Post date: Aug 12, 2014 11:39:40 PM
6 February 1966
I don’t think I’ll go to the organ school before I come home. I am still learning a lot by Kleuker. [Most apprentices start during secondary school, take classes half day and work half day. The technical school after apprenticeship provides them with missing physics and math that I already had as an undergraduate in Chemistry.]
After we finish the big organ (33 stops) in May, I’ll probably work a month or so in the pipe workshop. I have just about finished the designs for my demonstration organ (six keys) which I have started. I work on this about an hour a day after quitting time and on Saturdays.
13 February 1966
I’m writing with a capillary fountain pen which I bought for technical drawing. It comes with different size capillaries for different line widths. This is much easier to use than the old-style mechanical drawing pen. I have to make drawings of the demonstration organ model I’m building so I can cut the pieces to exact size. I also have to design the mechanical lever arms. Besides, it is good practice and maybe I can submit the drawings to the Handworkers’ Guild. Mr. Kleuker is going to try to arrange for them to give me an exam and a certificate of proof of my practical training. I’m not so much interested in the certificate as in the good experience I get from the work.
One of my friends from the Peace Corps is studying German in Blaubeuren. She wrote and gave me all the latest gossip. She left Nigeria a couple of days before the coup d’Etat there.
Yes, the cookies use flat, unleavened wafers from the church supply house.
I’ll probably get more pay starting this or next month. Had and evening of TV and conversing with the Meister [Kleuker] on Friday and he was shocked that I only get 200 DM ($50), which is good for an apprentice, because often they aren’t worth much more. [However, I replaced the electrical engineer, who left, and was doing all his work as well as the organ building.]
Prices in Germany have climbed terribly since I came. Many things are 50% [higher]. The streetcar now costs 15 cents and bread is 20 cents a pound. Meat is more expensive than in USA. Gasoline is 15 cents a quart or 60 cents a gallon. And a worker in manufacturing earns $1.10 an hour. The workers in steel are striking for 1% to 10% increases, but most prices are 50% higher. Eggs are now so expensive that most housewives have stopped buying them.
So far eight friends have applied to come to the States with me. I must start a factory soon to employ them all.
I saw my first snow-plow in Germany today. It never snows enough to warrant having plows, but in the past week we had three days of freezing rain, followed by below-freezing weather and the streets were like mirrors, but drivable, with care. I’m always a bit leery of the hill I have to go down, which ends in a very busy street.