Talk:William Seegers

Argument for Historic Significance

While Mr. Seegers didn't garner much attention while living, his life-story provides a cross-section of issues of the 20th century, from empires to WWI to the downfall of the Kaiser to Spanish flu to socialism to immigration to self-sufficiency to communes to, eventually, living a long, long time (centenarianism). Here is the definitive article on Mr. Seegers:

http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_6366047

Richmond man was drafted by Germany By Chris Treadway CONTRA COSTA TIMES

Article Launched: 07/13/2007 03:17:52 AM PDT

Richmond resident George Johnson was the state's last World War I veteran when he died in August at age 112, and it seemed that was the final chapter in the story of California residents who served during the Great War. At the time, all the remaining soldiers worldwide were older than 100 years old and seemed unlikely to relocate.

But in October, William Seegers left Pennsylvania to live with his daughter in -- of all places -- Richmond. He not only was a veteran of the war, but he also served for the other side.

Seegers, a reluctant draftee into the army of Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1917, died early Tuesday morning at age 106, just weeks after his veteran status had been verified.

"It's kind of ironic that lightning would strike twice in the same place like that," said Robert Young, a senior researcher for the Los Angeles-based Gerontology Research Group. Young, who verifies claims of "super-centenarians," interviewed Seegers in May and verified his claim of being a World War I veteran.

"It's not surprising to find another one, it's just surprising to find another one in the same city," Young said. "There's a chance there's somebody else that someone knows about."

When Seegers was added to the list of known WWI veterans, there was only one other from Germany, although there also were three American veterans and a Canadian veteran living in the United States. All told throughout the world, Seegers made 25.

Only 17 when he was drafted, Seegers was among

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the youngest of the surviving veterans. He never saw active combat and survived not only the war but also childhood malnutrition, tuberculosis and the Spanish flu. His early experiences forged a personality that stressed independence, self-reliance and physical activity. Seegers had a lifelong passion for the outdoors -- particularly gardening and hiking -- and he celebrated his 106th birthday and his arrival in California with a hike in Muir Woods National Monument in Marin County, said daughter Virginia Harrison of Richmond.

Long before the 1960s he was involved with the conservation movement and other progressive causes, and he had lived on a commune.

Seegers and his second wife, the former Eleanor Teasdale, also shared a love of performing and teaching international folk dancing, an activity he started at age 14 and gave up at 94.

As his wife's health declined, Seegers was her primary caretaker until her death in 2005. He continued to live on his own in the house he built in suburban Philadelphia until coming to live with his daughter in October.

"He had a real pride in self-sufficiency," Harrison said. "He really, strongly didn't want to have to depend on someone else."

Born October 24, 1900, outside Brinkum, Germany, Seegers was the second of five siblings. His family was poor, and food often was scarce while he was growing up. About the time he was 8, the household moved to a town in the Harz Mountains that was less hostile to the family's socialist leanings.

Tight times grew worse as Germany became mired in war in 1914.

"The family lived through the blockade," Harrison said. "The citizens suffered through the war and starved. My father told stories about getting one egg a week to eat."

With discretionary income nonexistent, young Seegers found a free source of recreation with an organization called Naturfreunde (Nature's Friends), a back-to-nature movement that would have a profound influence on his life, fostering a love of the outdoors. The organization, founded in 1895 and still in existence, promotes the appreciation and conservation of the natural world.

"The idea was for the people, the workers, to get away for the weekend to hike and eat and recreate," Harrison said.

Seegers' family was strongly opposed to the war, to the point that they left the Lutheran Church because of its support of the Kaiser's military aims.

Seegers, who left school after the eighth grade, contracted tuberculosis at age 15. Two years later, conscripted into the German army, he was hospitalized with the Spanish flu, a victim of the pandemic that killed more people than the war itself.

In an interview in May this year, "He talked about how some of his German compatriots had died of the Spanish flu, even though they were big guys and he was a little guy," recounted Young, the gerontology researcher.

The worldwide pandemic killed millions, but "Getting the flu may have saved his life because it kept him out of combat," Harrison said.

In fact, "He remembered that time with some fondness," she said.

All who were ill were sequestered together, regardless of nationality or allegiance.

"All these guys -- Italians, French, British, German -- made friends with each other. He realized these people were not his enemies," Harrison said.

By the time he returned to active duty, "the German government was falling apart and the Bolshevik revolution was going on," Harrison said. "So he just walked home. He never used the word deserted, but I realize now that's what he did. He wanted to get away. The middle class were all killing each other."

Realizing the penalty for desertion -- execution --Seegers returned to a different infantry regiment, where he served until he was discharged in April 1919.

With bleak conditions and prospects in post-war Germany, Seegers set out for the United States in 1923 with an ambition of traveling the world. He arrived in New Jersey wearing lederhosen and carrying a backpack and guitar over his shoulders, Harrison said, adding that he was dismayed to find lederhosen was not a standard form of dress here.

He left the New Jersey/ New York area after a year and went to live at New Llona, a progressive and socialist commune in Louisiana. It was there that he learned the printing trade that would provide his livelihood. And it was there that he met his first wife, Vinita Thurman, who was working in the print shop. They married and migrated to Philadelphia, where they both found work at union jobs as newspaper typographers.

In 1933 Seegers became a naturalized citizen. Born with the given name Wilhelm, he went by William and was known to most as Bill.

But even as he accepted his new homeland and climbed into the middle class, the couple remained outside the American mainstream. Seegers loved the personal freedom he found in the United States, but true to his self-sufficient nature, he criticized American society as wasteful, Harrison said.

At one point in the 1930s, he delivered a radio talk to the German community on the dangers posed by Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, Harrison said. The broadcast was mysteriously cut off midaddress.

The couple had two daughters, Ramona in 1935 and Virginia in 1943, before divorcing in 1951.

Seegers married Teasdale in 1952, and they bought an acre of land for $1,000 outside Philadelphia, where he built a home for which he drew the plans himself.

"He made and built it from scratch," Harrison said. "He loved doing things by himself, and he was quite good at making things out of almost nothing."

It was there that he indulged his love of gardening, getting up at dawn to prune trees before leaving for work.

"His two biggest passions were dancing and being outside," said granddaughter Julian Carter. He also enjoyed drawing, calligraphy and photography.

"He loved to make concrete changes in the world, things you could see," Carter said.

Reach Chris Treadway at 510-262-2784 or ctreadway@cctimes.com.

EPITAPH

WILLIAM (WILHELM) ALFRED SEEGERS

BORN: Oct. 24, 1900, outside Brinkum, Germany

DIED: July 9, 2007, in Richmond

SURVIVORS: First wife, Vinita Thurman, daughters Ramona Rose-Crossly of Tennessee and Virginia Harrison of Richmond, four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren

SERVICES: Arrangements are pending. For information, call Virginia Harrison at 510-237-5287.

ONLINE: For lists of surviving and recently deceased WWI veterans, visit:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surviving_veterans_of_World_War_I

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veterans_of_the_First_World_War_who_died_in_2007

Death Date Questions

While the San Francisco Chronicle lists Mr. Seegers as dead on July 10, the Contra Costa County Times says July 9. I will attempt to get some first-hand information to resolve this issue...Ryoung122 10:41, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

O.K. I've been told that July 10 was correct.65.81.25.228 21:37, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Greetings, yet another obit says "July 9" but the daughter told me he died 'after midnight' (around 3AM) on July 10. Hopefully the SSDI will have the correct date (at least one story got it right, the SF Chronicle).Ryoung122 23:26, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Why the 'clean-up' tag?

The article looks fine the way it is. If you have a problem with it, it is far better to attempt to make improvements than lazily tag it with a 'cleanup' tag and no explanation.Ryoung122 05:18, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Oops, didn't see this until just now. It needs to be divided into sections instead of long, unbroken sets of paragraphs that make it difficult to read. I have plenty of other things that I have to do, some on Wikipedia, many in the real world. I'd much prefer that someone with the expertise on the subject (aka. you) divide as you see fit, especially since it is an article you started. It's easier for me to clean up small details once you've done the big stuff than to do the big stuff, find out I've missed the point or your visualization for the section, and have all my time wasted. When I devote time to Wikipedia, I prefer to spend it seeing that articles are correctly referenced and that an infobox is placed into them (as you may have noticed, I gave every surviving World War I veteran a proper military personnel infobox, for example). This article is one of many that I one day plan on getting to to reference properly and infobox, but if the creator (or anyone else for that matter) wants to do that while cleaning up, so much the better. I'm only one person after all. Canadian Paul 19:26, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

And a Canadian one at that, Paul. Extremely sexy 19:04, 28 July 2007 (UTC)