"Mrs. Reinhard, then known as Carmen Weitmann, typed the names of more than 1,000 Jewish people — including her own and those of two friends — to create what became known as 'Schindler’s List.' She called herself a 'schreibkraft,' or typist. 'The only practical thing in my life that I learned was shorthand, but I never learned to type,' Mrs. Reinhard told the New York Times in 2007. 'I typed with two fingers only.'"
From "Mimi Reinhard, secretary who typed ‘Schindler’s List,’ dies at 107" (WaPo).
“It was a gamble as far as we were concerned,” she told Israel’s Ha’aretz newspaper in 2007. “To go with Schindler was no guarantee of anything. We didn’t believe that Schindler would really succeed in saving us. He was just taking us to a different camp. Who knew? We took a chance only because we believed in Schindler.”...
“He was no angel,” Mrs. Reinhard said of Schindler. “We knew that he was an SS man; he was a member of the highest ranks. They went out drinking together at night, but apparently he could not stand to see what they were doing to us. … I saw a man who was risking his life all the time for what he was doing.”
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Being a combat soldier is one thing. Being in some kind of resistance is another. You never know when somebody will rat you out. There is never any relaxation, never any rotation back to battalion rest area for four days out of every...maybe fifteen. No R&R in sight. Nothing you do, no matter how anodyne, is guaranteed not to catch somebody's eye.
Used to know a couple of guys who' been in the Dutch resistance. "dour" was their up side. And that was thirty years later on.
It's hard to believe this got only one comment!
ISTR Keneally's story about tracking down the former Frau Schindler, whose first comment as she let him into her house was, "So, the asshole is dead?"
Schindler makes me wonder how much was idealism, decency, and greed, and how much was the sheer joy of getting away with stuff.
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