"I found out only after my mother's death what her life was like and that she was in concentration camps," said Richard Oppenheimer.  what she called her "banishment to the east."  "She did wake up in the middle of the night many times screaming because she would have nightmares but she would never tell me what those dreams were about." Richard Oppenheimer's mother Erika and grandmother Lina were two of just three survivors from their German town Research led him to the fates of other family members.   RICHARD OPPENHEIMER: I'm going to break down and cry any minute now NEWSY'S SASHA INGBER: Thinking about your mother?  having to hide her pregnancy from her parents having a baby that was four years old that was killed by the Nazis And I'm the only one in my family that knows this.  OPPENHEIMER: It certainly is a big burden This is what bonded a wounded group that could have been strangers: We were waiting for Johannes Groetecke He's researched our family members for years Their lives were forever changed by the Holocaust They all happened to have lived in Bad Wildungen It's the same obscure town where he lives.  Related StoryGermany: Former Nazi Guard, 101, Jailed For Aiding Murder Groetecke first contacted me by email in 2017 He wanted to know more about my grandparents: Toska Klein and Leo Oberman Toska fled the Nazis and Leo was forced into German concentration camps then put him under x-rays for experimentation Toska had died and "Poppy Leo," as I called him Sometimes he'd wear a wig to cover up the skin cancer he'd developed The cancer and ensuing operations must have been a constant reminder of the genocide He died when I was 12 and I got older wishing I could have asked him more questions.   Holocaust Memorial Museum together; first taking group pictures My mother and I found Bad Wildungen on a long list of towns where the Nazis sent Jewish residents to their deaths.  We watched footage of Nazi medical experiments.  And then we stopped in a tall room filled with broken families Groetecke discovered an aunt I never knew — a daughter my grandfather had kept secret Maybe that was why he would cry when he spoke of a young niece named Lollie He said he dressed her up and put makeup and jewelry on her to try to make her look older But Nazis still took Lollie away.   Even historians stumble on family secrets.   GROETECKE: My grandfather worked at a railway station I found out that they lived in a house where Jewish family was and this family was murdered INGBER: Why is doing this work important?  But I think it is our duty to make the future better again And that means working together with the descendants of former Jews who lived in Bad Wildungen in order to create a better future where an official told us applications for German citizenship rose during former President Trump's term.  INGBER: Do you feel less safe in the United States today OPPENHEIMER: Maybe we're going to have to leave someday and I want to be better prepared than my parents were.  The global sailing community is mourning the loss of Wolfgang Heinemann who passed away on Monday 7 February Wolfgang had been an International Measurer with the Tornado Class since 2006 He also served the class with the benefit of his experience by offering advice on how to solve technical challenges and providing sails for Zuccoli One Design and OS3 craft from his Catsailing shed in Bad Wildungen He was an avid Tornado sailor for many years and known as a talkative friend sailor and sportsman who truly loved the class and was incredibly supportive of young sailors breaking into the class He will be sorely missed by the International Tornado Association Committee and entire world of sailing We use Cookies to keep our website safe and secure, to enhance your website experience, to provide social media features and to help us analyse our site. To learn more about the cookies we use and to learn how to manage your cookie preferences, please see the Cookie Policy section of our Privacy Policy Almost 30 years after the death of urologist Dr Klaus Kraft rusting utensils and a mouldy treatment chair remain in the dilapidated surgery The images were taken by urban explorer Sascha Jung we’d like to thank you for joining the debate - we’re glad you’ve chosen to participate and we value your opinions and experiences Please choose your username under which you would like all your comments to show up Please keep your posts respectful and abide by the community guidelines - and if you spot a comment you think doesn’t adhere to the guidelines please use the ‘Report’ link next to it to let us know Please preview your comment below and click ‘post’ when you’re happy with it That's because America has a rather Wild West approach where you only follow the rules if you feel like it and you can hang your shingle out whenever you're ready the procedure of producing a master craftsperson is much more codified While not every master craftsperson's journey there is identical each and every one of them has presented a masterpiece of theirs (like the ones pictured in this entry) to a commission that will pass or fail them they are legally allowed to open up shop; if they get the thumbs-down it's quite literally back to the drawing board would-be designer/builders in Germany must attend a sort of finishing school for craftspersons which can't help but make an American curious: Who attends these schools At Holz-Handwerk we had the pleasure of interviewing Michael Bücking the Holzfachschule ("Technical School for Wood") Bad Wildungen in Hesse has a wry German sense of humor and gamely answered all of our questions A Tischlermeister (Master Carpenter) himself he explained how the system works in Germany He also spoke frankly about the struggles those in his industry face Michael Bücking: I'm the headmaster of the Holzfachschule Bad Wildungen.  We are focusing on our guys becoming master of guilds in cabinet making and furniture making If you want to be qualified as a master craftsman here But you have to attend a course which is anywhere between nine months and 1.5 years You cannot compare it to the Master's Degree which you get from university; in this case you require this qualification to run your own workshop and that entitles you to train and educate trainees or apprentices you're not allowed to open up your joinery workshop All of the crafts here are organized in guilds or chambers And you're supposed to present—you have to pass an exam in theory and also with a bigger practical component And so you're supposed to build some masterpieces We brought one of these with us which is over there which was what initially drew me into HBW's booth.] they've got about four weeks to complete it before that they have to make the design and the construction It's actually very close to what you're supposed to do if you want to get a contract with the customer The first thing is you discuss with the customer what the requirements are You have to sell it to the customer before you get the order And so our commission is doing more or less the same So you have to convince the commission about your idea And after approval and after making all these drawings and presentations The minimum qualification is you have to be a qualified joiner or furniture maker So you have to [have completed] your apprenticeship And in the old days—"old days" which is about eight or ten years ago—you also had to have three years' minimum experience before you were allowed to pass this mastership program nowadays there's no practical experience required I'm a master craftsman myself so if you ask me what is right or wrong Because in the beginning we thought this might be very difficult that the students would be too "green" going into the program if they're coming fresh from school being highly motivated But then if you ask me what would be best [for you to have accomplished before coming to the school] five years of experience because you also have a personal standing if you're a very young master—a "green" master if I may phrase it that way—without experience it's the same wherever you are—the [guys above you] will tell you what's right and what is wrong And sometimes they used to run their own workshops [of different specialties] it's organized in a way that [having a mastership means] you can only do certain jobs Depending on what you hold you might not allowed to make windows or you're not allowed to produce furniture Let's say you run a business where you can buy windows from a supplier and you're capable of mounting them But once you want to build them by yourself or you want to cover the whole range of things we can actually manage to have a fairly good level of performance and standards in Germany which I think is the right way to do it We have a regulation in Germany: Whenever there's a possibility of certain dangers to the client or customer—for example if you're an electrician—you have to have your mastership If you are a joiner/carpenter who's making windows and stairs where people can be hurt no doubt about that—the danger to the customer is not that big So while you can get your mastership for goldsmithing you are not required to have it to run your own shop we've got two or three different kinds of students this is basically the son of the father who has his own workshop And at our school we have a tradition for about 60 years where the first thing we ask new students when they come to our school is [These days] about 60% say because it was recommended by my father And then we do have fairly young professionals So they make the decision when they're perhaps 18 or 19 for people who are willing to join these trades usually by the time they've reached 20 they've decided "I want to become a master," because the reputation is still very If I was asking guys ten years ago "Why are you here," the majority would say "I'm looking for better prospects I want to find a new job" [because those jobs were plentiful back then] he wants me to be qualified to take over certain things in the office and he keeps my position safe while I'm training." They do this more for long-term thinking at the moment we are experiencing a phase in Germany where if you've got certain qualifications We've got so many workshops that are looking for good people for taking measurements on the building site something that's changing is that in the old days one master was able to run six or eight journeymen to keep them busy and to make a lot of preparations You've got customers who require CAD/CAM technology And so we're moving more from the building side to the workshop where you need better-qualified people quite often we have workshop owners who send their people I need more [qualified folks] in my workshop." And so we train them for eight It has increased the demand for qualification on one hand the productivity gains of CNC technology are enormous if you're investing $200,000 in a machine and not investing in the people It's like you're buying somebody a Porsche and you don't train them to become good drivers I think 15 years ago shop owners were very proud of their machinery And so they were showing off what kind of stuff But if you don't have the qualified people to run that one something that has changed is that we do have a kind of qualification crisis in the sense that we no longer have as many people who are willing to go the hard way into craftsmanship They have got this tendency to become white collar workers Kids are used to playing around with iPads and computers but not with a hammer and a jigsaw anymore And this is of course having an effect [where the trades don't seem] that attractive anymore And there's a perception where if you're not studying and trying to become a lawyer it's like you did something wrong in your life we are working very hard to keep up the popularity of these trades And if you get some good people who appreciate what the craftsman and a joiner is doing we are fighting for all the qualified people at the moment first of all I think you have to make the work more attractive how much you try to bond people with your shops Having an appreciation for the people and taking an interest in their development the boss has about 30 people working for him It's a medium-sized craftsmanship workshop doing some interior design and building And within his company he has eight masters So each of the masters is running his own small team any master you hired was a competitor to the boss and today if you need to delegate you have to have the right people with the right capabilities to do jobs more or less by themselves And that's something which is happening because it doesn't make sense to invest enormous money and not have people qualified to run it we're running two courses a year and we produce about 60 masters every year And another part of our school is we have the modelmakers And then we produce about 20 industrial masters and sawmill masters They're in the industry of primary wood processing You can study that field and become an engineer but one level below that is the mastership degree we offer for sawmillers. But the bulk of masters we produce are still joiners and furniture makers And there are other students: Our school offers courses in the safe operation of machinery So each student or apprentice has to have attended these courses We've got about 16 colleagues focusing on lecturing and training About half of them are from a practical background so they are running the different workshops We have got about nine independent workshops it's like a hotel with full board at our place And the rest of the staff is basically catering In the mastership program we deliver about 1,080 training hours within 7.5 months But there's a lot of things happening in the evening hours as well because the program is very intense And we've got a concept of open workshops where our master students have got a key To give you a bit of historical background In the old days—old days of about 20 years ago—they spent much more time in the workshops preparing themselves for the exams But now its moved much more towards computers But overall I would think that from roughly 1,100 hours they spend about 300 hours with the practical background and workshops but I think if you're a designer or an artist and you do not understand the material capabilities and you do not have the basic—not even a high level anymore but the basic—understanding of manual operations I believe it's difficult to run a CNC machine if you cannot run a molder But it's not a video game or a computer game It's actually real workpieces that demand an understanding of construction In the old days our guys were trained very hard in manual drawing These days I haven't seen such a drawing since 20 years in our school they try to develop a design on the computer which is not working So my colleagues which are focusing on design say "I want a piece of paper and I want a pencil And after this design is good and we like that one and after I see your model where I believe it's a good design [So there's a danger to] focus too much on the computer without having understood what is actually behind all of that in terms of construction and proportions and such So we put our guys through one week of hand sketching But I also believe that this is just one component and we cannot focus on just that at the expense of the technology my opinion is that you earn the money in the workshop and you lose it in the office The admissions procedure; the pass/fail rate; Germany's dual system of study & work; the future of craft education in Germany; what design educators from other nations could learn from Germany and what German instructors could learn from them Are you keen to develop some woodworking skills but aren't sure where to start Test it out; it only takes a single click to unsubscribe Tactile is a product and UX design firm founded in 2004 is a boutique industrial design consultancy that .. 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At Holz-Handwerk we had the pleasure of interviewing Michael Bücking the Holzfachschule (\"Technical School for Wood\") Bad Wildungen in Hesse And in the old days—\"old days\" which is about eight or ten years ago—you also had to have three years' minimum experience before you were allowed to pass this mastership program that the students would be too \"green\" going into the program if you're a very young master—a \"green\" master if I may phrase it that way—without experience usually by the time they've reached 20 they've decided \"I want to become a master,\" because the reputation is still very If I was asking guys ten years ago \"Why are you here,\" the majority would say \"I'm looking for better prospects I want to find a new job\" [because those jobs were plentiful back then] and he keeps my position safe while I'm training.\" They do this more for long-term thinking I need more [qualified folks] in my workshop.\" And so we train them for eight So my colleagues which are focusing on design say \"I want a piece of paper and I want a pencil Don't have an account? 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