Oral History Office Regional Oral History Office
Forest History Society >ne Bancroft Library
Santa Cruz, California University of California, Berkeley
Emanuel Fritz Teacher, Editor, and Forestry Consultant
An Interview Conducted by Elwood R. Maunder
and Amelia R. Fry
(5) 1972 by The Forest History Society and the Regents of the University of California
All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between the Directors of the Forest History Society and the Regents of the University of California and Emanuel Fritz, dated 16 September 1969. The manu script 1s thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to Emanuel Fritz during his lifetime and to the Forest History Society and the University of California thereafter. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Executive Director of the Forest History Society or the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California.
Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to Forest History Society, P.O. Box 1581, Santa Cruz, California 95060, or the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, California 97420, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identifica tion of the user. The legal agreement with Emanuel Fritz requires that he be notified of the request and allowed thirty days in which to respond.
FOREWORD
This interview is part of a series produced by the Regional Oral History Office of Bancroft Library, University of California at Berkeley, under a grant from the Forest History Society, whose funding was made possible by the Hill Family Foundation .
Transcripts in the series consist of interviews with: DeWitt Nelson, retired head of the Department of Natural Resources, California; William R. Schofield, lobbyist for timber owners, Cal ifornia Legislature; Rex Black, also lobbyist for timber owners, California Legislature; Walter F. McCuIloch, retired Dean of the School of Forestry, Oregon State University, Con/all is, Oregon; Thornton Munger, retired head of U.S. Forest Service Experiment Station, Pacific Northwest Region; Leo Isaac, reti red, si I viculture research in the Forest Service Experiment Station, Pacific North west Region; and Walter Lund, retired chief, Division of Timber Management, Pacific Northwest Region of the Forest Service; Richard Colgan, retired forester for Diamond Match Lumber Company; Myron Krueger, professor of forestry, emeritus, U.C. Berkeley; and Woodbridge Metcalf, retired extension forester, U.C. Berkeley. Copies of the manuscripts are on deposit in the Bancroft Library, University of California at Los Angeles; and the Forest History Society, University of California at Santa Cruz.
Interviews done for the Forest History Society under other auspices include: Emanuel Fritz, professor of forestry, Univer sity of California, Berkeley, with funding from the California Red wood Association; and a forest genetics series on the Eddy Tree Breeding Station with tapes by W.C. Gumming, A.R. Liddicoet, N.T. Mirov, Mrs. Lloyd Austin, Jack Carpender, and F.I. Righter, cur rently funded by the Forest History Society Oral History Program.
The Regional Oral History Office was established to tape record autobiographical interviews with persons prominent in the history of the West. The Office is under the administrative supervision of the Director of the Bancroft Library.
Wi I la Klug Baum, Head Regional Oral History Office
Regional Oral History Office Room 486 The Bancroft Library University of California Berkeley, California
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE by Henry J. Vaux v
INTRODUCTION by Elwood R. Maunder vii
I EARLY LIFE 1
The Fritz Family in Baltimore 1 Baltimore Polytechnic
Cornell University 11 Teaching at Baltimore Polytechnic
Botany in Cornell Summer School 18
II YALE SCHOOL OF FORESTRY 20
Classes, Professors, and Field Work 20
Gifford Pinchot 27
Contrasts in Forestry Education 32
III BEGINNING A FORESTRY CAREER 36
The Context of Government and Industry 36
In the New Hampshire Forestry Department 40
In Montana and Idaho With the U.S. Forest Service 47
Fort Valley Experiment Station, Arizona 59
IV WORLD WAR ONE AIR SERVICE 68
V PINCHOT AND FEDERAL REGULATION 74
VI TEACHING AT UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA IN THE TWENTIES 79
Courses 79
Faculty 90
German vs. American Forestry in Early 1900's 97
A School of Forestry at Stanford? 103
VII THE REDWOODS 107
Second Growth Investigation 107
Projects With the U.S. Forest Service 117
Industry Cooperation and Forestry Attempts 127
The Union Lumber Company 127
Consulting in the Redwoods 130
The Tree Farm Movement 138
CRA forester for the NIRA Lumber Code (Article X) 141
Logging Conferences 145
VIII SOCIETY OF AMERICAN FORESTERS 151
Role of the Society 151
Journal of Forestry Work 157
The "UnhoTy Twelve Apostles" 173
Reed's Dismissal 189
Protection of Members 202
The Cox Case 202
The Black Case 208
iv
H.H. Chapman 221
IX THE DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR 234
S.A.F. Revolt: Chapman vs. Interior Foresters 236 Pinchot's Tour in the West During the Transfer Controversy 238
X THE CALIFORNIA FOREST PRACTICE ACT 242
Legislation Attempts for Acquisition of Cutover Lands 242 Consultant to the Legislative Forestry Study Committee
(The Biggar Committee) 250
The Legislation 257
The Douglas Fir Region 265
The Redwood Region 270
XI THE FOREST PRODUCTS LABORATORY 274
XII FOUNDATION FOR AMERICAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (FARM) 281
XIII GENERAL COMMENTS 291
APPENDICES 299
INDEX 318
PREFACE
If one were to characterize in one word tne personality and impact of Emanuel Fritz — whether as professional forester or as teacher — no doubt the word should be independence. Fritz's career included work in a wide variety of professional contexts: in forestry education at the University of California; in government programs in the Forest Service and Department of the Interior; in organized industry with the California Redwood Association; in the organized profession as editor of the Journal of Forestry; and in a considerable array of private relationships as a highly respected consultant. But within each and every one of these varied contexts, Fritz was always Fritz.
I knew him first as one of his students. It was in the mid-1950s when forestry seemed, in the eyes of most, to have become largely a government enterprise and when industrial forestry seemed impotent, if not actually dead. But Fritz confidently offered his students a different view, a vision of commercial forestry on a sound financial base imbued with the vitality inherent in an important sector of modern industry. This was truly only a vision in the 1930s, but it was due in no small measure to men like Fritz, and the students intrigued by his ideas, that the vision of the Thirties became the reality of the Sixties.
Fritz has never been reluctant to speak his views plainly, even bluntly. He has no hesitation in challenging the "conventional wisdom" and does so in any gathering where he can arouse interest in forestry. As a result, to many within the profession he has often appeared as a dissenter. But these same qualities have given him the interested atten tion of people outside of forestry. Not only did this earn him the cognomen of "Mr. Redwood" among many Ca I ifornians, but, more importantly, it introduced basic ideas of forest management among many land owners and public officials who simply were not hearing the forestry message being preached in other quarters. Foresters have often been self-critical of their tendency to talk only to themselves. Fritz has been a model exception to this generalization. Hence, his influence on forestry develop ment in California has been profound. His work with redwood forest landowners led to many constructive improvements in the management of large redwood landhol dings. As a member of the California Forestry Study Committee, he influenced strongly and constructively the landmark forestry legislation adopted by the state at the end of World War II. And in later years he was among the first voices to point to needed revision and strengthening of several features of the state's forestry policies.
Fritz's strong and independent voice lent balance to discussion of many forestry issues. Many students learned from him the importance of considering all sides of controversial policies. His practical approach to forestry, reinforced by a lifetime of astute observation in the woods, has helped innumerable people to think of forestry as a practice rather than as a theory. His unbounded interest and enthusiasm for redwood have been transmitted to a host of his listeners both within and outside the forestry profession.
V?
Fritz's profound Influence on forestry in California and elsewhere has recently been recognized with the award to him of the Gifford Pinchot Medal, This may have surprised Fritz, whose evenhanded criticism has at times fallen even on the "Father of the Profession," Gifford Pinchot. But to those who have seen Fritz's own contributions at close range, the award was fitting recognition to an outstanding figure in the profession.
Henry S. Vaux Professor of Forestry
4 July 1972
217 Mulford Hall
University of California, Berkeley
VI
INTRODUCTION
In the developing history of forestry in America certain men and women emerge as major figures in the arena of conservation and forest policy. Emanuel Fritz of Berkeley, California, is one of these. Professor Fritz has long been a familiar figure in forestry affairs. Widely known as Mr. Redwood, he wears this appellation with considerable discomfort. "It is a questionable moniker to hang on anyone," he scoffs. "Whenever I hear it, it makes me feel as if I am being identified as some kind of character and without realization that my life as been spent in work on many species besides Sequo i a semperv i rens . "
But to a considerable company of foresters who have studied under the strong-minded professor of lumbering and forest products at the world- renowned School of Forestry and Conservation on the University of California's Berkeley campus, Fritz is Mr. Redwood, and their number is considerably bolstered by a large contingent of laymen whose concern for the forests of America has brought them into frequent touch with the feisty professor in public meetings or through his extensive writings.
Emanuel Fritz was born October 29, 1886, in Baltimore, Maryland, to German immigrant parents, John George* Fritz and Rosa Barbara Trautwein Fritz. The family enjoyed the fruits of a prosperous new business and gave major consideration to the education of Its offspring. Young Emanuel grew up speaking German, learning English from his friends in the streets of Baltimore. He was sent to school at the Polytechnic Institute of Baltimore along with his younger brother, Theodore. Another younger brother, Gustave, attended the City College. Both brothers are deceased.
The Fritz family was devoutly religious in the evangelical tradition of the Lutheran faith. Daily Bible reading was part of family life. Young Emanuel 's early interest in nature derived, perhaps, from his father's active attention to birds, animals, and plants. When city neighbors objected to a swarm of bees brought home in a gunnysack from the country, the elder Fritz packed up his family and moved to a suburb.
After graduation from the Polytechnic Institute, Emanuel went to Cornell University following a major interest in engineering. Fritz took a generous variety of nonengineering courses through his years at Cornell, economics, corporate finance, contracts, and music. He sang regularly in the Cornell Chapel Choir, and, as he likes to recall, "received credit for it." In retrospect he now regrets not having pursued a degree in the arts as well as the mechanical engineering degree that he earned. Athletic skill was demonstrated by rowing stroke on the Engineering College crew. In intermural competition he came to know Fritz Fernow, stroke of the Arts Col lege crew. Fernow was the youngest son^ of the first professional forester in America, Bernhard Eduard Fernow.
Fritz turned to forestry some years after teaching a stint at his old alma mater, Baltimore Polytechnic Institute. He went to Yale University's highly-touted School of Forestry and in 1914 was awarded the master's
V I I I
degree in Forestry. Franklin Hough's Trees of North America sparked an interest in wood technology that led him into a life-long study of uses of the redwoods and other western species.
In 1914 he resumed a summer job he had previously landed as a student at Yale, working for the New Hampshire State Department of Forestry. The following year he joined the growing ranks of the United States Forest Service. This Involved him from 1915 to 1917, first, in fire suppression and prevention work and, secondly, in si I vicultural research. His exper ience with the Service ended with America's entry into World War I.
Immediately after the war, Fritz moved into the ranks of academic forestry. From 1919 to 1954 he rose from Assistant Professor to full Professor in forestry at the University of California. During these years he taught wood technology and timber utilization. He emphasized with his students that forestry must be brought out into the woods.
In line with this philosophy, from 1934 on, he served as consultant forester to the lumber industry, particularly in pine and redwood. Among his numerous positions and honors can be listed that of wood technologist for the California Pine Association and the West Coast Lumbermen's Association; forestry advisor and V ice-President of the Foundation of American Resource Management; Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Forestry; and Founder and Secretary of the Redwood Region Logging Conference.
Fritz was not one to ignore the role of federal and state government. Though advocating minimum public regulation of private forestry, he served, from 1938 to 1940, as consultant to the United States Department of the Interior and, from 1943 to 1945, as forestry consultant to the California Legislative Interim Committee.
His work thrust him into contact with a bustling lumber industry which was already showing signs of the sickness that was to provoke the critical analyses of William B. Greeley, David T. Mason, and, later, Wilson Compton. Fritz felt a sympathy for loggers and lumbermen and defended them against critics both within his profession and in the muckraker press. It was this attitude, maintained throughout a long career, which has brought upon his head the frequent accusation that he is a stalking-horse of industrial interests. The bitter battle over management of the nation's forest resources in this century, continuing with heightened fury today, creates fertile ground for such accusations. Historians of the future will appraise Fritz's role from the careful examination of his personal papers, preserved in the University of California's Bancroft Library, as well as his voluminous published record of American forestry.
That Fritz took up the cudgels frequently in the great battles of recent forest history, often opposing one of his leading mentors at Yale, H.H. Chapman, is a part of this work which will draw special attention from scholars. Whatever future analyses of Fritz may produce, it is
*ln the course of these interviews with Emanuel Fritz the Forest History Society also obtained funding from the California Redwood Associa tion for the inventorying and indexing of the Fritz papers in The Bancroft Library. This was done by Marion Stuart of the Forestry Library, University of California, Berkeley.
ix
without doubt that he made a clear and unequivocal impact upon the record of American forestry.
The Fritz interviews were made over a period of nine years. I made the f 1 rst, interview .in San Francisco. on January 2, 1958. This
was followed by another Interview of mine made in Berkeley on November 5, 1958. Mrs. Fry conducted separate interviews on November 12, 1965, and August 28, 1967, in Berkeley. Working from rough drafts of these initial interviews, Mrs. Fry and I made further interviews with Professor Fritz in Berkeley on February 27, 1967, and on March I, 2, 3, and 4, 1967. The volume is composed of major portions of all the various interviews.
This volume of oral history interviews with Professor Fritz is one of a series of works focusing upon Western American forest history and made possible by grants from the Louis W. and Maud Hill Family Foundation and the Weyerhaeuser Family Foundation. The Hill and Weyerhaeuser grants were made to the Forest History Society during the 1960s to permit the making of selected in-depth interviews with westerners who had been either major participants in or keen observers of developing patterns of western forest land use.
A considerable list of desirable interviews was compiled with the aid and assistance of colleagues in the major western universities and colleges with which the Forest History Society has enjoyed a symbiotic relationship for nearly two decades. Interviews were planned with a final high-priority list. Preparatory research for the interviews included searching published sources as well as examining available documentary materials relating to the men and women to be interviewed. To conserve funds, interviews were planned to take advantage of the attendance of respondents at regional or national meetings held on the West Coast.* Experts in the oral history method in western universities were employed to assist in the program, particularly from the Regional Oral History Office of the Bancroft Library at the University of California in Berkeley.** Professor William H. Hutchinson of the History Department at Chico State University was also recruited to make interviews which explored the folk lore of the western woodlands.***
*George L. Drake, tape-recorded interview in 1967, and David T. Mason, tape-recorded interview in 1965, 1966 and 1967, by Elwood R. Maunder, Forest History Society, Santa Cruz, California. In process.
**Among these interviews were, C. Raymond Clar, tape-recorded interview in 1966 by Amelia R. Fry, in process; Leo A. Isaac, "Douglas Fir Research in the Pacific Northwest, 1920-1956," typed transcript of tape-recorded interview by Amelia R. Fry, 1967; Woodbridge Metcalf, "Extension Forester, 1926-1956," typed transcript of tape-recorded interview by Evelyn Bonnie Fairburn, '1969, University of Ca I iforni a Bancroft Library Regional Oral History Office, Berkeley.
: ***W.B. Laughead, typed transcript of tape-recorded interview by William H. Hutchinson, Forest History Society, Santa Cruz, California. 1957.
As the principal investigator I was privileged to make approximately half of the interviews. Amelia Roberts Fry of the Regional Oral History Office, Berkeley, is co-author of this work and the author of other interviews In this series. Wi I la K. Baum, Director of the Regional Oral History Office of Berkeley, assisted In directing the processing of
Interviews. The preparatory research on the large Fritz connection, which 1s a comprehensive documentary resource for all areas of his professional life, was done by Amelia Fry; my Yale University colleagues Joseph A. Miller, Judith C. Rudnicki, and Margaret G. -Davidson did much of the research from related deposits in the Forest History Society and the Yale Historical Manu scripts Collection. Susan R. Schrepfer and Barbara D. Holman did the final editing of the manuscript, created its index, and saw the volume through the last steps of publication.
Acknowledgment of advice of many others who aided in the arrangements for interviews would require several pages to record here. Of particular noteworthy assistance were Carwin Wool ley, Executive Vice-President of the Pacific Logging Congress; Bernard L. Orel I and Irving Luiten of the Weyerhaeuser Company; Dave James of Simpson Timber Company; Foresters Thornton T. Munger, David T. Mason, Henry J. Vaux, Henry E. Clepper, Frank H. Kaufert, George A. Garratt, and Paul M. Dunn. Hardin C. Glascock of the Western Forestry and Conservation Association, now Executive Vice- President of the Society of American Foresters, was a most helpful consultant and critic.
Special appreciation is expressed for the encouragement and patience of the sponsors, in particular A. A. Heckman and John D. Taylor of the Hill Family Foundation, Frank B. Rarig and Frederick K. Weyerhaeuser of the Weyerhaeuser Family Foundation, and Philip Farnsworth and Kramer Adams of the California Redwood Association.
Oral history is a new and demanding discipline. The great volume of work involved in designing, planning, and carrying out the processing of all the many interviews was done without intrusion of any kind upon the team of scholars who labored so long and hard upon it. Many of the men and women who were interviewed have since died. That their vivid memories of the history of western forestry and conservation have been preserved in the interviews of this series is a tribute to all who have been associated with the project.
It is our hope that more interviews in this series may be published and that excerpts from other unpublished interviews can be submitted as articles to scholarly and popular journals. Funds are now being sought fror the National Endowment for the Humanities and other sources cf philanthropy to assist us toward these goals. A significant number of articles from oral interviews have already been published in Forest History and American Forests.
The potential of oral history has only begun to be realized. Much progress has been made since Professor A I Ian Nevins began to develop the method at Columbia University in 1950. It is a matter of pride to the Forest History Society that its first exploration of the method was made only two years later, the result of conversations I had with Professor
xi
Nevins. Today the ranks of oral historians are growing at a rate that amazes even those optimistic advocates who championed the method in the face of considerable criticism during the early fifties. The Oral History Association now stands on sturdy feet, counts numerous members on its rolls, and gains prestige with the counting number of fine books and articles published. The Forest History Society is proud to add this volume to the library of American oral history.
Copies of this manuscript, either in manuscript or microfiche form, can be purchased from the Forest History Society.
Elwood R. Maunder, Interviewer Executive Director Forest History Society
30 November 1972 Forest History Society 733 River Street Santa Cruz, California
xi i
LI wood l\. Mjuridor was cjrodudtotJ from I ho llnl ver^i ly of Minno-joKi in 1939 wi rh a B.A. in journalism. He was a reporter and editor of Hie Minnesota Dai I y and an officer of his class. From 1939 to December, 1941, he was a reporter and feature writer for the Minneapolis Ti mes-Tri bune and the Minneapolis Star-Journa I . He enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard December 21, 1941, and served as a combat correspondent in both the European and Mediterranean theaters of war on landing craft for infantry and combat transports. He was editor of the Ninth Naval District's magazine, Sound! nqs, at the conclusion of the war. He was graduated from Washington University at St. Louis in 1947 with an M. A. in history. He attended the London School of Economics and Political Science for one year and worked as a freelance foreign correspondent and British Gallup Pollster. He was a member of the staff of the U.S. Department of State during the Meeting of Foreign Ministers in London in 1947 and 1948. Returning to the United States he was named director of Public Relations for the Board of Missions of the Methodist Church, later director of public relations for the Ohio area of the Methodist Church. In 1952 he was appointed executive director of the Forest History Society. He is the author of many articles, has produced more than one hundred oral history interviews, and edited with Margaret G. Davidson A Hi story of the Forest Products Industries: Proceedings of the First National Col loqu i urn, sponsored by the Forest History Society and the Business History Group of the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. He is the publisher and long-time editor of Forest History, quarterly journal of the Forest History Society. He is an Honorary Member of the Society of American Foresters and a Fellow of the Forest History Society.
XI I I
Amelia R. Fry was graduated from the University of Oklahoma In 1947 with a B.A. in psychology. She wrote for the campus magazine. She received her Master of Arts in educational psychology from the University of Illinois in 1952, with heavy minors in English for both degrees. She taught freshman English at the University of Illinois from 1947 to 1948 and at Hiram College in Ohio from 1954 to 1955. Mrs. Fry also taught English as a foreign language in Chicago from 1950 to 1953. She writes feature articles for various newspapers and was reporter for a suburban daily from 1966 to 1967 and writes professional articles for journals and historical magazines. She joined the staff of Regional Oral History Office, University of California, Berkeley, in 1959, first specializing in the field of conservation and forest history, then public administration and politics. She is currently director of the Earl Warren Oral History Project at the university and secretary of the Oral History Association.
Of tlV
•o the wood R.
:.sor
This photograph was taken on the occasion of the presentation of the Emanuel Fritz papers to the Bancroft Library. From left to right, Elwood R. Maunder, Donald Coney, former University of California, Berkeley, Librarian, and Professor Fritz.
S.F. CHRONICLE Thursday, December 15, 1988
OBITUARIES
UC Forestry Expert Emmanuel Fritz
Emmanuel Fritz, a forestry ex pert nicknamed "Mr. Redwood" and the oldest faculty member at the University of California at Berkeley, died last Thursday in his Berkeley home at the age of 102.
Mr. Fritz was involved in nearly every aspect of the redwood indus try and was considered a forestry and conservation authority for 70 years.
He advised elected and appoint ed officials on the need to balance demands for lumber in a rapidly growing state with the need to pre serve old-growth groves, replant logged areas and set aside areas for protection.
"He encouraged reforestation and cooperation between the log ging industry and conservation groups," said John DeWitt, execu tive director of the Save the Red woods League, of which Mr. Fritz was a longtime member.
Mr. Fritz wrote a pamphlet in 1932 entitled "The Story Told by the Fallen Redwood" which is still dis tributed by the Save The Redwoods League to schools across the coun try. DeWitt said.
Millions of people who do not recognize Mr. Fritz's name probably remember reading the book at some point during their childhood, DeWitt said. The book describes1 how tree rings, fire scars and other markings can provide a detailed chronology of an ancient redwood's history.
When Mr. Fritz turned 102, he earned the distinction of becoming the oldest faculty member in UC Berkeley history. Cal's previously oldest professor, chemist Joel Hiide- brand, was 101 when he died in 1963.
Mr. Fritz helped create Califor nia's State Forest program and ad-
» vised Governor Earl Warren on for est and logging matters. And he was the founder of the Redwood Region
^Logging Conference, which honor ed him on its 50th anniversary earli er this year for his prominence and his influence on forestry practices.
His personal papers are at UC Berkeley's Bancroft Library, noted for its collection documenting the "history of the Western United "States.
Mr. Fritz was a member of the Commonwealth Club and of the Bo hemian Club. At the Bohemian Club he established a museum to depict the life, history and ecology of the trees on the club grounds along the Russian River.
Mr. Fritz was born in Baltimore ] on Oct. 29, 1886. He received a bach elor 's degree fromjCorneU in 1908 " and a master's from Yale in 1914.
He was a forester for the New npshire State Forestry Depart- • ment before moving West to work ' for the VS. Forest Service and serv ing as an Air Service captain in ! World War I.
Mr. Fritz joined UC Berkeley's ' Division of Forestry in 1919 and re tired in 1954, retaining the title pro- » f essor emeritus.
fc. He is survived by two daugh- ; ters, Barbara Fritz of Berkeley and . Roberta Fair of Eugene, Ore. At his ' request, no services were planned.
Donations ire preferred to Save the Redwoods League, Alta .Bates Hospice, S232 Claremont Ave- , nue, Oakland, 94618 or to the Soci- L«y of American Foresters' building •Jund, 5400 Grosvenor Lane, Bethes- JOa,Md., 20814-2188.
I EARLY LIFE
The Fritz Fami ly in Baltimore
Maunder: Emanuel, can you start out by telling us something about your
family origins and where you were born and something perhaps of your early childhood?
Fritz: I was born in Baltimore, Maryland, October 29, 1886. My father was born in Ebersberg, Wurttemberg, on February 14, 1855. My mother was born in Stuttgart, Wurttemberg, on February 2, 1856. Father was nearly eighty-three when he passed away and mother was just past eighty-two.
Father was a tailor, learning the trade in Switzerland to which he went before he was twenty. He came to the United States in about 1880. Mother came to the United States about the same time and they were married in Baltimore on April 15, 1884.
When they came to this country, they went to night school at once to learn the language, and in my father's case, he also learned bookkeeping so that he could set up his own business. While he finished his apprenticeship In Switzerland, where he spent most of his youth although born in Germany, he decided that the thing to do in the United States was to have his own business. He set up one shortly after he was married and the business prospered. The only tough times we knew as boys were those of the 1892-1893 period in the very severe depression of those years. My parents often spoke of those days, but they pulled themselves out of the slump without help, as did the rest of the country.
Maunder: Your father's name was what?
Fritz: John George Fritz. And my mother's maiden name was Rosa Barbara
Trautwein. Her parents and ancestors were all soldiers. My father's were soldiers and farmers. My father was exempted from military service because of a bad leg.
Maunder: What brought him to this country? Was it the economic opportunity?
Fritz: Well, in those days of course many young men in Europe felt that the streets of the United States were paved with gold, and they thought they'd come over here and pick up some of it. My father often told me that in this country one is compensated in accordance with how hard he works and what he knows, while in Europe, one's station in life, as to birth, pretty much determined how far you could get.
Maunder: When did he come to this country?
Aunt Carrie Trautwein Muth with Emanuel Fritz, ca. 1890
Fritz:
Maunder: Fritz:
Maunder: Fritz: Maunder: Fritz:
Maunder:
Fritz:
Maunder: Fritz:
It must have been about 1880. I was born in 1886, October 29th. Mother and father, as I said, met in this country and they were both nearly thirty when they married.
Was there any particular reason for their settling in Baltimore?
No, unless it was the church. My father was a very devout church man. He joined the church while he was a young man in Switzerland. He was somewhat of an orator — at least he liked to speak before groups — and I have an idea the church gave him an opportunity to express himself.
This was one of the evangelical churches? That's right, a Lutheran offshoot. Which one?
It was called merely the Evangelical Church. That's my recollec tion. 1 should remember it more clearly but frankly we boys (three of us in the fami ly and I was the oldest) had to go to church and Sunday school so much in the course of a week that we, you might say, got a little too much of it. There was a lot of dogma and fear of the hereafter. But my father insisted on it and as long as he was the boss, we went.
Has that persisted through your life? churchman as a result of this?
Have you not been an active
I really did enjoy going to church while in college, both at Cornell and at Yale. Attendance was purely voluntary. They had invited preachers, a different one nearly every Sunday, and they were really great men and good speakers. They spoke with good sense and I en joyed attending those sermons, but since then I haven't been very active in any church. As youngsters, we would occasionally go to a synagogue or a Catholic church to see what it was like.
Was this a German community that you lived in as a boy in Baltimore?
In part. It was changing. Baltimore had a large number of Germans and Irish. Italians, largely from Naples and Sicily, were beginning to arrive in large numbers.
The Germans had Turnvereins (gymnasium clubs). I belonged to one. And they had a lot of societies and singing groups (Saenger verein). They would go during the summer to their Schuetzenpark for their Schuetzenfest, as they called it. "Schuetz," of course, would be a guard.
I don't know what the origin of those organizations was and why they were set up but as a result of the First World War and the strong feeling against the Germans, all those organizations came to a quick end. It was rather unfortunate because they were very
Fritz:
M.-iunder: Fritz:
Maunder: Fritz:
Maunder: Fritz:
good social organizations and very loyal to America. The Germans we came In contact with were mostly from south Germany, kind, fun- loving, religious and not militaristic as were the Prussians. They became citizens as soon as they could and prized their new status.
Did you grow up speaking both t'ruiIKh ,in<1 Herman?
I spoke German until I was eight, and when I was about eight, 1 picked up English on the street and to some extent in school.
I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about your family life and your growing up as a young man in the eastern United States. What do you recall most about your boyhood?
Well, it was a very happy boyhood. Our parents took a great deal
of interest in us and gave us every opportunity. Of course, trans
portation in those days wasn't what it is today. We had to ride
streetcars or we walked or rode our bicycles.
Even though we lived right in the city I had to walk to school as far as Abraham Lincoln was reported to have walked and mine was always on hard city streets — but no mud. The Polytechnic Institute was about two miles from home but we enjoyed walking. When 1 say "we," I mean my younger brother Theodore and I. There were a lot of Interesting windows en route, especially Schwartz's Toy Store, which was always fascinating.
Where did your middle brother gc to school?
He went to the Polytechnic as I did, but did not finish. Theodore thought it was very foolish to stay in school so long when you could go out and make money right away, so he quit the Polytechnic early and entered business college. He was one of the first to operate what is today a "stenotype" machine.
As soon as he graduated from this business college — I think it was Strayer's — he got excellent jobs and he worked himself up very rapidly in business. His principal employer at the time, as I recall, was Armour and Company. Later he had a large steel dis tributing business, everything from chain link fencing to tool steels.
Maunder: But your younger brother went along with you through the Polytechnic?
Fritz: That was Theodore. The other brother, Gustave, was four years
younger and went to the City College. Baltimore in those days had no high schools for boys under that name. It had only the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute and they had the Baltimore City College, both for boys only.
My youngest brother Gus had decided to become a doctor so that meant that he would go to the City College where he would be prepared to enter either Hopkins or the University of Maryland. He chose the
Fritz: University of Maryland and developed an excellent medical practice. Both brothers are deceased, Gus at fifty, Ted at sixty-eight. Both were hard workers.
Maunder: Your parents were in a position to give you all the very best of education as you were growing up?
Fritz: Yes, they insisted upon it. They were not always in comfortable
circumstances but they generally had enough. They were very frugal and they made a dollar go a long way. They taught us the same principle. They encouraged us to do some work on the outside with the result that when 1 went to college 1 financed my first two years myself and made nearly enough money in the summertime and at odd times to help me through the third year, although my father and mother contributed a considerable share.
They were very independent people, especially my mother. They felt that one appreciated more what he had to work for. Mother was very practical. Father, on the other hand, was pretty much of an ideal ist.
My father was a diligent student of the Bible and he read very widely on biological subjects, medical and zoological. Living in the city, we had little opportunity to have any biological interests except that father raised Newfoundland dogs and fancy pigeons for show purposes and others for racing. Since the birds didn't need the floor of the cage, I was permitted to have some guinea pigs and a squirrel, but that was the extent of that. How ever, we bicycled often to the country and particularly to the fine Druid Hill Park to see something green.
Even though the back yard was small, as in all those city houses, we built some boxes on the porch in which we had flowers and vines.
My father's interest in birds and animals and plants, which he couldn't really develop in the city, led him finally to quit the city and move to the country. He had been on a Sunday walk in the country with my mother, beyond the end of the car line. He found a swarm of bees and he told mother that swarm was going to belong to him. So he went to a nearby farm house for a gunny sack, slipped the sack over the swarm and took it home. Although it meant being absent from church that Sunday night, he stayed home and made him self a beehive out of, I believe, a cracker box, and the next morn ing we were amateur apiarists.
Those bees were very active and had to forage pretty far and wide in the city to get what they needed. Some of the neighbors com plained, so my father said, "If the neighbors don't like my bees, I'm going to move where nobody can be bothered by them." So he bought himself a little place of about seven acres about a mile from the end of the Belair Road car line at a place called Kenwood Park. There was a newly completed house on the property which was up for sale because the owner had lost his wife. It was a large
Fritz: house, very well built, and the grounds gave father a chance to have not only bees and pigeons but chickens and everything else. As a result of that Interest, a few years later 1 built him an aviary about twenty by twenty, in which he raised pheasants of five or six different kinds.
The chicken house, as I remember it, was pretty much like a modern four-room house. On the second floor he had pigeons and on the first floor there were chickens—fancy chickens, by the way. Mother, being rather practical, couldn't see the sense — being generally badly bent financially—of raising show birds, so she insisted on birds that would lay eggs and cause no tears if they were laid on a block and decapitated. So she had her own flock of Plymouth Rocks and Leghorns for eggs and the big Orpingtons for meat, so we were on a chicken diet at least once a week and we had more eggs than we knew what to do with.
An interesting sidelight on that was this: they moved to the country while 1 was a junior at Cornell but I didn't spend the following summer with them. That summer I spent in Steelton, Pennsylvania, working for the Pennsylvania Steel Company.
After college graduation, I became a teacher at the Baltimore Poly technic Institute. (This is jumping ahead a little, on this chicken business.) Our chickens were doing so well laying eggs that we thought it deserved some attention as a business. It happened that in the summer of 1910, I think it was, 1 worked as a drafts man for the Cambria Steel Company in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Two other draftsmen also liked the outdoors so we three used to take walks Saturday afternoons and all day Sundays in the woods and talked over our future as young fellows will.
I noticed that one of them could identify grasses. He apparently was a farm-bred boy and could distinguish one grass from another merely by the fruit. I thought that was very interesting. The other one knew some trees while 1 didn't know any of those things. We decided it would be interesting to have a little hobby, or a little sideline, so two of us enrol led in Pennsylvania State Col lege extension courses, correspondence courses in fact.
I recall my first course was the propagation of plants in which we learned how plants live and grow and how they are propagated. That opened an entirely new world to me and it came to be very fascinat ing. I couldn't wait for the next exercise to come in the ma i I . Then I took courses in poultry husbandry and in fertilizers and so on, but the poultry husbandry course was the one I look back upon with real amusement.
The courses told us that chickens will lay well if treated well, what chickens needed in the way of treatment was this and that. So when 1 got back to Maryland for the winter term of