Fearing your neighbor
Lotte Bieniek, 95, reflects on her childhood in Germany during WWII, her immigration to America and life now.
By Anna Pearson and Sarah Bakeman
Lotte Bieniek was thrown from her bed in the dead of the night from the strength of another fire bomb landing near her village in Arberg, Germany. Everything was dark as the planes flew overhead, and the sky lit up as they formed Christmas trees of warning to alert civilians to where their next target was. Maybe 10 minutes later, the ground shook again as the unknown planes dropped additional explosives to the ground. When another plane came, it was impossible to tell if it was American, German, English or Russian, what direction it was going or what direction it was coming from.
“When you grow up in a place like that — unbelievable. As kids, we were so scared,” Bieniek said.
Now 95, Bieniek resides in an independent-living apartment building for the elderly in Shoreview. Minnesota has remained her home since 1952, seven years after World War II ended. She came with her Polish husband and 3-year-old daughter seeking a new start, though her German family never followed her to the States.
“When you grow up in a place like that — unbelievable. As kids, we were so scared.” — Lotte Bieniek
Upon their arrival, the Bieniek family’s plan to move to Little Rock, Arkansas fell through, and they spent months with unstable living conditions. A large storm had ruined the farm machinery business they were headed to work at, and they were sent to Minnesota instead, often finding shelter at the Frederic Hotel in St. Paul. Eventually, with the help of a woman who spoke German, Bieniek improved her English and found work in a kitchen while her husband was employed as a mechanic at a car dealership.
Along with the income from their jobs, the people who provided food and shelter for them in St. Paul allowed for Bieniek and her husband to slowly build a life for themselves. After two years of saving money, the couple was able to rent an apartment, and eventually had three more children. Although their families were in Europe, they felt that they could go back anytime — they just didn’t want to. Bieniek has stayed in Minnesota even after the death of her husband, but has been back to visit Germany many times, including to show her children her home village.
“I must say, I don’t think there is any other country in this world who is like the United States,” Bieniek said. “Some crazy people make it worse, but it’s the best place there is.”
Nearly 80 years after WWII’s conclusion, Bieniek still holds vivid memories of wartime.
“It’s really interesting to hear her talk about [the war],” Bieniek’s fellow apartment resident Sally Pierson said. “She doesn’t like to talk about it very much. It was hard for her.”
When she speaks of the war, she tells it like this: soldiers would come knocking on the locked front door of her family home often, searching for hidden soldiers or ammunition. While Bieniek only had five siblings, her six cousins had been sheltering in her house ever since her aunt’s house in Aschaffenburg, Germany, had been bombed. Much like the planes flying overhead, it was always uncertain who the soldiers would be, or where they were from. Some of these soldiers were dangerous, others were friendly. One time, soldiers realized 12 children lived in Bieniek’s house and hastily left. The event scared the family initially, but the soldiers later returned with deer meat and potatoes for the family.
“That was something so unbelievable,” Bieniek said. “We were so scared because we didn’t know [why they left].”
Bieniek says her family was lucky to get through WWII without facing hunger. Her father often went out to his butcher shop in the middle of the night to silently process lambs for local farmers. The farmers’ animals were earmarked for the German government, making it dangerous work to do for the locals. But Bieniek’s father would be compensated with some of the meat.
“You couldn’t tell anybody else. We had to lock our door when we ate dinner,” Bieniek said. “You couldn’t trust your neighbor.”
She remembers collecting blueberries and mushrooms in her yard. Her brothers didn’t like the work, but when the girls would finish for the day, they’d have 100-pound bags of mushrooms. Usually, these would get sold and loaded onto a truck weekly. But Bieniek’s devout Catholic mother sometimes saved a portion of the food for a Jewish family in their town. They owned a business, so Bieniek’s mother could trade for items in the shop. That deal ended at the same time the business closed and the family disappeared.
“You couldn’t tell anybody else. We had to lock our door when we ate dinner. You couldn’t trust your neighbor.” — Lotte Bieniek
Bieniek befriended a Jewish girl whose parents also disappeared. She had been adopted by a German family once her heritage became a threat, though she never learned the ultimate fate of her birth parents. Bieniek and the girl would pass days playing hide and seek in fruit gardens, occasionally throwing the produce at each other.
“I did not know she was Jewish, but that wouldn’t have made any difference anyways,” Bieniek said. “As kids, you don’t know.”
Family was an essential part of Bieniek’s life in Germany, and continued to be in America. She now gathers every Sunday with her daughter, her son-in-law and her three adult grandsons in her apartment to cook dinner for them.
Pictures of her children and their families adorn several tables in her living room, carefully displayed upon white doilies and glass tabletops, along with get well soon cards from her recent bout at the hospital. A small, folded pile of blankets with a stuffed dinosaur on top is beside her recliner, for her grandson’s dog Louie, who usually sits on the couch and watches the family eat around the table, hungrily awaiting their scraps. Some weeks her grandson helps her cook, occasionally baking his signature cheesecake for dessert, though she says he always leaves a mess. Other weeks Bieniek welcomes friends from the apartment building or her grandsons’ girlfriends.
But now, she keeps the front door unlocked, unafraid to welcome in anyone anytime.
