My Story, Won.2: Is There a Creative Power in Disintegration?

The World War I Effect

My great-Grandmother Weber & Grandfather Frank

A decade later, WWI 1914-1918 had negative effects on both Frederick and his two teen-aged sons. With that war came the ugly shame of being pure-bred German. During that time, in various ways, being a U.S. German was hard. Like the big-leagues shame of having billion-dollar Swindler Bernie Madoff for a father. With the false belief that surely Bernie's adult sons' hands were dirty, too. Madoff's two sons died too young. The Madoff boys could only temporarily survive the association shame.

Critics can be cruel and paranoid. When choosing something as personal as a family doctor, maybe some patients preferred a background different from German Dr. Frederick's. His slight accent was a give-away. For needed money, Anna continued to pick up the slack by earning money as a type of washer woman.

Maybe for affirmation's sake, around age 70, Frank's father put his name "out there," writing a self-published and deeply-thought 1920 astronomy book in reaction to the Nova Aquilae of 1918, titled, "Is There a Creative Power in Disintegration?" Maybe with hopes of birthing an overall reputation do-over. He thrived on educated dreaming and deep thinking. Sadly, the book's conclusions never stuck and neither did his do-over. The doctor/philosopher's premise overly embraced the intuitive factor. He based his writing on an introduction that included no fact-based scientific premise. His ideas were merely assumptions. At times, the disillusioned doctor distracted his mind and philosophized in wine cellars about things like the universe, or possibly Hitler's infamous 1923 Beer Hall Putsch, or about the grandiose preparations for the then-spectacular 1936 Berlin Olympics. His death in 1939 was at the ripe old age of 89.

Frank Marries

But my Grandfather Frank is the intuitive and striving son who will make up for his down-trodden father and his impaired brother. Following a brief mid-1918 Navy enlistment, Frank returns home having gained a bigger perspective. He wants to create a better life. Being a struggling medical doctor and marrying a pure-bred German are both noble, but Frank goes against the grain… he obtains his degree and marries over-doer Dane Hazel, opting for a competitive business career. To earn lots of money that obliterates any shame his family has experienced. Frank believes that his choices can be noble as well. Danish blood will produce strong family and re-establish pride.

The Roaring-20s couple

Frank's campus peanut-dispensing vending machines, purchased during struggling college years, made decent money for him. Anticipating a need, before anyone else realized that need, benefited before and it will benefit him again. His father's philosophizing and World War I experiences had intuitively prepared him for the potential of yet another ugly war. With a $500 loan from his mother, in the 1930s he purchased a spring manufacturing company, to provide for the present, and hopefully for future needs, and maybe even one day help to protect his country.

Frank's children will enjoy the healthy and open outdoor air of the booming Chicago suburbs. And attend schools with greater opportunities to fully develop their skills and talents. Maybe one of them will be an accomplished doctor, and vindicate their Grandfather Frederick's German name. My attention-to-detail Grandmother Hazel, raised on a struggling Wisconsin farm, will create tensions, exhibiting affluence to forward her three silver-spoon children. Over-achieving was Hazel's middle name.

Hazel wanted more for her children, and the Socialite Webers had the money to make it happen. While other Americans struggled to survive through The Depression, boats, horses, vacations, and high-style were all theirs. Her stringent ways (think of the relationship between proper Matriarch Emily Gilmore of "Gilmore Girls", and her against-the-grain Daughter Lorelai) communicated to her husband and her three children unreachable expectations, in no uncertain terms. Bedding was pressed and top sheets were crisply tucked, in proper fashion. Towels were carefully folded and stored to exacting specifications. A live-in maid was hired to achieve pristine perfection in the household.