Phoenix from the Ashes

9)
1949 - 1951
American tanks still rumbled through our town, ruining the blue stones of centuries old cobble pavements. Boy was I scared.
They were so terribly LOUD and huge. I was hor-ri-fied. I remember being at the opposite side of our house and needed to cross the street to go home. I did not dare to run between two tanks. Frozen with fear as I was the soldiers were sitting on top of the tanks having a blast throwing chocoloate bars and introducing chewing gum to the old world.
"Shawing Goom" is what we read on the Wrigley wrappings and that's what the kids were screaming for. "Shawing Goom, Shawing Goom"
(Owing to my extreme youth, I don't know how I even remember any of this. But I surely do, even now I still see myself looking in horror at these tanks and sticking my fingers into my ears.)
My parents hated this "shawing goom" and forbade us to chew in their presence and actually all together. "One can not imagine that any one with good manners would CHEW and throw that stuff around in their mouths all day long and in front of other people"!
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Now two new states were born. Germany was divided into the German Democratic Republic (DDR) and the BRD, the West.
The East first was fed by Russia, just as the West was supported by the Allies. The Soviet Union could not let the population starve because after all they wanted to take over, thus had to pretend to be friendly.
Sadly however, the Russians dissembled entire productive facilities, complete industries, even the tracks of railroads because Russia had nothing left either.
I can not even start to imagine how chaotic life must have been in the east sector. They were totally isolated - there was no in or out. (Which of course got worse in August of 1963 when the wall was built to halt a mass exodus and keep 'brains' in the eastern part of the country.)

1949 West Germany conducted it's first free and democratic election:

A Catholic Attorney and former Mayor of the City of Cologne,
Konrad Adenauer became the first post war Chancellor, after a while affectionately called:
"Der Alte" (The Old one)
Adenauer shaped the politics of West Germany for more than 14 years
and managed to raise Germany's reputation in the world again.

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German soldiers were still imprisoned in Siberia, Russia in 1958 !!!
and Adenauer was the one who traveled, negotiated, and begged
the Russian Government to finally free them.
He was successful, but not many were able to come home.
Most of our POWs had starved to death.

********

Surely you have heard of the world famous International Frankfurt Fair - a fair for all kinds of goods and the biggest in the world of it's kind. (It could be though, that Shanghai in China might be bigger now)
Father attended the International Frankfurt Fair since the first one in 1948 (Twice a year the Koziol company is present to this day).

This was one of the first if not THE first display ever at Frankfurt Fair,
presenting Ivory and the new "imitations" (1948) Today Koziol is represented at over 40 international fairs every year.

The only thing Germans were longing for now was working and living in peace. They were busy as bees rebuilding their country.

My Father though came up with an ingenious idea. And naturally there is also a story to it.

T'was winter 1950 when a man drove through the forest surrounding his home town and became stuck in a snow drift. Looking back out of the window of his VW Beetle he saw in front of tall firs two deer  that were probably as stunned as he was.
Snow was falling softly and because this man was my Father he immediately saw a "story". It was the birth of the world renown Snow Globe, right there in the middle of a dreamy snow covered forest.

Yup, Bernhard Koziol sr. invented and produced the first Snow Globe ever. An item that I think everybody owned at one point and has fond memories of.
Being a child and wanting an allowance I always had to earn it. I painted figurines or the back "sky" onto the clear globes. I glued scenes together or - later on - had to clean those LOUD, big, greasy injection machines or work benches. This work was carried on after school or on Saturdays and during school vacations.
I earned a dime and then later a quarter per hour and although I didn't like it, I learned some discipline. I had to write an invoice before I got paid and I remember at one point Father handing me a letter saying that he is only paying me if I "promise not to waste the money and spend it on things that are harmful to the body". Yes, I am serious!
Yet today I think he had a good reason to ask for responsibility because I was a bad tomboy, always fervently wishing to be a boy. Yes, I had dolls, but the more welcome gifts were cars big enough for me to sit in and race around. No tree was too high for me, I never ever had "clean" knees. We were not allowed to leave our vast backyard and visiting kids from the neighborhood were almost hand picked. I always was the "leader" but looking back we were not aware then how much our parents had isolated us.
In hindsight - THAT was NOT a good thing for me.

MUCH more to come.

Please don't forget to hug your kids tonight! I missed out on that :(

In the meantime, Please , sign up, become a "fan", follow me? Leave a message? Tweet it, click on +1 ...?? I'd be grateful. Thank you!

And this is what I am doing now, trying to pay my bills :

This is my Store - Offering OLD Ivory and MUCH more

My personal Web Site

And I am selling part of my jewelry HERE

Kindly

Johanna (YooHUNNa)

Moving on to New Pastures

6)

1938

Hugely successful were all kinds of animals;
it's light hearted during difficult times

These are all original photographs from back then

Father's business was outgrowing his workshop. Almost 100 people were crowded into the available space to work the coveted jobs. But the Boss had already planned ahead. Was it a coincidence that ground was broken for a new, larger building on the very same day that his first child, Edith, was born? May 5, 1938

1939

The finished building had more likeness to a Sanatorium than a factory

Creating our own steel moulds

Injection moulding section

Ladies scraping the seams off and hand painting many items

1939 - 1940

By the time the new factory was ready, the old shop was bursting at the seams with a work force of over 150. Yet, the optimistic expansion of the business occurred in step with darker political and military developments of the nation. Despite the attempts of Western Allied Powers to appease Hitler's own designs for expansion, Poland, Denmark, Norway, The Netherlands, Belgium and then France all succumbed to the blitzkrieg as the Reich swept through western Europe.

Honestly, I am cringing here ... I know the entire history but it hurts me to put all this into writing - AGAIN.
Understandably the political changes had huge impacts on Father and his company though.

Inevitably, the rapid expansion of the German frontier beyond its borders prompted greater control of resources within them. Father had just finished a major order for a national social relief organization when the order came.
His business was to cease fabrication of jewelry and vanity items and turn to production of war and survival materials, instead.

1942 - 1943
The company suffered the same fate as so many others did. Parts for tanks, radios, and ignition devices had to be produced from now on. There was no "beauty", no more Ivory.
The male work force count went down to 40 employees; women had to take over the brunt, 20 of "our" soldiers did not come home anymore.

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Please don't forget to hug your kids ... to be continued.
Thank you JS Geare for correcting my sometimes "very personal English" ;)

In the meantime, please leave a message? Click on +1 ...?? I'd be grateful. Thank you!

 

This is my birth town, Michelstadt, dubbed "The Pearl of Odenwald". Enjoy my little Video presentation ;)

And this is what I am doing now, trying to pay my bills:

This is my Store - Offering OLD Ivory and MUCH more

My personal Web Site

And I am selling part of my jewelry HERE

Kindly
Johanna (YooHUNNa)

A Milestone

5)
1935

Proving to be quite prophetic was a small new figure: an ascending Dove carved to be a pin, carrying a fish or perhaps a heart ♥

Koziol had acquired something totally new to the area. An injection molding machine. This was unheard of and called the "Devil's machine" by Father's fellow Ivory carving guild. He had his windows smashed, stones flew, a riot and an uproar ensured. Trying to explain that this had nothing to do with real Ivory carving didn't do much good.

The company "drove two-tired". Ivory was still worked, but at the same time, the new machines were also used. A figure, or part of a bracelet, had to be worked by hand into a steel mould to produce a 10 gram "heavy" dove from plastic granulate. These appeared to be just like the "real" ones that were carved from Ivory. 

Koziol offered both versions and was successful from the start.

Non-Ivory was called "imitation" and mostly hand decorated, hand painted.

1936

The year of the Berlin Olympic Games. Nazi-Germany mocked the entire world, feigned and presented itself as friendly and peaceful.

My Father had found his soul mate (don't know how he managed THAT one... working so hard and courting a girl) but without big ado they announced their wedding on Dec. 19, 1936.

However, we learned 60 years later that our Mother had been in love with another man named Georg.  Unfortunately "Georg" was not Catholic - so, a marriage between him and my Mother was a strict no-no. We never found out who this Georg was - after her passing we found love letters that Mother kept hidden for more than half a century.

Mother had everything and more, my Father adored and worshipped her but to me she always seemed bitter, snippy ... not quite sad, but just not "there".

She was not able to show or give love although she had a very loving childhood home. I do not remember that she ever hugged me in a warm loving, or comforting way - when tears had to be dried, she always said: "Oh come on, don't be such a wuss." Or even better: "Get out of here" and she meant it.

Nor did my Father show any loving gestures ever - I HAD to go to our so-called "Gentlemen's* Meeting Room", say "good night" and give a kiss; a kiss which really wasn’t one - it was just something I HAD to do. No, back then I didn't think anything about the lack of affection; it was just normal. I feared Father down to my bones (being a bad tomboy I surely had done SOMEthing wrong again).

And, believe it or not, I still feared him when I was 40 years old.

*This Gentlemen's Room, or "Library" was a cozy room with a huge tile stove (heated from a fire “hole” in the kitchen), a

big  round table, rugs everywhere, also on the walls, round sofas, big chairs and heavy curtains.

Lots of business and POLITICS were brewed up there. NO access for kids, except when we had to say our formal ‘good night’.

Father was politically VERY active too – I sat on the first German Chancellor’s - “Konrad Adenauer’s” - lap...

See, there was no "dad or "mom" (Mutti) in our house. We had to call our parents "Father" and "Mother". This might explain a little more...???

But now, I am getting WAY ahead of myself - 1936/37 was no offspring in sight.

So, please don't forget to hug your kids ... this will be continued.

In the meantime, please leave a message? Tell me what you think, correct my typos and grammar - Click on +1 ...?? I'd be grateful. Thank you!

And this is what I am doing now, trying to pay my bills:

This is my Store - Offering OLD Ivory and MUCH more

My personal Web Site

And I am selling part of my jewelry HERE

Kindly
Johanna (YooHUNNa)

... it wasn't easy...

Follow me?? Please?

4)
1931/32
Germany now had 6 million unemployed people. The economical adversities gave radical parties more and more influence. National Socialists won one election after another.

Father had 32 employees by now - 32 families plus his own were fed. The company's revenue reached a whopping 132,000 "Reichs Mark" and half of it were international orders.

I put an x over my father ;)

There surely were no toilets in this old barn-factory. So, saga has it that Father asked a worker to clean the "outhouse" which the employee refused: 'I am an Ivory Carver, I am not hired to clean the shit.'
Now, Father ordered him to get a chair. The man did. Then Father told him to sit down beside the out-house hole. The man did. Father grabbed shovel and bucket and started to clean out the hole.
It's said that the onlooking man got up and without a word took shovel and bucket out of the boss' hands and finished the job.
(Ok, I KNOW this story is true!! There are more like this to come.)

 It's all Ivory Jewelry

We all know what hellish times dawned next. Compulsory service was ordered as well as the construction of the Autobahn.

Beautiful Ivory carvings continued to be created at the Koziol Ivory factory, located hidden in the small town of Michelstadt in a serene forest - something like the Black Forest, just much smaller.

There were many more Ivory carving businesses, of course. After all it was the Ivory Capital of Europe.
But Father was such a hard worker, was so committed that he grew by leaps and bounds and while others "went out for a beer" he toiled away. Never took free time or God-forbid a vacation. Times were just not cut out for such.

As the very first of all of the region's Ivory Carvers in 1934 Koziol presented his goods at the Leipzig (East Germany) international fair.
The attendance' result was an immediate duplication of the company's revenue. Koziol achieved business connections that should persist over decades.

1935

Meanwhile the Government dictated what was "cultur" and what NOT. In many exhibits people were shown what was meant by 'degenerated art'...

... and Father took on yet another mile stone that should change and define his (affectionally 'my') company for the next 50 years and beyond.

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As always! Stay tuned, this will be continued - slowly but surely it's getting more personal then - not so much sad politics anymore. Well, yes, a little.
This is my birth town, Michelstadt, dubbed "The Pearl of Odenwald". Enjoy my little Video presentation ;)

I sincerely hope I am getting you hooked - please tweet, +1, send it to FB

AND ... visit my little adventures. All comments are welcome, especially the nice ones ;-)

Please visit me and say 'hi'    or here, at my private website

Don't forget to hug your kids and tell them they are doing GREAT!
I NEVER got one or a pat on my shoulder growing up!

Johanna (YoooHUNna)