Heinrich (Harry) Beckmann (1903-1996), his early days were spent at home with his two brothers, Carsten and Willie, working around the farm. some of his early recollections were gold coins piled on the kitchen table, used when his father bought and sold farm animals. When a teenager his father gave him an old trumpet, (we still have the trumpet, 100 years later), which he played in the town band. Later on he also learned to play the Cello. When he was 17 or 18 his brother Georg gave him 500 Marks to go to Hamburg to study music.
While in Hamburg, his brother Henry, and his uncle Charles the Hotel owner, from America, visited him. His uncle bought him an English made Cello which cost 500 American dollars (a princely sum in those days). You could buy a house in America with that much money. Anyway, Harry asked his uncle and brother if he could go to America with that much money, they said yes. They sailed on the liner George Washington, brothers Henry and Harry in 3rd class and uncle Charles in 1st class accomodations.
Harry arrived in Brooklyn, America in 1923. He stayed with his brother Henry on 3rd avenue in Brooklyn. At that time the 3rd avenue elevated train, passed right past Henry's and Dorothy's house, just about 30 feet away from where Harry slept. Every 15 minutes a train would pass by, a noisy new experience for a 20 year old from Germany. New York City sounds.
Harry obtained work as a musician, playing for the silent movies, when the action in the film was slow he would play his Cello, when it moved fast he played the trumpet. He learned English by reading the sub titles at the bottom of the movie screen. When the silent movies went to talkies, Harry moved to the butcher trade with his older brother Barthold.
After working a few years at the butcher trade, he delivered some meat orders to a Delicatessen and met another young German immigrant girl, from Schleswig Holstein named Mary Friedrichsen. They both were interested in music, she had a soprano voice and played piano. They also had mutual friends who enjoyed music. On May 1, 1928 they were married in Brooklyn City Hall.
They lived for a while in Briarwood, Queens, my brother was born there in 1930. Between 1930 and 1935 when I was born, my father had health problems, which almost cost him his life. Through the financial help of the Hillerman family, my fathers health was restored, and I was born on May 7, 1935.
My mother was an intelligent woman, who had a good head for business, my father complemented her in his drive and hard work ethic. Between the both of them they managed to buy a house at 216-72nd street, Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. This house, 3 stories high, they filled with German immigrant renters. My mother's sister, Anna Friedrichsen, also immigrated from Germany around 1927, she worked with my mother and father in financing our home. This business arrangement worked well enough, so my father could buy a new 1936 Chevy sedan. My father continued owning and running a butcher shop in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn.
About 1940, The Hillerman family (Gesina Beckmann) owned a small restaurant in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn. The tenants, distant relatives wanted to give the business up. The shop was right next to a shipyard where workers came from all over NYC to repair ships. At that time many were damaged by German U-boats.
My mother seized upon this opportunity and set up a restaurant, making coffee, soups and sandwiches, for the shipyard workers. After a very successful year in business, the war was just starting, my parents thought it would be wise to get their families out of NYC. So they bought a 35 acre farm in Pleasant Valley, New York about 100 miles north of NYC in Dutchess county. It worked out well, eggs, chickens, vegetables from the farm were used in the restaurant. Our family prospered well enough so that my parents bought another farm in Dutchess county with 30 milk cows. Some other German immigrant families, who owned Deli's sold them, and bought farms, so that thay would not have to go into the service to kill cousins and brothers. If you were a farmer in the USA, you would be exempt from military service during WWII. One must consider farm produce helped the war effort too.
At the same time the war was coming to a close in Europe and Japan. Our relatives in and around Kiel and Hamburg had been through Hell! My father, mother and aunt made up many food packages, clothing packages for families all around Northern Germany. One thing we used to do was hide cigarettes in vegetable cans, which could be used for barter. All the packages were sealed and using cloth material from bleached chicken feed bags sewn up so the packages couldn't be opened easily. My parents did a big part to help their former home land.
Brother Harry joined the Army in 1947, he was posted to an elite Army unit in Washington DC at Arlington National Cemetery. He played taps on a trumpet at the funerals for the returning war dead, he guarded the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier. He was on a National Radio Program, We The People Speak, (the days before TV). He took part in the funeral of General Pershing, WWI Allied Commander and the retirement of General Eisenhower from the US Army. Son Harry married Pat Hoyt, had 2 children, a boy and a girl, then moved to the western state of Washington and pursued the life of a salesman.
My parents moved out of NYC in 1951, they started another business in Poughkeepsie, but it wasn't very successful. They traveled to Germany, Florida and Western US and lived a relatively comfortable life in Dutches county.
Son George entered the US Navy in 1957, did some flying in training aircraft. Finally ended up on a WWII destroyer, the USS Hale (DD-642), which sailed around the world involving itself with cold war conflicts in Lebanon and Formosa. Cousin Bill Beckmann, son of Willie, my fathers brother, served in the US Marines during these same actions.
George married a German girl Edda Weyer from the Pfalz and had 3 sons. George pursued a career in IBM and worked there 28 years.
Father Harry continued working in the butcher trade for a large supermarket. He remained an active musician and was one of the founding members of the Dutchess County Philharmonic. In the 1970's Harry played his cello with the Dutchess County Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall NYC. This was the high water mark of his musical career. He was often sought out until his eightieth year to play his cello at various occasions. He also owned some real estate which he had accumulated with my mother which supplemented their income.
Mother Mary bought a small farm in Suderschmeideby (near Flensburg) in the 1960's. She wanted to provide a place to live in Germany, for her brother Peter and sister Anna. It didn't work out, and the farm was quickly sold to a Berlin architech.
Mother Mary died in 1975, at Stuart, Florida, from heart failure in a hospital near brother Carsten's home. Shortly thereafter, Tante Anna Friedrichsen, Mary's sister entered a senior home, Victory Lake in Hyde Park, Anna died there in 1987 at 95 years of age.
About 1981 George divorced from Edda Weyer, she went on to pursue a career of Nursing and Social Work in the Poughkeepsie area. She now lives in Pleasant Valley, NY near her sons.
Divorce, in the 1980's America, affected 50% of all marriages, it swept the entire country.
George met and married Bonita Nenno, who originally grew up in Western New York State, she was a nurse, graduated from 'Sisters of Charity' nursing school inBuffalo. Bonnie is of mostly of Irish Catholic and a little bit of Alsace Lorraine heritage. She was employed as a mental health nurse for the state of New York. She had a sister Maureen who was married to an Air Force officer (a lawyer) and lived in Washington DC. sadly her sister passed away at age 44 in 1986 of cancer, leaving two teenaged children behind.
George and Bonnie started their life together in Rhinebeck, NY, where they lived for over 20 years. After retirement, they moved to "The Villages", Lady Lake, Florida.
Harry lived on after Mary's death, in 1981 he met a companion, Gerda Spengler, a widow, born in Nordhausen, Germany, they shared their lives together for 14 years, enjoying the Poughkeepsie Germania Club and spending winters at Warm Mineral Springs in North Port, Florida. Gerda passed away Christmas time 1994. Harry died May 26, 1996 at the age of 93 at his son george's home in Rhinebeck, NY.
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