Waiting for Lindbergh, 1927
On May 21, 1927, my father was in the crowd of more than 100,000 people who gathered at this airfield near Paris to await the arrival of Charles Lindbergh at Read More ...
Welcome to the 1930s
Boulogne-Billancourt is the largest suburb of Paris, which makes it the second largest city in the Île-de-France, after Paris itself. Although I am not a big fan of 1930s architecture, Read More ...
Palais de la Porte Dorée in Paris
This building from the year 1931 is now something of an embarrassment (anyone who isn’t embarrassed ought to be) because the whole front façade is covered by crass propaganda bas-reliefs Read More ...
Operas and cycling in . . . Gelsenkirchen?
In 1958 the Austrian singer-songwriter Georg Kreisler (1922-2011), author of Lola Blau and the hilarious Opera Boogie, made a lot of enemies in this part of Germany with his song Read More ...
Arrival in Tân Ba 1964
From October 1964 to March 1965 I was the lowest ranking member of a five-man American “advisory team” stationed in a small Vietnamese village called Tân Ba on the bank Read More ...
Mitterrand and the Panthéon
Every time I ride past the Panthéon in Paris I am reminded of a man I met in Berkeley, California when I was living there in 1967. I was working Read More ...
Tomb of l’Emperrrreurrrrr
My first visit to Napoléon’s tomb was in the 1960s. It was a memorable visit because of the elderly gentleman who told us in great detail about the glorious life Read More ...
Rostock 1989
It wasn’t planned that way, but my first visit to Rostock came at a major turning point in recent German history. I arrived there on 14 November 1989, just five Read More ...
Tay Ninh and Cu Chi 1995
On our last day in Vietnam in 1995, my son Nick and I took an excellent day tour (organized by the Sinh Café) from Saigon that went first to Tay Read More ...
About me
Hello, my name’s Don. I’m an American living in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, where I teach, ride a bicycle and go to the opera. I became an opera fan at Read More ...
Frankfurt OperaTalk
If you speak English, live in or near Frankfurt and are interested in opera, be sure to sign up for Germany’s only English-language opera appreciation course, Frankfurt OperaTalk, at the Read More ...
Opern-Gespräche
Seit 1999 leite ich einen Kurs namens „Opern-Gespräche“ an der Volkshochschule Frankfurt. In diesem Kurs reden wir (nicht nur ich!) mit fachkundigen Gästen aus dem Opernbetrieb über das reichhaltige Frankfurter Read More ...