The Mountain Lodge at Camp King, Oberursel before its Major Renovation

A reader just asked me for photos of the Mountain Lodge, Camp King, in Oberursel before it was changed to this modernized state.

This might be an interesting visual tour for all the enlisted personnel, who were stationed at Camp King, but did not get to see the NCOs building from the inside.

Mountain Lodge, Camp King, Oberursel in August 2016

 

The photos below I took when the Candy Bomber paid us a visit back in June of 2013. The guest of honor at the tour and discussion was Col. Gail S. Halvorsen USAF (Ret.), one of the last surviving pilots of the Airlift.

This is a medley of interior photos. If anyone can help identify the location of some of the rooms, please share it under comments. I have posted the photos in the same way I walked through the house.

Attic of the Mountain Lodge, Camp King Oberursel

 

Open House at the Mountain Lodge, Camp King

 

 

Hallway at the Mountain Lodge, Camp King in Oberursel

Manfred Kopp and the Candy Bomber, June 2013

Hope you’ve enjoyed this tour.

German Lesson: der Schießstand

What connection do the Oberstedten/Oberursel Shooting Range Club (Schützenverein) and our current Tax and Revenue Office in Bad Homburg have in common? There is one, and it will take us back to WWII.

First, there is this sign at the corner of the road ‘Im Rosengärtchen’ and ‘Forsthausweg’ with that particular Schießstand located at Forsthausweg 9 (towards the animal shelter). This Schießstand is only about a three-minute walk away from the main road. I must have passed this many times without knowing it.

Schießstand

The sign reminded me of the Schützenvereinfest (shooting club fest), located further into the forest towards Oberstedten, which we went to on Christ Ascension Day, a public holiday, which also happens to be Father’s Day in Germany. We go there every year.

On that day, the Schützenverein serve homemade salads, the young ones are behind the grill, occasionally they have a band playing, and the elderly ladies run the cake stand in the back of the club.

Two weeks ago, we were there again with our French family in town. It was interesting to see no indication whatsoever of its club purpose at their fest. Just beer on the table, happy people on benches, the smell of barbecued Bratwurst, and kids running around.

Schützenverein

When the club manager heard, we had brought Parisians to this little fest, he came out to share a bit more about this place.

This shooting range was used for training by soldiers stationed in Bad Homburg during WWII. They’d walk from Bad Homburg through the village of Oberstedten to get to the shooting range. Their military barracks were located what is now the Tax and Revenue Office (Finanzamt) on the Kaiser-Friedrich-Promenade.

Well, major renovations at the Tax and Revenue Office have been underway since January 2016, and so it has temporarily moved to Norsk-Data-Straße 1, in Ober-Eschbach. The restoration should be completed by late 2017. Add at least another six months, since after all, this is Germany, where any form of construction generally takes longer.

Vocabulary: der Schießstand: schießen (to shoot) + der Stand (stand/range)

Be mindful of the pronunciation. In German, when you have a double vowel such as ‘ie’, you’d pronounce the second vowel ‘e’ (a long e in English) only.

If you mispronounce it, and say it with a long ‘i’ instead, you get ‘scheißen’, which is something completely different.

Camp King and its Historic Buildings

Located the end of the slope, the Mountain Lodge overlooks former Camp King. Of all the remaining buildings since the departure of the U.S. Army, the lodge is the only one without a purpose.

All others are used either as residences or e.g., today’s Kinderhaus, which serves as a child-care center, also has a long history:

1922 Villa Haus am Wald (House on the edge of the woods), residence
1933 Sports facility for Frankfurt University
1938 (after renovation) conference center for the Gau settler school (Gau: close to the English term shire; The administrative use of the term stood for subdivision during the period of Nazi Germany in 1933–1945)
1939 Kommandant’s Office of the Auswertestelle West (Intelligence and Evaluation Center West)
1945 Conference room and work place for the Historical Division, Name: House Florida
1950 Used for conferences, meetings, community hall, among others. Name: House 997

Kinderhaus

Walking by there today, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, I even saw a children’s party being set up in the garden behind.

This is in sharp contrast to the Mountain Lodge, which started out as an agricultural school (1939), then was later converted  to Officers’ Club (or Mountain Lodge) by the Americans.

The Mountain Lodge had been purchased by a private investor in June 2010 (you can read more about this on Officers’ Club at Camp King finds Investor), but there are no repairs to be seen. As a matter of fact, it looks worse every year.

The city has added a sign right next to the Mountain Lodge to remind pedestrians to pay attention:

Attention! No snow removal service, damaged paths, enter at your own risk

Achtung!

Another photo update below showing the current idle state. This is mostly due to its well-off German neighbors, who petition any kind of development, on behalf of their privacy.

Building permits were issued for housing in close proximity, for the sake of profit.

Mountain Lodge in Camp King July 2012

This report states renovation should be completed by 2013. Unfortunately, it looks as if it hasn’t even started yet.

Officers’ Club at Camp King finds Investor

In my last post  from 18 June, I had reported about the difficulties in finding an investor to take on the Officers’ Club. All that has changed within the last two weeks – after 17 years of lying idle.

The Taunuszeitung, dated 30 June 2010, had the following article Luxus hinterm Fachwerk (extravagance behind the half-timber). The Oberurseler Woche, date 01 July 2010, also carried an article titled  Im Offizierskasino entstehen Wohnungen (The Officers’ Club will change into apartments).

Over the years, several investors had been interested in the Officers’ Club, but none of their plans of turning it into any kind of business got approved. The residents of this Villenviertel (exclusive residential area) had enough say-so to put any type of business plans to rest.

This has come to an end with the current investor’s proposal for turning the building into privately owned apartments. To do that, the investor set up his own corporation, Mountain Lodge Grundstücks-GmbH, and bought the areal of 1200 qm (close to three acres) from the city of Oberursel.

The Officers’ Club (also called Mountain Lodge around here) has found a new purpose, and the previous hope of getting the basement to house the Camp King archives is lost. Manfred Kopp, the Camp King archivist, is still without a permanent home for the Camp King archives, but we will continue looking for an appropriate location.

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