 1882 one fourth, and by 1901 one third of the  population” (Imperial 28).   The people who were responsible for the growth of the middle class were those who made the change from agriculture to industry.

Although there was a lot of success that Germany was experiencing, there were problems that separated the people.  “The disputes among opposing classes (industry and agriculture, protectionists and free traders, manufacturers and primary suppliers, and small capital against big capital) prevented unity among the people of Germany” (Peculiarities).  There were too many subdivisions among the middle class for Germany to unite.  The accomplishments that were made were balanced with problems such as the disunity among the dominant groups of society.  The shift from rural to urban occurred quite quickly, making it difficult to adjust to the new large cities and the slowly shrinking farmland.  “In 1871, two-thirds of the German people still lived in rural communities, but on the eve of the First World War the urban population comprised almost two-thirds of the nation” (Imperial 23).  Although the cities were growing, the disunity made it hard to appreciate the success of the cities.  It seemed that every step forward was balanced by a step back.

Unfortunately for my great-grandfather, he was unable to experience both the successes and the set-backs that his country was undergoing; he left for America while these great changes were occurring.  Moving to the United States was never an option that my great-grandfather considered; he never would have left if he had not been sent for by his birth mother.  He didn’t want to leave the people whom he thought were his parents, but they thought that it was best for him to be with his real mother.  Joseph wanted to stay in Germany on the farm where he grew up.   He liked the idea of working on the farm while practicing his art techniques.  When my great-grandfather became confident of his work, he had  planned to quit the farm and find a job doing what he really loved, painting.  He wanted to become a painter and paint the beautiful landscapes of Germany.  “He regarded any other kind of work as a waste of time; he felt that he was put on the earth to paint and do nothing else” (Interview).  Regrettably, he had to leave his beloved home and family to move to the United States to help a woman who abandoned him 16 years earlier.  Needless to say, he was not looking forward to meeting his mother.

When my great-grandfather arrived in the United States he found out the reason for his move.  His mother, my great-great-grandmother, needed help at the bakery where she worked.  My great-grandfather protested working in the bakery from the beginning because he wanted to learn more about painting.  His mother said “You want to be an artist?  Here, decorate these cakes.”  From the moment she said that, he despised his job; he became determined to get out of that bakery and become a successful artist.

My great-grandfather loathed his job so much that he sabotaged the cakes and pies.  Instead of putting the sponge filling in the cakes, he ate the sponge part himself and replaced it with stale bagels and bread.  He was able to disguise his “special” cakes with his artistic technique of applying the icing.  His attitude was “What was the worst they could do, fire me?  That was what I was hoping for.”  Once people caught on to his scheme, he was fired and forced to find a new occupation (he wasn’t too heart-broken).

With the ability and freedom to find a job that he wanted, he headed right towards the paint and easel.  He found a home in Ridgewood, Queens and a job as an apprentice to an artist.  The job didn’t offer the kind of money that another job may have, but he was doing what he loved.  My great-grandfather took the job with the artist because he still had a lot to learn when it came to brush strokes and mixing paint.  For a while all my great-grandfather did was clean the brushes, but he didn’t mind it was “good experience.”

By 1912, at the age of 22, Joseph was doing what he had wanted to do ever since he was a little boy, which was make art.  After the bakery “incident” and the apprenticeship with the artist, he began to paint paintings and enter them in contests at fairs.  It didn’t take him long to make money with his art; the work he did as an apprentice paid off and he was able to rely on his own art work for money.  He supported himself and his mother the best he could with the prize money he won in the contests.  Joseph worked for several years as a painter, but when he got married to my great-grandmother Bessy on June 16, 1925, he knew that prize money was not going to be able to support him, his new wife, and eventually a family.  He got a job as a free lance artist at around 1927.

As a freelance commercial artist, Joseph worked for a company called Hartz-Mountain.  Hartz-Mountain was a pet product company that needed someone to paint box covers and advertisements.  It wasn’t exactly inspirational art work that my great-grandfather was producing, but it put food on the table and some money in the bank.  “He was fortunate to have such a steady job during this period in time because the rest of the country was experiencing the effects of the Great Depression” (Interview).  Even though Joseph and Bessy were lucky to have a dependable income, Joseph did give up some “extras” in order for the entire family to benefit.  With a new baby girl they named Joan, my grandmother, who arrived on August 22, 1928, my great-grandfather took one for the team each day and walked across the Brooklyn Bridge.  He wanted to save as much money as possible.  Instead of taking a train or a cab into the city, he walked.

It was only one year after the birth of Joseph’s daughter Joan that the tragedy of the Great Depression struck the world.  On October 29, 1929, stock market prices, which had been climbing at an amazing pace for years, peaked and plummeted, sending bankers and speculators into a panic.  “Over a million ordinary people - doctors, shoeshine boys, file clerks, and waitresses - invested their life savings in stocks but lost their livelihoods in the speculation frenzy” (Life During.. 11).  It was amazing that my great grandparents weren’t severely hurt by all of the rough times the Great Depression brought to the people of the United States.  Joseph and Bessy spent the minimal amount of money, worrying that Joseph could lose his job at any time; they wanted to be prepared for the worst.

Sad to report, for many people in the United States, a steady income and money in the bank was a luxury they had to do without.  “Almost twelve million Americans were unemployed in 1932.  Most of them had been out of work for so long that their savings had run out” (Great Depression 13).  With no money in the bank and no job to pay for expenses, many people had to give up their homes and apartments.  Small communities of cardboard shacks popped up all over the country because there was no where else to live.  People had to wait on bread lines that were as long as city blocks.  “At the peak of the Depression, seventeen thousand families were put out on the street each month” (Life During.. 25).  My great-grandparents did have to worry about making the payments for the house they were living in, but they never had to endure the pain of moving out of a home into cardboard boxes.  They didn’t have much to eat, their clothes were a little worn, and their savings were dwindling down quickly when a miracle came along that shocked my great-grandparents; Joseph found a better paying job while the rest of the country had trouble paying for the bare necessities.

In 1937, when people were being hit hard by the effects of the Great Depression, Joseph landed a new job at Republic Pictures.  The new job didn’t pay that much more than the job at Hartz-Mountain, but it was an unbelievable achievement to even find a job for an artist at that time in history.  A big city like New York “could only afford $2.39 a week for a family of four” (New Deal 23).  Not having to rely on aid from the city was a bragging right that my great-grandfather used for the rest of his life.  He was very proud that he was able to do what he loved during such a negative economic time.  Once again, the art he was making at his job was not meant to hang up in a museum, but it was painting, so he was happy.

Joseph’s new job at Republic Pictures had to do with movies.  He had to paint the large posters that advertised the movie and the movie stars.  My great-grandfather had to paint people like John Wayne and Roy Rogers on huge poster boards.  He even had his daughter Joan help with the lettering (she seemed to have inherited his artistic flair).  This job was able to give the Dommerque family a little more money to spend and to save.  Good luck like a new job during the Great Depression was unbelievable and they felt like such luck couldn’t last forever.  Amazingly enough however, Joseph’s good luck in his career continued until the very end of the Depression.

As the Great Depression began to come to an end in 1941, Joseph found himself being offered another great job that related to art.  This time, the artwork that he was helping to create would be remembered for a very, very long time.  My great-grandfather got a job at Famous Studios, where he joined the animation department.  Famous Studios produced such cartoons as “Little Lulu” and “Popeye”.  Joseph worked on the Popeye cartoons, drawing the several different backgrounds used in each cartoon.  This was the job that he worked at for the rest of his life.  Joseph loved the idea that he was creating art work that people all over the country could enjoy (even though it was just the backgrounds).  He had a great new job, a bank account with some money in it, and a lovely family; he was a happy man.

 With this new and better paying job, and money already in the bank, Joseph and Bessy decided to treat themselves to something they had waited a long time for, their honeymoon.  They chose to go to the  “in” place for a honeymoon during the 1940's, which was Niagra Falls.  They planned to go to Canada and have a great weekend where they could relax.  They were able to have a good trip to Canada and a nice stay, but unfortunately, their trip home was a difficult one; they never realized that people could be so prejudiced and mean.

My great-grandparents innocently planned their wonderful weekend getaway during the early years of the Second World War.  Although Joseph had been a citizen of the United States for over thirty years, the United States border officials gave him a hard time when he wanted to return to America because he was German.  Canada was already involved in the fighting in Europe, making the United States a little hesitant about letting a German into United States territory.  My great-grandfather had a heavy German accent, so hiding the fact that he was German was impossible.  It took several hours of arguing and convincing in order for Joseph to be allowed back into the United States.  The attitude that the border officials displayed hurt Joseph and Bessy.  My great-grandfather was never able to look at the United States the same way again.  It’s sad that he began to have such feelings towards America because it was at the time that he had just started to not regret having left Germany.  It was the World Wars that hurt the reputation of Germany and made Germans like myself feel awkward and ashamed of their heritage.  My family’s first experience of stereotyping relating to Nazism was experienced by my great-grandparents and the experiences of stereotyping continues with myself.
It is sad to say that when most people learn that I am German they think of Adolf Hitler and Nazis.  There have been several times in my life when I would answer the question “What nationality are you?” and get saluted or heard “Oh, a Nazi huh?”  As hard as it is to believe that such stereotypes exist in the twenty first century, it is even harder to experience.  When people respond to my heritage in a negative manner, I feel awkward and ashamed; I never know how to react to those horrible comments.

Fortunately, my family members don’t have the same kind of embarrassing feelings towards our background.  They are proud to be German and they don’t seem to care what other people say.  Their attitude is comforting to me because their pride shows me that they were never faced with the hurtful stereotypical remarks that I had to unfortunately experience.  Hopefully they never will have to hear such painful comments about our nationality.  The pride that my family holds and the stories that my family cherishes helps me forget the bad and focus on the good.  Writing the story of my family’s beginning in the United States was an experience that assisted me on the road of self-acceptance.  I was able to look past and forget all of the detrimental opinions that surround my nationality and love my family and their story.  I realized that I am who I am with or without the negativity.  My relatives came to America from Germany and there is nothing that I can do or say to make it any different.  Learning about my great-grandfather gives me a reason to be proud and not to be self-conscious when I answer the question “What nationality are you?”

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Farrell, Jaqueline.  The Great Depression.  California: Lucent Books, 1996.

James, Harold.  A German Identity: 1770-1990.  New York: Routledge, Chapman and Hall Inc., 1989.

McElvaine, Robert S.  The Great Depression: America, 1929-1941.  New York: Times Books, 1984.

Nishi, Dennis.  Life During the Great Depression.  California: Lucent Books, 1998.

Schraff, Anne E.  The Great Depression and the New Deal.  New York: Twentieth Century American History, 1990.

Seckler, Joan.  Personal Interview.  20 Oct. 2000.

Sheehan, James J. ed.  Imperial Germany.  New York: New Viewpoints, 1976.