Well, now settled in for what looks like it will be a month. Simple routine: sleep until whenever, potter around, drink coffee, read (and write a little), have supper, go to bed, read a little more and watch Cheers, get off to sleep. As they say (whoever ‘they’ are) it’s not rocket science.
My sister and brother-in-law aren’t due back until February 4 and we (my brother and I) will probably not leave until February 10. Got a couple of duty visits to make (which I never look forward to, though they are no great deal) but apart from that it is just: do as you please. Might get into a bit of walking, but I’ll leave that at ‘might’ as I’m often a great one for plans which remain unrealised. The only thing I must bloody do — and I mean — must is get as much of this Hemingway bollocks done as I can, to get it out of the way. Still reading and — a little — re-writing, but it’s got to be more writing and re-writing.
. . .
Repaired my nephew’s guitar so I have a guitar (a metal acoustic) to play while I am here. The only thing which was wrong with it was that the handle of one of the machine heads had long ago broken off, so the guitar couldn’t be tuned properly. The head which had snapped off was the one with which you tuned the top E string, so all the other strings had to be tuned to that string. The guitar wasn’t particularly out-of-tune when you did do that, just a little, but I prefer a guitar to be as in-tune as it should be.
I had bought a set of machine heads in Bodmin and brought them with me, and set about replacing the old ones on Wednesday (we arrived on Tuesday night), but what should have been a straightforward job got a little more difficult when one of the guitar pegs (which hold the strings at the bridge) bust as I was easing it out. By the look of it it had previously been broken, then repaired, but by now it was in two pieces and useless.
I ordered a set on Amazon (and a winder to boot) which was due to arrive yesterday, but (as usual) became impatient and wanted some pegs now, so I googled ‘guitar shops near me’ to I could visit one and buy some. The closest, in Leer, 15 miles away was Musik Bruns, and I was all set for a trippette to go there on Thursday, but luckily then noted (it wasn’t very prominent on the website) that the shop was closed for refurbishment until February 11.
It was off then to my second choice, Gitarrenbau Massen, in Esterwegen, 38 miles away, which I had found in my search, so off I went on Thursday: but it wasn’t the guitar shop I had, without thinking about it, imagined it to be
but a guitar factory. Actually, Gitarrenbau was the clue and I had picked up on that, but for some reason I thought it would be a small workshop. It wasn’t.
The guy who owns and runs it — alone now because, as he told me, at 70 he doesn’t have the energy to run a business and is winding it down — was alone with a large showroom of about 50 guitars, a warehouse with I don’t know how many more guitars in their boxes and a workshop with the bits and pieces — bodies and necks — of about 100 more. (He doesn’t make them all, but also resells brands such as Fender and Yamaha.)
I told him I was looking for guitar pegs and he sold me ten and two plectrums for €5. Then I asked what was a factory this size — not big but certainly not small and certainly not just a workshop — like this doing in the back of beyond like Esterwegen?
In fact, it isn’t even in Esterwegen, a village of about 4,500 souls, but about two miles out of town (towards the main Bundesstraße 401 (which connects Oldenburg to the Bundesautobahn 31 to the west if you are interested, though I can’t imagine many are unless, of course, you are a travelling salesman, are lost somewhere in the area and have come across this blog by chance, in which case: Hi, but back to the main narrative). What, I asked Friederich (that was his name, but in fact it is his surname. I have since discovered his full name is Hans-Günter Friederich) is a factory of this size doing in the back of beyond (ganz weit draußen, though I can’t remember if I actually used the phrase)?
Well, he told me, when he was younger, he and his family built up a thriving guitar-building business near Dortmund (which is in industrial North-Rhine Westphalia). In fact, it was doing so well, they wanted to expand their premises, but found the cost of commercial land in the area was extortionately high, and (somehow) came across the present site in Esterwegen which was just a fraction of the price. So the whole factory, with his Meister (those he employed to help build the guitars), moved 140 miles north and never looked back. Rent was cheaper (I’m assuming they rent, but perhaps they bought the land) and it was a far nicer part of the country in which to live and raise a family.
I have to say I was puzzled by why in a factory that size with several hundred guitars, some finished, some in the process of being built, he was the sole worker. Well, he said, he was winding it all down. He had been selling guitars worldwide through his website, but was simply getting tired of it all and wanted to enjoy life a bit more. That makes sense to me. And did he also play guitar? No, he said, building them ruins your fingers.
. . .
I’ve just done a Google search and found this story about Friederich and his factory which appeared two years ago in the Osnabrücker Zeitung. It seems the business was started by his father in the village of Massen, near Unna about 12 miles from Dortmund, where they lived. Here are a few piccies nicked from the Osnabrücker Zeitung of the man at work.
Hans-Günter will have been seven at the time. Eight years later, the company Gitarrenbau Massen was founded and and apart from building their own guitars, they also imported half-completed electric guitars from the United States, can finished them off. The move to Esterwegen came 15 years later, in 1980. His father knew the area because the family had a holiday home there.
PS I might seemed to have acted precipitously by not waiting for the guitar pegs I had ordered from Amazon to arrive, as promised, the following day, but in fact I’m glad I did. I was able to fit the new machine heads and put a new set of strings on the guitar — and play it — by Thursday evening.
The Amazon guitar heads did arrive on time and as planned, but 683 miles away at home in St Breward. I had given my home address as the delivery destination. Must be more careful. I couldn’t understand why I got a message from Amazon saying ‘the item has been delivered’ when so obviously it had not.
. . .
Some reading this might be familiar with the name Esterwegen or it might just ring a bell. If so the two letters ‘KZ’ will make things clearer. The Nazis came to power on January 30, 1933, and just five/six months later they had established their first prison camp. In this case it was for political opponents (and why that small detail didn’t already ring alarm bells in the rest of Europe is baffling). Three years later it became a regular prison camp, although political prisoners well also kept there. After the war, the British used it was a PoW camp.
Here’s a picture of the Esterwegen KZ memorial:
