Aunt Franka

There is so much stuff about Aunt Franka, this site will be reserved for family notes, etc. Otherwise, I will collect information on a separate site. Click here.

Mom's Memoirs:

Take 1:

Franka left Berlin in 1924 to get married to Dr. Moritz Tramer. She was 40 years old by then and this was not exactly a romance. (Franka had a PhD in psychology; her field was mainly professional aptitude, business psychology, etc. )She had been engaged at least once before, to Eduard Fuchs, the social historian, but I don’t know what happened to that engagement. During WWI she had worked at the Royal Library in Berlin and had been much involved with Polish prisoners of war. I have some of their (Moritz and Franka) correspondence immediately preceding heir marriage[1] and it is utterly devoid of endearments. They decided to use the familiar “du” only after Franka had accepted Tramer’s proposal (in a registered letter saying only “Ja – Tramerchen”!) (Mom’s note on side: Tramerchen is a form of endearment in German; actually it is used to indicate something small, eg: Kind – Kindchen; Mutter – Mutterchen; Hund – Hundchen). 

Tramer’s career is a story in itself. He came from poor Jewish farm parents in Mahren; left home as a boy to go to Basel, finished a technical school there, worked (where is he lost ½ finger in some machinery), and studied mathematics.  He taught math in Zurich at a private school thus putting himself through medical school. He became a psychiatrist and just before his marriage accepted the job of superintendent  (director) of the co------- mental institution in Solothurn (“Kantonale Heilanstalt”) hereon known as “Rosegg”.  The Rosegg was surrounded by farm land and orchards, had cattle and poultry, a working farm; worked mostly by the patients. I loved wondering about there, watching swallows nest in the stables. For Franka this was an enormous change, a real cultural shock, from a cosmopolitan metropolis to a sleepy little Swiss town with less than 7 Jewish families. I believe Tramer had promised that this would be only a temporary job but he stayed there for 22 years. Franka taught as a “Privatdozentin” at the University of Bern during all the years in Solothurn, wrote books and articles, engaged in polemics (attacked – or was being attacked by – colleagues via newspapers, express letters etc) and spent most of her life at her desk. Her hearing was impaired early (supposedly by Scarlett fever as a young girl, which made it impossible for her to learn “scion per-----“ (can’t decipher) and she remained an outsider, socially isolated. 

Late in life she was named a Professor Emeritus at the University of Bern, a much sought-after distinction which came pitifully late. She sent my mother a telegram announcing, “Suis Professeur”. Tramer also taught as a P-D (Privatdozent) at the University of Zurich for many years and eventually was named Proffessor. 

It was a pretty competitive marriage; both were workaholics and wrote profusely. Tante Franka did not just stick to professional work (her big success was a book published in 1924, I believe, on professional aptitude tests; it was translated into many languages and became standard text at many universities.) Later on, she fancied herself a counselor in life situations and published something like advice columns under different names, (Professionally she was known as Franziska Baumgarten or Franziska Baumgarten-Tramer, privately as Fran Dr Tramer (sas: can’t quite decipher that). Tramer (Franka called him “Dudi” and I “Uncle Tramer”; he hated his given name Moritz) was instrumental in developing the branch of “child psychiatry” (Kinder psychiatrie). In Switzerland he was recognized as the “father of child psychiatry”; I don’t believe that this recognition was totally international. He wrote the first major text on the subject in German (Lehrbuck der Kinderpsychiatrie) and edited his own journal “Zeitschrift der KP” later “Kinderpsychiatrie, Acta paedopsychiatrica. His counterpart in the States was Prof Leo Kanner of Baltimore, a friend of his. In the late 20’s (?) Tramer was in Washington DC and I believe there was talk of his having an attractive offer there but nothing came of it – I do not know the circumstances. [Shirley’s note: if you Google Leo Kanner, he is credited with being the “father of child psychiatry” Interesting] 

The Tramers did not have children; I spent many summers with them, the first in 1927 and in 1933 there was serious discussion of whether I should stay with them (Hitler situation). Inquires were made about school etc but the plan was not carried out and I do not remember why not. Peter Baumgarten also visited there for extended periods of time; one summer (1934?) together with me and we played at pretending we were brother and sister.

Take 2:

I think it was probably the sorrow of his [Uncle Tramer's] life that he did not have any children; but Franka was 40 by the time they got married, and in the nineteen twenties I am sure this was not considered child-bearing age any more. Anyway, I know even as a teenager their relationship always puzzled me: they slept in a double bed, but they never went to bed at the same time, nor did they get up at the same time: Uncle was the “early to bed early to rise” type, aunt the night owl. She called him “Dudi” (pronounce:”doodee”),  he called her Franka, the good-night was a peck on the cheek... I never heard any endearments, and yet they were married over forty years. They had some friends, not very intimate, but then the Swiss are not very outgoing people on the whole. I remember a Dr. Schnyder, an ophthalmologist, I believe. Of course Franka was very handicapped socially, because of her very poor hearing (no decent hearing aids available in those days, I remember her struggling with a huge battery, which kept giving up its ghost, also experimenting with some other hearing aids - maybe her deafness was of the kind that did not respond to aids I believe she lost her hearing after a bout with Scarlet Fever as a teenager(?); this also made it impossible for her to learn the Swiss-German dialect (difficult to learn at the best of times -   and the Swiss did not like to use “Hoch deutsch” for anything  but the written language. My  own “Schwytzer duetsch” was not very good, sort of a mixture between the Bernese and the Zuerich dialects, but that’s what I always spoke with Heidi anyway. (Each canton has its own dialect, some of them much harder to understand than others, the worst are the ones spoken in the four “Ur Kanton”, the original kantons where Switzerland was founded around what is now the “Vierwald stetter See” = Lake of Lucerne in this country. (I used to be very interested in Swiss legends, had a fat book on Swiss legends and tales of heroes, the Swiss have an interesting history). As I said, Solothurn was located at the foot of the Jura Mountains, to be precise at the foot of the “Weissenstein”. I guess ( and I mean “guess” - too lazy to look it up) that Solothurn was ca 700m above sea level, and the Jura mountains up to 1500m? (I just looked it up, the highest peak is in the Geneva area, Cret de la Neige, 5,600ft  - I spent a weekend there once with Rene) A local train ran along the foot of the mountains (coming from Basel) and the station of that train was quite near the “Rosegg”, where uncle worked.  It was a “kantonale Nervenheilanstalt”, an institution for mental patients, and Uncle Tramer, a psychiatrist, was the director. The director had his quarters in the main administrative building, but by the time I had a family of my own, there was a separate Villa for the director as I have mentioned before, and it was plenty big for just two people, hence I could have my own room when I stayed there. (There were at least three bedrooms - and a maid’s room in the attic). My uncle was very fond of walking, his only exercise, -he could not swim as far as I remember- and a day excursion to the Weissenstein was one of the favorites.  Aunt F would “schlepp” along. She was terribly afraid of little bridges over little streams, and there were plenty of those in the mountains!   The Tramers were also supposedly fond of animals, but I don’t think they were very successful in their relationships with animals: they had a Bernese Mountain Dog called “Ferry” at one time, but the poor thing did not get enough exercise, and I believe getting too fat killed him. They also had cats , I remember a pair of Siamese kittens, again there is a photograph of them somewhere, but I can’t tell how long they were around and what happened to them. There also was a canary at one time.  Did Tramer have a parrott at one time or do I get this mixed up with my father-in-law, who definitely DID have a grey parrot as a young man (there was a certain similarity between my uncle and Henry’s father) Canaries were very popular pets in those days, my grandparents in Poland had one too.  I may have had one myself at one time, but not very long. I had two  African finches, pretty little birds, but I was always so sorry for them to have to live in a small cage. I tried to let them fly around the room, but then I could not get them back into the cage! Again I don’t remember how long I had them and what happened to them (I am talking about Berlin days, of course) 

...

The Tramers had an apartment on Thunstrasse, a nice part of town, and they each had their own office in there, perfectly reflecting their characters; Uncle’s was tidy., Aunt’s unbelievably messy;  I know Ralph’s looks messy (the very few times I ever got a glimpse of it,)  but I think he has order in his madness, using the floor for filing etc, however Aunt Franka’s was just a heap of papers, how she ever found anything is beyond comprehension, especially since she had very poor vision. She had had cataract surgery, but I don’t believe it was as successful as it is nowadays, or maybe she had glaucoma as well. She employed a typist, but I don’t think the typist’s responsibilities included straightening things out. They bought the house in Spiegel, a suburb at the end of the streetcar route, very pretty  (albeit very small) to have somewhere to get away to easily, and Uncle especially loved it. (Later on, when I inherited it, it turned out that it was so overmortgaged, that the lawyer at first was not sure whether I should even accept the inheritance, because I would become responsible for all the debts. It then turned out that the ground it stood on had gained value and was quite sellable. Eventually a small apartment house, 4 units, was built on the site. After Uncle’s death (I don’t believe it happened before) Franka litterally stuffed the little house to the gills with papers. I tried to hire one of her secretaries to go through the stuff to sort out anything of value, but it was a totally thankless task, and before the sale all the paper mess was simply destroyed (“eingestampft” ) One day, when I tried to catch them to put back behind bars I ended up with the tailfeathers  in my hand! A tragedy long remembered in my family.  Reportedly I said “I made two creatures unhappy for the rest of their lives”. But lo and behold, in due time the feathers grew back in! I had also been told by her that she had valuable manuscripts at the bank, with instructions that they could not be opened until twenty years after her death. When that time had approached we were not travelling to Switzerland any more but I asked the bank to access it for me.It turned out to be practically all in Polish, I think the bank gave me a table of content, and the manuscript of a novel (autobiographical in nature?), 

Notes:

1. Not sure that I have found this correspondence yet, but I have found some in Uncle Tramer's archives, including a letter to Franka's mother, speaking to the "love' issue.

2. Don't know who Nirl and U. Tramer are. 

3. Langendorf, Switzerland?

4. Mom's stamp collecting I guess! 

5. Don't know who this is, but obviously someone who felt she knew both Mom and her mother, as well as Franka. Franka's archives include some other correspondence from  Frieda Weigelt, dated 1947-1952, Berlin/Spandau.

6. I had forgotten that Aunt Franka had sent the samovar to Mom as a gift. Don't know anything about the custom duties and whether Mom recovered them.