Nazi Germany - Rise of Hitler

I have been falling behind on my blog posts so I'll be posting a fair amount in the next few days. Today I'll be writing about Hitler's rise to power in Germany and how he helped form the Nazi party.

        Hitler was one of many Germans who were angered by the surrender of Germany in 1918 in World War I, and they were upset by the treaty of Versailles which forced Germany to disarm and pay for damage caused by World War I. Hitler was very angry about the current state of the German government so he spent a lot of time studying the different political parties. One party that caught Hitlers attention was the Germany Workers' Party and he decided to become the leader of that party. Hitler was a great public speaker and he was able to get people excited by the ideas he had. He told them of how Germany had once been glorious and how Germany had a destiny of a supreme nation. One of the points that Hitler made that would define how people look back at him now is that he blamed Jews for most of Germany's problems. Hitler decided to rename the National Socialist German Worker's Party (NSDAP) it was commonly referred to as the Nazi Party. In July of 1921, Hitler was elected as the supreme leader of the Nazi Party and he had many plans for the future of Germany.
       Hitler started his reign of terror right then, he went around forcing people to support his party with the threat of death. Hitler was arrested for his actions and sentenced for 5 years in prison. While he was in prison Hitler wrote a book that told of his plans for Germany. He called it Mein Kampf which means My Struggles. It would become a sort of rule book that the Nazi's followed. Hitler didn't stay in prison for the full 5 years. When he got out he still had the same goal, but he went about achieving it slightly different. Hitler worked his way up in the political world, using every little thing to his advantage he eventually became the Absolute Fuher, the most powerful and influential position in Germany. The age of Hitler had begun, he called it the Third Reich and claimed that it would last for the next thousand years.

Life

Well, I am back in Dubuque now and things are starting to get back to normal. I start my soccer season on Monday and along with that get back into the swing of things with school. I was so blessed to have an opportunity to go live in Arizona for 2 months and I really think I grew from the experience. I definitely want to go back and visit sometime, hopefully sooner rather than later so that the kids I taught will still be there. However, whenever I can go back I will jump at the opportunity! I will try and post some of the pictures I took while I was there soon!

My last post while in Arizona: The Roaring Twenties

I am winding down on my time here in Arizona, and I am also finishing up my school work. I have been plowing through history a lot while I was here, I started in the late 1800s and am finishing up the 1920s. I have been reading a maginzine called Learning Through History. One story that I really enjoyed reading was about Harry Houdini and his war against all the fraud mediums that were tricking people and taking all their money.
As far as illusionists go, Houdini was the best of the best. And he didn't want to see people falling for tricks that he found very easy to spot. Houdini had gone to mediums before in hopes that maybe, just maybe there was some truth in spiritualism and he could contact his mother who had passed away. But to his disgust, Houdini was able to see through every single medium and realize that there were a lot of people being taken advantage of. So he set out on a war against spiritualism, he had performances that he used to show how these mediums did their tricks. He also was working with reporters who would publish his opinions.
Because of his work against spiritualism Houdini lost a friendship with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle who's wife was a well known medium. Houdini was able to prove Lady Doyle false and that caused a big gap in his friendship with the Doyles. Doyle would go on to defend all the mediums that Houdini uncovered.
Overall I thought it was very interesting how one illusionist would be so hard set to uncover others who were using their abilities in illusion to trick people, not to entertain them. Perhaps Houdini was so against the mediums because none of them were able to hep him contact his mother. I could be that his reasons were much more personal than just wanting to save people from losing their money.

A nice little life update

IT SNOWED AGAIN!! You would think that Arizona would be far enough to get away from the snow... next time I'm going to Florida. My time here is quickly winding down so I'm starting to both physically and mentally prepare myself to return home. For the most part things have been pretty normal here, I teach the 3rd and 4th graders PE on Mondays and Fridays. I'm really enjoying that a lot. I also had the chance to go skiing on a mountain in Colorado last week, that was truly amazing. I will not be forgetting that anytime soon. I took some pretty cool pictures while I was there but they are on my camera and I can't post them to here because my phone has no internet. Today is the last time I'll be doing something two more times while I'm here. I have EPIC (the youth group) and pickleball tonight, and I'll get to do those one more time while I'm here. It's been a really great time here, but I am very ready to go home.

Books I've been reading for school

In this blog post I am going to be writing about the books I've been reading. I've ready 4 books since I arrived. So I'll do a short little summary of each one.

The first book I read was called America's First World War: General Pershing and the Yanks.
I've already talked about General Pershing in one of my posts so I won't dwell on that book for too long. It was about Pershings life and all his war experiences, both exciting and boring, happy and tragic.

The second book I read was called Lord of the Nutcracker Men. This was a book that I really enjoyed quite a lot! It was about a little boy named Johnny, his father was a toy maker and before he left for the war he gave his son his own little army of nutcracker men. Johnny loves to play with his army and pretend that he is fighting his own little World War. The beginning of every chapter starts with a letter from his father and a new little army man that his father has sent. As the war escalates Johnny begins to think that what he pretends to do at home has an effect on the war in the trenches. He is terrified that he might be killing people by playing with his toy soldiers.

The third book was Warhorse, it's a story told from the perspective of a horse named Joey. (I'd say that's a pretty good name) Joey goes through a lot during the war, he has many different owners over the 4 years he is in the war and has to do very strenuous work. Things that killed many other horses, but he has a drive unlike any other horse, he wants to get home to his real master. I liked this book a lot, and I was very excited to find out that there is a movie version of it too! I will definitely be watching it when I get home.

The fourth book that I have read while in Arizona is The Great Gatsby. I had seen the movie before so I somewhat knew the story already, but it had been a while and I had forgotten a lot of the details. The book takes place in the 1920s and is the story about a young man who moves to New York and is next door neighbors to the popular party thrower, Jay Gatsby. No one knows very much about Gatsby, and what they do know probably isn't true. But as the story goes on Gatsby opens up to his neighbor and we learn Gatsby's backstory and then continue to learn about him in his current situation.

A little update on my life

Not too much has been happening out of the ordinary here at the Mission. I've been teaching PE to the 3rd and 4th graders here, we've been playing soccer. I am staying pretty busy around here, I have something to go do almost every night. There is even soccer on Wednesday nights, however I'm excited to get home and play for my soccer team. For the most part every day is about the same as the last one, the time is starting to pass quickly these days!!

Another blog about my history learnings

In the past two weeks I have finished my History of Us 1880-1917 book and read my first extra reading book. The extra reading book was called America's First World War. It's a very interesting book about a influential man in American military, his name is John J. Pershing. The book tells about how Pershing worked his way up through the ranks of the army. Pershing was born before the Civil War and died after the start of World War Two. When he was a young man he wanted to be a lawyer, but he was offered free college education at the United States Military Academy and he changed his course drastically. He originally planned to go to get an education, then when his army duty was finished he would go to law school. That, never happened. As he went through college and then the rest of his time in the Army, Pershing made friends with important people and was noticed for his excellence as a military leader. Not the least of these friends was Theodore Roosevelt, they fought together at the Battle of San Juan Hill. Pershing grew in importance and eventually lead the Americans "Over There" to aid in the World War. Pershing's help was vital to the outcome of the war.
Overall Pershing's story is really a very fascinating one! He was born when ramrod guns ruled the world, he fought in wars where they machine gun mowed soldiers down, fought along side tanks, saw the effects of gas warfare, and lived long enough to know the threat of atomic bombs. It is said that no matter what he faced, Pershing was always professional with a straight back and a serious expression. The only time he acted otherwise was when he was around young children. He lost his wife and three daughters in a fire in San Francisco, only his son survived. It would seem that to fight for his country was all he was passionate about after that. Pershing passed away July, 15th of 1948. He was 87 when he died. He is buried in the Arlington National Cemetery, along side the men who served under him.
        Along with John J. Pershing I learned more about Theodore Roosevelt and about his childhood, college years and ultimately his presidency. The famously know Teddy Bear was named after an incident of Roosevelt hunting. It is said that while he was hunting bears he found a small cub that he thought was too cute to kill so he spared it's life. A toy maker sent him a stuffed bear and called it a Teddy Bear, soon everyone was buying them and they're still in high demand today. Theodore Roosevelt also said that he didn't think there was ever a presidential family that had more fun being president than the Roosevelt family.