WWII through the articles and personal letters of an award-winning journalist.
Dana Adams Schmidt was born in Bay Village, Ohio in 1915 to a German/Austrian father and a mother from a prominent American family with roots to the early settlers. He was a graduate of Pomona College in Claremont California and the Columbia School of Journalism.
This account of his life as a news correspondent throughout pre- and post-World War II is the great achievement of his sister, Elizabeth Schmidt Crahan, undertaken in the last years of her life. Her move from Los Angeles to the Mendocino Coast in 2000 involved the discovery of the letters he had written home, as she explains in the book. As a medical librarian, her skills to read critically and find special significance in written words, plus the fact that she lived through the events of the war and beyond, especially as seen through her brother's eyes, equipped her for this project.
Dana's mother, Margaret Adams Schmidt, plays a key role in this book because he promised to write a letter home each week while abroad resulting in 1200 letters through the war and beyond. His sister, Elizabeth Schmidt Crahan, has brilliantly intertwined the letters with his main articles giving an intimate first person account of World War II.
This book takes the reader through key events in the war, starting in Berlin in 1938 with perhaps Dana's most significant post. His perfect command of the German language gave him an advantage in understanding the issues of the time and place. From Kristallnacht to Nuremberg, you will find a unique perspective from Dana's own words.
