Iowa Prisoner of War??

Summer television is SO INTERESTING. (I'm the only person in America who means that SINCERELY...)

One of the shows I've enjoyed is TLC's "Who Do You Think You Are"? It is fascinating to watch people looking back into their family history.  You never know what you will find...slave owners or robbers and thieves?  I think this show used to be on ABC,but they dropped it. And TLC picked it up -- and there are new episodes this summer.

Chelsea Handler -- the caustic late-night comedian -- came on the show to find out about her grandfather...who was in the German Army during WW II. He ended up being captured in France and spent two years in a POW camp here in America. The camp was located in....

Wait for it.....

ALGONA, IOWA....!!

Apparently, England already had all the German prisoners they could handle. So after the invasion of Normandy -- they started sending them to the United States.

From the website: During WW2, Algona, Iowa was the site of a main camp for prisoners of war.

This camp was ‘home’ to a total of 10,000 German prisoners from April 1944 to February 1946. The value of the work done by the prisoners in the 4 state region was estimated at $3,506,000. A total of 34 branch camps were supervised from Algona. The average monthly camp system population was 3,216, although the number kept in the Algona camp rarely exceeded 2,500. Many visitors remark they had no idea such a camp existed...

Main Street Algona 1944.

The prisoners were treated well, they had lots of food and activities...they put on plays, and even had an orchestra. The POW's worked in area towns, detassled corn and picked peas. There were very few guards -- but that was not a problem because there were no escape attempts. Many of the POWs choose to stay in the United States after the war. (Our neighbor, Karl Otte, came to Iowa as a German prisoner. He liked it so much he stayed and bought a farm -- which is now being run by his grandson.) In 1946, the Algona camp was completely dismantled and every board was sold at auction or burned -- so there is no evidence that it ever existed.  In this map -- you can see the 39 other WW II  prisoner of war camps in the midwest....

Of course, the nature of cable television is that TLC runs their shows over and over again. And because of ON DEMAND -- you can probably watch it any time you want.

So -- hey -- if you've already seen all the episodes of Duck Dynasty or Honey Boo Boo -- CHECK IT OUT...