Grandpa's Life Adventures and Polemic.    by Ludwig Steiner

Grandpa is homeless.

      It had always been my wish to travel and see the world, and here was my opportunity, and my destination was Bremen or Hamburg, and from there to America.

      I was able and willing to work, and should be able to earn a living. That afternoon found me in Furth and there I was asked if I was willing to earn a Mark, a Mark for a boy who did not have a Pfenig in his pocket. I had to distribute hand bills to advertise a Magic Show. My first money earned. Now I can buy bread until something else turned up. In Wurzburg I had soup at the monastery with other Handwerks burschen (traveling workers) and we had to exchange our hat for the loan of a spoon. From Wurzburg to Karlstadt and Lohr, and soon I sat at the boundary of my native land Bavaria. Hungry and tired I sat with my back to the blue and white marker and cried. Two attempts at begging ended in failure, at one house they told me that they have nothing to eat themselves, at the other house they told me that I should be ashamed of myself being young and strong I should be working instead of begging; when I offered my willingness to work they said they had none and I should try some other place.

      While sitting there deploring my misery, a man came along and said "Ken Kunde", I did not know that this was a greeting in the hobo language. He wanted to know the reason for my tears, and when I told him Hunger he said if I care to eat dry bread, he had a whole bag full. No cakes or pastry ever tasted as good as those chunks of stale bread from this fellow tramp.

      He was experienced and made me his companion, and I never was without bread while I stayed with him. We went to Frankfurt, Wiesbaden, and Mainz. In Mainz we had to pay 4 Pfenig to cross the Bridge, and early one morning a boatman sailed us across the Rhein to Rudesheim where we paid a visit to the Germania, and then back to Bingen. In Bingen I got work unloading a Rhein barge with bricks. The pay was 2 Mark per 10 hour day. At noon I could not work any longer, the tips of my fingers were bleeding from handling of the bricks. The others had leathers to protect their hands and I had none. At Bingen the Rhein makes a sharp turn to flow north. The beautiful scenes of the Rhein begin at Rudesheim and by the time the waves reach Bonn the Weinberge with their historic ruins are left behind. At Rudesheim I saw many small patches where they grow grapes, some of them no larger than two city lots, owned by wine dealers. On their labels you can read Rudesheimer Berg, from our own wine gardens in Rudesheim. They may grow 200 gallons on that patch and sell 10.000.

      In Bonn I learned that some hoboes go to the University for examinations by students, and are paid 30 Pfenig for the exam. At the University we had to strip to the waist, and students tapped us with rubber tipped mallets and marked our bodies with crayons of different colors. After the professors examination we could dress, were paid, and went down to the river Rhein to wash off the crayon and be ready for the next day. A nights lodging was 30 Pfenig and was easy to earn.

      In Bonn I lost my companion, maybe he was verschut (arrested). At the University I met a German speaking Hungarian and he became my new companion. In Koln (Cologne) we visited the Cadetral (cathedral ?). Cologne may be 90 percent catholic but it is a poor town for tramps. The speak a dialect that I cannot translate but it means in English 'stay at home as our boys do, then you have something to eat'. They may be good on religion but they are poor on charity. We departed without regret, and marched on to Dusseldorf. In the Herberge zur Heimat (Christian asylum for tramps) it is customary that the hobo surrenders his shirt at night for inspection. If a louse is found in his shirt, his money is returned and out he goes, the lodger in fear that a louse may be in bed, sleeps in the nude and hangs his rags on the bedpost.

      While dressing in the morning, suddenly my world collapsed, my watch and chain had been stolen, no matter how much I raved and lamented, there was no hope of recovery.

      A whale was on exhibition on a Rhein-barge, we did not have any money to see it, but we could smell it blocks away.

      Disgusted by the loss of my watch, we turned our backs to the town and headed to Elberfeld, there we saw the Mono railroad between Elberfeld and Barmen. There was no opportunity in this mining district for work, so on we marched towards Dortmund.

      In Dortmund we found bills posted, stating that a few days before a Geraldine Kruse and her son Wilhelm Kruse had been beheaded for killing their husband and father.

      We are now in a Protestant section of our country, and it seems more prosperous. The farm houses were so different from those we had seen. Everything was under one roof. The family dwelling was on the front of the building, the rear or barn door was so big that they could drive in with a load of hay. On one side was a room for male, on the other for female help. Next to the male help were the stalls for horses, on the women side stalls for cows and calves. The attic was for hay. By the family and help quarter was an open fire, there was no chimney, the smoke rose to beams of the attic floor and there, oh heavenly sight, hung hams, shoulders, bacons and bolognas to be cured by the smoke before it departs thru the large barn door. How our mouths did water at the sight of those delicacies. The loafs of bread were so big, I saw a woman carrying a loaf on a wheelbarrow from the bakery. The flour is coarse, there were whole kernels of rye in the bread. But its lasting quality is appreciated by the hungry tramp.

      The land is flat and uninteresting, and our next stop was at Osnabruck. Sleeping in a Herberge we were aroused during the night. While the owner held a lantern a policeman was checking the legitimacy of our papers. My companion who had a Hungarian passport, handed it to the Policeman. After studying the paper he said to my companion, "How long have you been traveling as an Ox?" About a year and a half was the answer. "Well", said the Policeman, "as far as I am concerned, you can continue to be one". That Hungarian Passport was a bill of lading for the transport of an Ox on the Hungarian Railroad, and the German Policeman could read Hungarian.

      On we went to Diepholz, Bassum, Syke, and Bremen. The first thing we wanted to see was a ship, something we had only seen on pictures. Bremem we were told was not much of a port, but if we wanted to see big ships to go to Bremerhaven, a distance of about 65 Kilometer. On the way to Bremerhaven I not only lost my companion, but at night ran into a terrible rain and thunderstorm. No houses in sight, but lightning showed that a building was a few hundred feet ahead of me, the door was locked but in back as a lean-to shed; in I went and laid down on the dirt floor, and my coat was my blanket, and soon was asleep. Awakening my hand touched something cold and slimy. It was the arm of a drowned man, on a stretcher swollen beyond description, eyes and mouth full of sand and a little eel crawling from his nose. I who had a fear of the dead slept alongside this corpse. Wet to the bones, I went out so fast that I forgot my hat, and went to beg for one rather than go back. It was a new cemetery, with but few graves I did not see in the dark, and the corpse was fished from the river Weser, and I was only about 2 hours travel to Bremerhaven.

      Now that I was in Bremerhaven there was only the North sea and the Atlantic Ocean between me and America, so I thought. At the Heuer Buro (hiring hall) of the North German Lloyd I was told that being a minor, I had to have the written permission of my parents or guardian. A letter went post haste to my parents asking for their consent.

      Before my letter arrived they had one from Uncle George, telling them that I had left him, that I wanted to be on my own and not to be surprised should I arrive one day in the company of the police.

      The parental order was to come home at once, and if I was ragged to come at night. What outlook was there for me at home? No, I was not going home. In Hamburg there are ships of many nations I was told, and there may be a chance to sail on one of them so on to Hamburg with a new traveling companion.


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