A trip to Garmisch and other things

I learned from the papers Becky gave me that Stewart had done something he didn't mention in his final letter home. He had made a trip to Garmisch-Partenkirchen on a two-day pass, Nov. 2nd and 3rd, 1946. The army evidently operated facilities there for servicemen to stay. Stewart seems to have stayed in the Alpenhof. It was a large hotel right in the center of town, across from the Red Cross Club on one side and the PX on the other. Among the papers are a couple of little guide books describing the facilities available. Every conceivable sports facility was there; in winter: skiing, ice skating, bobsled, tobogganing, sleighing. Probably also an indoor swimming pool. There were also sights to see: the Ettal Monastery, and the Schloss Linderhof, the castle of Bavaria's mad king Ludwig. Also, the village of Oberammergau was nearby - home of the famous Passion Play. You could also take a train to the Zugspitze, Germany's highest peak. So, there was lots to do; too bad we don't know what Stewart actually did. But this photo may give a clue:

This photo is unlabeled, but I'm guessing it was taken during the trip to Garmisch and Stewart is up at the Zugspitze. Just a guess.*************************************************** Garmisch-Partenkirchen, by the way, was the site of the 1936 Winter Olympics. It is two towns, originally separate but now joined. ******************************************************** I also learned from the papers left that on December 29th, Stewart was in Fort Sheridan, Illinois. So he probably was not home for Christmas. However, he was given a 2-week furlough on the 29th, so he may have been home for New Year's Eve. He was formally discharged Feb. 20, 1947. There is also a receipt for $97.66 paid to Grinnell College for the 2nd semester on March 24, 1947. So those dates tell the story of his return to civilian life. One other piece of paper (in the pile from Becky) is very interesting: the first and second page of The Stars and Stripes, the "unofficial newspaper of U.S. Armed Forces in the European Theater," dated "November 27, 1946." So this is from just the time Stewart was writing his letter to mother. The big headline is the trial of John L. Lewis, president of the United Mine Workers. Lewis was charged with contempt of court for refusing to obey a court injunction requiring him to return the striking coal miners to work. The miners strike was affecting the economy in a big way. Much of the rest of the front page is about the crash of a C53 into a glacier in the Austrian Alps, a crash every passenger seems to have survived, and there are several articles of human interest. Why did Stewart save this? Well, down in the corner is the picture of a soldier who had won a contest for a drawing of "Lena the Hyena" for the European Theater. And when you turned the paper over to page 2, you saw this:

The STARS AND STRIPES version of Lena the Hyena ************************** I think this is why Stewart saved the paper. This was sort of a big deal at the time, among young white males anyway. Al Capp, cartoonist for the L'il Abner comic strip, had introduced Lena the Hyena of Lower Slobbovia into the strip as a character. She was supposedly the "ugliest woman in the world" - so ugly, that in the strip, anyone who looked at her would immediately go insane. Capp actually refused to show her drawing in the comic strip for fear that by looking at it, some poor reader would go mad or even die! OK, we're dealing with a kind of misogyny here, presumably all in fun. After several weeks of baiting his audience, Capp announced a contest - who could draw the ugliest picture of Lena? According to legend, 500,000 entries were submitted. A committee of judges composed of Frank Sinatra, Boris Karloff and Salvador Dali (!) were to choose the winner - announced in the strip. Dali and Sinatra pay the ultimate price for their services - they are struck dead - and only Karloff manages to show the picture to the crowd outside the window before going insane. The picture the readers of the strip saw was not the one above, but this one, drawn by Basil Wolverton, who went on to Mad Magazine fame.

Basil Wolverton's drawing of "Lena"**************************** So why two drawings of Lena? I'm not sure, but it may be that since Stars and Stripes did not carry L'il Abner, they did not have permission to publish the stateside drawing, so they held their own contest. Amazingly, all this is detailed on the internet, including all the L'il Abner strips leading up to the announcement of the contest winner. Just Google "Lena the Hyena," "Basil Wolverton," etc. - it's all there.