Figure 1.--The post card here is captioned, "Wir gehen gratulieren." I thought that might mean, "We go to graduate, but apparently it means, "We go congratulating." Notice some of the children cary flowers. The children are of different ages, but they seem to represent roughly primary age children, perhaps including Kingergarten or even nursery-age children. We at first thought that they attended a small village school. We now think a small orphanage is more likely. |
When we first loaded this image we assumed that it was a group of village school children. After working with it and receiving comments from our Europen readers, we now believe that the imge shows a group of orphans. We still have several questions about this image, but understand many aspects of the image now. We do not, however, understand who the children are going to congratulate. The image is a professionally done commercial post card and not a photograph.
The post card here is captioned, "Wir gehen gratulieren." I thought that might mean, "We go to graduate, but apparently it means, "We go congratulating." Notice some of the children cary flowers. We are not sure just who the children are congratulating and for what reason. We wonder if this is some kind of German custom. If the children are orphans, perhaps they are thanking loval people who help suport the orpanage.
The children are of different ages. They are grouped by age with the younger children in front. They seem to represent roughly primary age children, perhaps including Kingergarten or even nursery-age children. They presumably attend a small village school because there are both boys and girls.
We do not know when it was taken, but would guess the late 30s or early 40s. It may have been taken in 1945, but the scene looks very orderly for 1945. Also we wonder if any one in Germany was doing commercial post cards in 1945. A German reader writes, "I personally don't think that the picture was taken during the war, more probably in the early 1930s. The building style is of the beginning of the 20th century (1900-1925)."
This picture was probably taken in northern Germany, were most of Germany's protestants live. It looks to be a village rather than a large city.
We also did not understand who all the adults are. These can not all be teachers or school care givers for such a small number of teachers. The mix of adults suggests to us that this may be an orphanage.
A Dutch reader tells us, "The two ladies are wearing the typical uniform of "Diakonisse" i.e. women in the Calvinist and Lutheran churches of Switzerland,
Germany and Holland who perform much the same functions as Roman-Catholic nuns. They traditionally care for the poor and the sick. I have yet to hear of one who is employed in teaching though." A German reader tells us, "The sisters of the Protestants (similar to the sisters of the Red Cross) do not have cloister rules like the Catholics (nuns) have. They usually work in hospitals or in (Protestantic) orphanages, also sometimes in Protestantic Kindergartens. Besides working in the home country (mostly Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland), they also go to underdeveloped countries or come from there (e.g., Africa or South America)." A German reader tells us, "What the Dutch reader wrote about Diakonisseis is absolutely correct. Typically, in a protestant community in a village or town there was a Diakonisse working for the church supporting sick and elderly people. It was (and still is) possible to be member of the "Diakonissenverein" of the community to support it financially.
After working with it and receiving comments from our Europen readers, we now believe that the imge shows a group of orphans. A German reader tells us, "I don't think that it was a school because some of the adult women are Protestantic sisters who usually didn't run a school. It may be a hospital group, but I would say an orphange is more likely because the children all look healthy." We thought that the children may have been injured in the Allied air raids, notice the nurses. Perhaps this is an orphanage. The building looks like an orphanage, certainly not a village school. But they all seem very healthy. So perhaps this is just a normal German orphanage. If the photograph was taken dufing the War, then some of the children may have been orphaned by the Allied air rades. A Dutch reader writes, "I agree that this is an orphanage group and not a school. The first lady from the left (apron!) may be from the institutions' housekeeping department of the orphanage. The second lady clearly is a visitor (elegant dress, coat over her arm). The child at her arm is dressed very differently from the other children." This appears to be a relatively small orphanage. We are not sure that the children are all of the orphans, but we suspect that they are.
We do not have much information on German orphanages. It appears that like in other European countries that there were both state and church supported orphanages. The small orphanage here appears to ne supported by the local Protestant churches.
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