While the pro-Hitlerite element among the German-Americans was perfecting its plans for the boycott against the boycotters of goods made in Nazi Germany, inquiries yesterday at 308 East Eighty-sixth street, given the address of Reinhold Walter, newly-elected head of the League of the Friends of the New Germany, revealed that it was only his mailing address.
A young man at the Eighty-sixth street address, where Yorkville Kanzlei, a travel bureau, is located, declining to give his name, explained to the Jewish Daily Bulletin reporter that letters addressed to Walter come there “once in a while.”
The young man was wearing a button inscribed with the legend, “D. A. W. A.,” the initials being those of the German words standing for the “German-American Protective Alliance,” of the United German Societies of Greater New York, which has launched a movement “with a view to bring about the collapse of the boycott” against German-made goods, as one of the several English and German leaflets displayed on the counter of the travel bureau stated. The name of Anton Hugel also appears on the window of Yorkville Kanzlei.
“WE HAVE OUR OWN WAYS”
The anonymous youth said that Walter had no regular hours at which he could be found in that office, nor would he be particularly interested in publicity in the English-language newspapers as “we have our own ways of reaching the people we are interested in.”
Pointing to the “D. A. W. A.” button in his lapel, the youth proudly explained that more than 10,000 have thud far been distributed to persons wishing to wear them.
He offered a variety of the movement’s literature, one of the German-English leaflets declaring that it “is a question of honor and self-defense” for all opposed to the anti-Hitler boycott to “combine all their forces in order to oppose the armies of destruction and hatred.”
At the Tuesday night meeting it was announced that the movement aspires to enlist 750,000 German Americans in the metropolitan area. Walter’s election to head the New York branch of the League of the Friends of the New Germany to succeed Fritz Gissibl is the result of a new Nazi decree in Germany to the effect that members of the German party are barred from membership or leadership of the American organization. Consequently, the heads of the pro-Hitlerite movement here are being replaced with Germans who are naturalized American citizens.
LEAGUE IS “FLOURISHING”
In his speech of acceptance of the election, which also made him the leader of the national organization of the Friends of the New Germany, Walter declared that the league is now “in a very flourishing condition.”
Carl Nicolai, former acting president of the United German Societies, which at one time was controlled by Heinz Spanknoebel, mysteriously missing since Oct. 27, also addressed the gathering of 2,500 who crowded the Yorkville Casino, 210 East Eighty-sixth street, on Tuesday. At a late hour yesterday a sign in front of the Casino was still proclaiming that “members must show their cards to be admitted.”
Jewish influence was blamed for the boycott sentiment here and various speakers urged a boycott against all boycotting Hitlerite Germany. The D. A. W. A. is planning the publication of a “trade guide” of its member firms.
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