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379 Acknowledgments This book has been a long time in the making, and, as a result, I have incurred a long list of debts, both professional and personal. Regarding the former, I must begin by thanking David Bathrick, who first suggested that the Ernst Thälmann myth would make a good subject for a book. I would be remiss if I did not also thank the members of David’s seminar “The Writer and the State in the German Democratic Republic ,” which encouraged serious discourse on the subject. I am grateful to Bob Shirer, who first pointed out to me the similarities between East German personality cults and the cults of medieval saints. Also important on this score is Don Prudlo, my colleague at Jacksonville State University. Not only did he read the entire manuscript—more than once—but he also encouraged me to make use of the political religions paradigm. The following people at Jacksonville State also contributed to the development of the manuscript in significant ways: Joe Delap, George Lauderbaugh, Paul Beezley, Rebecca Turner, and Earl Wade. I am also grateful to my department chair, Gordon Harvey, who did what he could for me with limited resources. The National Endowment for the Humanities and the German Academic Exchange Service also provided funds that made researching this book possible. I am indebted as well to the broader scholarly community. Jay W. Baird provided me with top-notch training as a scholar and educated me regarding the role of myth in the building of a society. In addition to Jay, the following scholars have read parts of the manuscript—often unbeknownst to them—and their comments have improved it dramatically : David Murphy, David Meier, John Davidson, Sabine Hake, Silke Arnold-de Simone, and Diethelm Prowe. Needless to say, I could not have written this book without the kind help of librarians and archivists on two continents. In the United States, Jacksonville State’s history and interlibrary loan librarians, Linda Cain and Debra Deering-Barrett, were especially helpful. In Germany, Sabine Stein took me on a personal tour of the Thälmann sites at Buchenwald Concentration Camp, and Bernt Roder of the Prenzlauer Berg Museum was similarly helpful. Günter Hortzschansky, arguably the GDR’s leading authority on the 380 Acknowledgments life of Ernst Thälmann, was kind enough to answer my written questions concerning the Thälmann legend. The number of archivists who aided my efforts is too vast for them to be listed here, and their invaluable aid was often given anonymously. I thank the staffs of the following German archives: the German Federal Archives in Berlin, Potsdam, and Koblenz; the German Federal Film Archive in Berlin; Berlin’s Television and Radio Archive; the Archive of the GDR’s Academy of Arts; the Thuringia State Archive; the Institute for Contemporary History (Munich); and the Buchenwald Archive. I also made use of the following collections in the United States: the Hoover Institution Archive; the Archive of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum; and the Library of Congress. Anyone who has performed scholarly research recognizes the valuable contribution such institutions make. Portions of this book have appeared in different places. “‘Germany ’s Eternal Son’: The Genesis of the Ernst Thälmann Myth, 1930–1950” was published in the May 2009 number of German Studies Review. Parts of chapter 4 originally saw the light of day as “‘Great Truths and Minor Truths’: Kurt Maetzig’s Ernst Thälmann Films and the Politics of Biography in the German Democratic Republic,” in John Davidson and Sabine Hake, eds., Framing the Fifties: Cinema in a Divided Germany, 91–105 (Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2007). Finally, chapter 9 originally appeared in a different version as “‘Imprisoned, Murdered, Besmirched’: The Controversy Surrounding Berlin’s Ernst Thälmann Monument and German National Identity, 1990–1995,” in Silke Arnold-de Simone, ed., Memory Traces: 1989 and German Cultural Memory, 309–334 (Bern: Peter Lang, 2005). I thank all of these publishers for permission to reprint portions of these earlier works. On a more personal level, I thank “Hardy” Jackson, Carmine Di Biase, and Shakil Khan. I owe these three truly fine men more than I can possibly say—or ever repay. My mother and father always encouraged my intellectual pursuits, and for that I am truly grateful. Finally, I thank my wife, Diana, and daughter, Lauren. Scholars’ families are often inconvenienced in unusual ways. My daughter especially has lived with “ET” for as long as she can remember. It is...

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