Rolling buseum shows POW experience
By Brandi Watters
The prison camps of Nazi Germany rolled into Anderson on wheels this week when a mobile ÒbuseumÓ offered a first-hand look at life as an American prisoner of war.
Visitors to ÒBehind Barbed Wire: Midwest POWS in Nazi GermanyÓ were given an inside look at life behind the barbed wire that imprisoned approximately 99,000 American soldiers in Europe during World War II.
Davis Webb, 14, toured the exhibit with his eighth-grade class from Anderson Christian School and enjoyed seeing the clever creations of American POWs.
ÒPeople in those concentration camps were resourceful. They made cigarette holders out of Spam cans.Ó
The Anderson Public Library-sponsored program took place in a school bus converted into a rolling museum.
The seats of the gray and black school bus have been removed and in their place, a tribute to POWs in Nazi Germany lines the sides of the small space.
The narrow aisles allow for only a handful of visitors at a time but the recreation of the POW experience included a line of barbed wire that wraps itself around the bus, a collection of authentic letters written by the hands of soldiers enduring imprisonment, 1940s propaganda movies illustrating the wartime climate and several personal items and photographs salvaged in the wake of the war.
The exhibit was formed after the Traces museum of Minnesota interviewed 55 former POWs from the Midwest. It is currently on its eighth tour.
Irving Kellman, the buseumÕs tour guide, explained that the moving exhibit has seen over 1,000 towns and 100,000 visitors in its travels across 15 states.
WebbÕs classmate, 14-year-old Princess Sakeuh, said she could relate to the POWs.
ÒI know how they felt when they lived in the camp because when I was younger, my family lived in a camp because so many people were being killed.Ó
Sakeuh was born in Liberia and says her family was forced into a refugee camp during a conflict in her country. She left the camp at three and sought asylum in America.
ÒSometimes it scares me to think that stuff like that would happen in America.Ó
Beth Oljace, the Indiana Room librarian at APL, said the exhibit is important because it provides another learning opportunity for those who are too young to remember the war.
ÒIt concerns me that many young people get their impressions of history from television and movies alone. The people who were witnessing these things are the generation weÕre losing.Ó