Interview with George L. Mosse, 1975 March 26

Partial Transcript: Birthplace, date, occupations of upper middle class parents, newspaper ownership.

Partial Transcript: Family origin in Germany circa 1300, relationships between father's and mother's families, Lachmann family and the Franco-Prussian War, ancestors'-occupations, rise of the House of Mosse, Mosses and the Polish Revolt, origins of the Rudolf Mosse Verlag, Mosses and the Second Reich.

Partial Transcript: Degree of assimilation in various family members, social acceptance in upper-class German society.

Partial Transcript: Salemschule, anti-semitism in and out of school, Jewish identity at school.

Partial Transcript: Discussion of general lack of observance in the home, father's Reform Jewish activities, including interfaith service performed by Berlin Philharmonic, involvement with “German National Jews,” militant anti-Zionism.

Partial Transcript: Short discussion of German values, a tour of Mossehaus, parents' expectations of GLM, father's relative non-involvement with the business, father's cultural connections in the musical and architectural worlds, the Mosse children and music, GLM and the cello.

Partial Transcript: Names, locations, and occupations of siblings. GLM's father and the Great War.

Partial Transcript: Description of immediate flight, Goering's offer of Aryanization to the family, swastikas in villages surrounding Salemschule on the Lake of Constance, escape during the final minutes of free emigration, insulation from approaching terror.

Partial Transcript: Paris, “the city of my dreams,” family business interests in Paris and Zurich, boarding school stint near Zurich. Bootham School in England and parents' divorce in France.

Partial Transcript: Description of the Quaker boarding school in Yorkshire, mastery of English language, relationships with Englishmen at school, relationships with German Jewish refugees, French Jews, nasty remarks about Frenchmen, kind remarks about Englishmen and English Jews, life as an emigre in England, liberal dropping of names.

Partial Transcript: Description of the general state of ignorance regarding the status of Jews in Nazi Germany, anti-fascist activities, solidarity (or lack of same) with European Jewry, consciousness of the Spanish Civil War.

Partial Transcript: Pacifism and the Spanish Civil War, debate at the Cambridge Union in 1938, Chamberlain and Churchill, the “Peace Pledge,” the “voice of British youth” for the Spanish loyalists, the overshadowing of the Jewish problem by anti-fascism.

Partial Transcript: Information on the Socialist Club at Cambridge, interruption of courses at Cambridge due to outbreak of World War II, visit to sister in Schenectady, N.Y. at war's outbreak

Partial Transcript: America during the dog days, arrival on the Statendam, ease of immigration for the rich, circumstances of admission to Haverford College through the offices of the Philadelphia Quakers, “A Bootham Boy in distress.”

Partial Transcript: Relatives in Argentina, immigration of parents in 1944.

Partial Transcript: Contact with leading scholars as an English major, lack of modern historical scholarship at American undergraduate institutions in the 1940's.

Partial Transcript: Jews and the ethnic numerus clausus, the advantages of an illustrious German family at Harvard Graduate School, experiences with Princeton and Columbia

Partial Transcript: Limitation of contacts, contacts through U.S. Army.

Partial Transcript: Teaching of historical courses for the occupation of France and Czechoslovakia, the Draft and U.S. citizenship, problems arising from Prussian state passport in the U.S. Army, rank attained.

Partial Transcript: Discussion of holocaust rumors, Zionism vs. Support of Britain debate during the war among university people, reading Mein Kampf, and the holocaust.

Partial Transcript: Dates of Harvard residency, major, prelims, job application.

Partial Transcript: Impressions on arrival in Iowa City, the disappearing job, firing and re-hiring at the University of Iowa, one-year job at the University of Michigan.

Partial Transcript: First trip to Israel in 1951 (from research at Vatican Museum), lack of interest in modern Jewish studies at Univ. of Iowa, GLM's lack of deep involvement with Jewish affairs at Iowa, Zionism.

Partial Transcript: Large lectures, early modern historical studies, speaking experiences throughout Iowa, radio interview program in Des Moines, McCarthyism and university professors, denunciation of GLM to HUAC by another professor.

Partial Transcript: “Cowboy” Bill Taylor and Iowa, sentiments favorable toward amicable settlement of Berlin dispute, etc., crises in 1948.

Partial Transcript: Slansky anti-semitic trials in Eastern Europe.

Partial Transcript: Reasons for leaving Iowa job, praise for Univ, of Iowa, attractions of the Wisconsin History Department, courses taught.

Partial Transcript: Drifting into Jewish involvement, Rabbi Ticktin and Hillel at U.W., involvement with Hillel through friendship with Rabbi Ticktin, identification with Jewish community, Rabbi Swarsensky.

Partial Transcript: Asserts that he only gained interest in this when he taught new courses at U.W. Graduate student influence.