Champ was KO’d in Crete
QUESTION Did German heavyweight boxer Max Schmeling take part in the parachute landings on Crete in World War II? Maxi-Millian adolph Otto Siegfried ‘Max’ Schmeling (1905-2005) was heavyweight champion of the world from 1930 to 1932. Self-taught, he developed sound skills, an iron physique and a powerful punch with either hand. He was also blessed with a shrewd tactical brain.
On June 19, 1936, he scored one of the great boxing upsets of all time, knocking out ‘Brown Bomber’ Joe louis in the 12th round. The victory was a propaganda coup for the nazis, although Schmeling didn’t support Hitler’s racial policies.
in 1935, he had defied Joseph Goebbels’s order to replace Joe Jacobs, his Jewishamerican trainer. He also refused to divorce his Czechoslovakian film star wife, anny Ondra. On november 9, 1938, he sheltered two teenage sons of a Jewish friend in his Berlin hotel room during the Kristallnacht pogrom in Germany.
When Schmeling met louis in a rematch at Yankee Stadium on June 22, 1938, in a bout of unremitting savagery, the Bomber knocked Schmeling out after just two minutes of the first round.
The drafting of Schmeling into the German army was part punishment for his loss and support of Jews, and part propaganda.
initially assigned to an anti-aircraft unit in East Prussia, he did his basic training, earned promotion to corporal, then undertook airborne training. after assignment to a combat unit, in early 1941 he was sent to Greece. Photos of Schmeling in paratroop uniform appeared around the world.
On the evening of May 19, the 120 men of Friedrich august Freiherr von der Heydte’s parachute regiment battalion were preparing for the assault on Crete.
Schmeling went to see von der Heydte, as he was suffering from dysentery.
‘He was in a quandary,’ remembered von der Heydte. ‘if he reported sick, it might be assumed he was trying to shirk, and this he did not wish to do under any circumstances. So i advised him . . . to tie his waterproof jumping suit especially tightly from behind and to fly and jump with the rest of us.’
On May 20, 1941, his unit jumped into Crete in the face of heavy British fire.
Schmeling landed in a vineyard, but hit the ground hard, aggravating a vertebra fractured while fighting Joe louis. Weak from illness, he got cut off from his unit and found his way back only the following night. German PoWs captured in Crete told their British captors he’d been wounded and, soon, reuters and United Press reported that he had ‘fallen in the fighting in Crete’.
in fact, he was being treated in a German field hospital. it wasn’t until May 30 that the Germans learned he was alive.
Goebbels then used the incident as part of a propaganda campaign. Schmeling was awarded the iron Cross, and the incident was used to deride the accuracy of enemy press reports. The boxer was invalided out of the army in 1943.
after the war, Schmeling became a successful businessman and wellrespected member of Hamburg society.
He remained friends with Joe louis, whom he helped financially, even paying for part of his funeral.
Jacob Arthurs, Kidderminster, Worcs.
QUESTION Wasn’t there an earlier TV series based on the 1973 film Westworld? iT’S often forgotten there was a sequel to Westworld called Futureworld (1976) — probably because it wasn’t very good.
Several years after the disaster at the delos resort, which was peopled by androids, it reopens. The Westworld of cowboys was replaced with several theme parks: Spaworld (‘where old age and pain have been eliminated’), Medievalworld, ancient romanworld and Futureworld, the latter of which simulates a space station.
However, reporters Chuck Browning (Peter Fonda) and Tracy Ballard (Blythe danner) suspect skulduggery . . .
Beyond Westworld (1980), took elements from Westworld and Futureworld and turned them into a TV series. it featured Jim McMullan as security chief John Moore of the delos Corporation, who discovers a plot by the evil scientist Quaid (James Wainwright) to send the failed theme park’s androids to infiltrate society and take over the world. in Episode 1: Westworld destroyed, an android infiltrates the crew of a U.S. nuclear submarine. despite several positive reviews, only five episodes were produced and only three aired before cancellation. a dVd of the complete series was released by Warner in 2014. Jason Keys, Wilmslow, Cheshire.
QUESTION Living in the town of Eccles made me think: what other towns are known for a single item? THE Eccles cake is, of course, a simple, flaky pastry treat packed with currants topped with sugar. it has a high butter content and a flattened bun shape with three vents in the top.
despite being so distinctive, it doesn’t have protected geographical indication (PGi) under European Union law, though its heritage remains rooted in Eccles, Greater Manchester.
Other places that have given their names to famous foodstuffs are Cheddar, to the cheese; arbroath, to the arbroath Smokie or smoked haddock; Bakewell, to the tart; Melton Mowbray, to the Melton Mowbray pork pie (which does have PGi status) and Kendal, to the Mint Cake.
Stilton is an interesting one — it was reputed to have originated in the village of Stilton, in Cambridgeshire (historically Huntingdonshire). Today, cheese made there may not be legally called Stilton, and only blue cheese made in the three counties of derbyshire, leicestershire and nottinghamshire can be called Stilton.
away from food, Sandhurst in Berkshire is renowned for the royal Military academy, and Coldstream in the Scottish Borders for the famous Guards regiment.
Strontian, a village in lochaber, northern Highlands is known as the place where, in 1790, dr adair Crawford discovered in lead mine ores a new mineral, which was named ‘strontites’.
When the element was eventually isolated by Sir Humphry davy in 1808, he renamed it strontium.
J. B. Holme, Hexham, Northumberland. ECCLES isn’t famous just for its cakes as any Goon Show fan knows. What about Bluebottle’s friend, ‘The Famous Eccles’?
David Ralph, Zeals, Wilts.
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