Heimat

1918 (November) -- World War I ends. 1919 -- the Weimar Republic is set up at Weimar, Germany. Katharina and Mathias Simon live in the small village of Schabbach in the Hunsrick area of Germany. They have three children: Eduard, Pauline…

1929 -- the Great Depression begins further impoverishing the less fortunate Germans. This puts great pressure on the ill-equipped Weimar democracy. 1932 -- unemployment is now extremely high. The fascist private army, the SA, with…

From Berlin the sickly Eduard brings his wife Lucie home to Schabbach. Lucie is an extremely ambitious woman and wants her husband to rise politically. She constantly henpecks poor Eduard to figure out a way to become more and more…

1938 -- to escape the politically worsening situation in Germany, the famous German movie star Marlene Dietrich emigrates to the United States. A young Swedish girl named Zarah Leander with a lovely singing voice (whose grandparents…

1938 (June) -- German heavy-weight boxer Max Schmeling loses badly in a rematch with American boxer Joe Louis. A bombshell is dropped on Maria and Otto. Paul Simon of Simon Electric Incorporated, Detroit, Michigan, USA, has written to…

1943 -- the last large-scale German offensive assault on the eastern front begins at Kursk. The military situation really begins to deteriorate for the Germans in the Soviet Union. Maria gave birth to a son by Otto, named Hermann,…

1944 (June 6) -- the allied forces land on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. 1944 (July 20) -- would-be assassins plant a bomb which goes off near Hitler, but Hitler escapes death. 1944 (August 25) -- liberation of Paris. 1944…

1945 (May 8) -- Germany surrenders. Lucie sees the arrival of the Americans in Schabbach as just another opportunity for her to help Eduard move up in terms of economic and political power. Paul Simon is now able to return to…

1955 -- West Germany joins NATO, while East Germany joins the Warsaw Pact. Maria absolutely dotes on her son Hermann. She has great plans for him, wanting him to become very educated. He is actually the first member of the family…

1968 -- there are student demonstrations and unrest in West Germany as in the rest of the West. 1969 -- Chancellor Willy Brantd opens negotiations with East Germany. He is also the man who introduced color television to West…

1982-1998 -- reign of Helmut Kohl as Chancellor of Germany. He saw the destruction of the Berlin Wall (November 9, 1989) and the formal unification of West and East Germany (October 3, 1990). At the age of 82, Maria Simon dies. The…