Franka’s mother’s determination pushed her past the timelines that the doctors laid out for her. For Sarah, “six months to live” meant “I’ll see you next year to make you eat your words.” She wanted to spend her time outside, in the wondrous natural playground that seemed to stretch without boundary all around them. Franka’s father, Thomas, bought the cabin in the mountains from his uncle Hermann, who had used it as a hunting lodge on his expeditions to shoot red deer and boar. Franka and her mother took to refurbishing the cabin while Thomas worked on making it habitable in time for the warmer months. They spent most of that summer of 1933 up there, luxuriating in their time together. Franka grew to adore the sight of her family sitting outside the cabin as she returned with her friends from a hike in the mountains. On those warm summer nights when the sun set behind the cabin, bathing the sky and trees in orange and red, when the smell of food on the stove mixed with the smoke from her father’s pipe, it seemed like they’d found their own little piece of heaven. At the end of that glorious summer, when Sarah declared that she was going to see the same again the next year, Fredi wrapped loving arms around her. Franka and her father remained silent. Only Fredi seemed to believe it was possible, but time would prove him right.
School changed. The Nazis were determined to be the party of youth. Commanding and controlling the allegiances of Germany’s youth was a fundamental goal. The influence of the National Socialist revolution was evident when Franka returned to Freiburg after that summer. The Nazi flag was hoisted in every classroom, and suddenly portraits of Adolf Hitler, the demigod at the head of the nation, appeared in place of crucifixes on the walls. The visage of a man she wouldn’t have recognized a year before was now in every classroom. Books from the school library that were deemed subversive were taken out, piled high, and burned in the yard. Franka asked the librarian what they had taken and was told that the local party members had removed any books, fact or fiction, that expressed a liberal idea, or suggested that the people themselves, rather than the führer, should control their own destinies. New books on how the National Socialists had rescued Germany from the abyss of the Weimar Republic soon filled the gaps on the shelves. These new books were written in childish, simple language, but none of the teachers complained. They all became members of the National Socialist Teachers League. Eager to retain their jobs, and under pressure from the local government, they began championing the new ideas of the Nazis. Franka’s favorite teacher, Herr Stiegel, was one of the few to protest the new ways, insisting that his lessons remain the same as they had been before the new government came to power. He lasted two weeks, and when Franka and some of the other students went to visit him at his old house outside town, they found it empty. They never saw him again. Nina Hess boasted afterward that she had informed on him to one of the local Nazi leaders. She was rewarded with a red sash signifying her loyalty to the National Socialist regime, which she wore every day for the rest of the school year.
No one wanted to be left behind, and Franka found herself swept up in the tidal wave of enthusiasm for the new dawn of the Aryan people. The Nazis had started using that term, “Aryan,” to describe the characteristics of ideal Germans. Franka was undoubtedly one of the superrace they described. There was something gratifying in being told by the government that your blond hair and blue eyes were perfect, that they made you the ideal German. She didn’t know any other races, but the National Socialists insisted that she and her friends were blood born into a master race, and that they were superior to all others. It felt good. She felt part of something important.
The decision to join the League of German Girls came easily. All her friends already had. She was almost seventeen then, and a bit old to be a member, but the promise of possibly being a group leader spurred her on. She didn’t want to be left out, and besides, this was not a time to stand on the sidelines. This was a time for bold action. So she joined, despite the protestations of her parents, who seemed wary of the Nazi Party at almost every level. Franka Gerber was the model of the magnificent youngster that Hitler prophesized would help Germany dominate the world, and she wasn’t going to let any old-fashioned notions stand in her way. She was going to do her bit for the cause of the German people.
Franka cherished her uniform of a white blouse with a loose black tie, pinned tight with the emblem of a swastika, over a navy skirt. The girls of the league marched in much the same way as the boys in the Hitler Youth who eyed them. They performed drills and did calisthenics and went on long hikes, often camping out under the stars, where they sang songs glorifying the führer and longing for the day when they might provide strong sons for a future war effort. A sisterhood developed between the girls. Their common goals and focused efforts brought them together. It felt wonderful to be accepted, to be valued, to be superior.
Daniel was a troop leader in the Hitler Youth and led the drills as they jogged through town in swastika-emblazoned singlets, singing “the old must perish, the weak must decay.” Truly they were the finest of German youth, slim and lithe, as fast as greyhounds, and as hard as Krupp steel, just as Hitler himself had demanded. And Daniel was the finest of them all and directed the younger members with a strict but fair countenance. With flushed cheeks, all the girls talked about him and whispered behind their hands as he strode past. He and Franka came together like magnets—all that was strong and beautiful about the new Germany encapsulated between them. His father, who had been unemployed before the National Socialist revolution, was now a leading member of the local council. Franka never saw him without his Nazi pin on his chest, or the Nazi armband adorning his bicep. His son was the realization of his dreams, the promise of a new and better life for the Aryan race.
Daniel was stern with his recruits but reserved a tenderness that he seemed to show only her. He was ambitious and forward-looking, serious and determined. He was the perfect boyfriend for the exciting times she was living through. She found herself drawn in deeper and deeper. It was the end of school, just before graduation, when she took him home to meet her parents for the first time. Daniel was respectful and polite. He wore his Hitler Youth leader’s uniform to dinner and gave the Nazi salute as Franka’s father opened the door to him. Franka’s mother stepped forward, doing her best to smile as he greeted her. They made their way to the table, and Franka sat down next to him. Fredi sat in his usual spot at the end of the table. Daniel greeted him with a nod. He wasn’t shy toward her parents, however, and spoke of his plans to join the newly formed Gestapo, the elite police force, and about the need to protect the revolution from spies and malingerers. That was the first time Franka ever heard the phrase “enemies of the state.” Her parents retained their polite demeanor, but she saw them glancing toward one another during the meal through slit eyes, could feel their judgment. She knew what was coming after he left.
Franka’s father carried Fredi up to bed. Her mother waited until he got back downstairs before she sat Franka down. She put a pale hand on Franka’s leg. She looked tired all the time now, her beauty dulled by the unseen enemy within her. Her bloodshot eyes were earnest but calm.
“How serious is it with Daniel? I know you’ve been seeing each other awhile.”
“I love him, Mother. You were only a little older than I am now when you met Father.”
Thomas sat down, rubbing his eyes. “I was twenty-two, your mother nineteen. You’re just seventeen and still in school. We’re wondering if Daniel is a distraction to your studies. You’re so involved with this League of German Girls now. It seems that you’re spending all your free time with them.”
“I love my troop. I’m part of something. You don’t know anything about what’s going on in this country. You’re stuck in the old world of the kaiser and the Weimar idiots who ran Germany into the ground.”
“The old world?” Sarah said. “Who taught you these things?”
Franka fought back the sympathetic emotions telling her to comfort her mother. That wouldn’t have been the patriotic thing to do. This was an opportunity to convince her parents that every German had a duty to help with the National Socialist revolution.
“We’re worried about you,” her mother said.
“Worried about what? I have the comradeship of the other girls in the league. Even my teachers all express the glory of the new movement. Everyone seems to but you.”
“So tell me about your glorious revolution,” Thomas said, his voice low.