The Hess family was a prominent, assimilated Jewish family in Pirna, Germany. They owned a large chemical and lacquer manufacturing plant. Gustav and Hermine Hess had three children - Ilse, Manfred, and Albert. All were married in Germany and managed to escape the war. Ilse and her family moved to NY (she married Alfred Rosenstern and the name was later changed to Roston). Manfred, his wife Gertrud"Trud", and their daughters Ursula and Luise left Germany for England in 1939. Albert Günther Hess (AGH) and his family went to Belgium and later to the US. AGH was born on March 1, 1909. He studied music and law; still and motion picture photography was his lifelong hobby. In the 1930s, he made travel and family films on 9.5 mm. He was drafted by the US Army shortly after arriving in the US in the early 1940s. He was in a military intelligence unit, interrogated and translated for Nazi prisoners, interviewed Hermann Goering, and helped liberate Dachau (His photographs are available in the USHMM Photo Archives). In the 1950s, he returned to filming his family and documenting his travels. AGH married three times, first to Ilse Sobel (who appears in many of his early films and who - later in the US - went by the name Peggy Kaufman), next to Gisela Oppens (a refugee and the mother of the donor), and finally to Julia Kao. AGH was also a criminology professor, an airplane pilot, a boater, and a language enthusiast.
IM INNERSTEN WESTFALEN. Boy in suit, VAR shots. Dog, couple playing with dog in winter. Aerial shots. FREUNDE UND BEKANNT. Young couple. CU, man writing at desk. MERAN BEISCHLECHTEM WETTEN... Trees waving in the wind. ... UND BEI GUTEN. Aerial shots, landscape, women smelling blossoms on a tree, CUs blossoms. AM MONT BLAN. Snow capped mountains, people hiking/trekking. AUF DEM GENFER SEE. Homes on waterfront, views from a boat on the sea, men playing violins. GANZ KLEIN SIEHT DER SALEV VON GENF HER AUS! Pan riverside. UEBERHOLTES AUS AROSA. In small village, pedestrians, women, cats on chair. VOR DEM ON MARCH. Well-dressed pedestrians walking on a city street, shops, shop windows. ESCARGOTS. Snails at market. Man going down ladder, lab and machine, goat and two men in field with church in BG. Women in city square with pigeons. DIE BEVOELKERUNG DORT SPRICHT AUFF ENDER WEISE...SOERBSISCH! Man standing outside building in city. ALLES LEBT AUF DEN STRASSE. CU, child in street. STAEDTE UND LAENDER. City buildings in Prague, people at market, tram, church. AMUSEMENTS IN BRUESSEL. Amusement park. IM BOIS. DIE PROVINZLER-SIND ANGEKOMMEN. Group of people sitting in a circle in a park, celebrating a birthday. 06:13 CUs, AGH (Albert Günther Hess), the filmmaker. CUs, a woman. ANDERE WIEDER SITZEN AUF SEHR HOHEM ROSSE. Man on horse in a park. IM SCHWIMMBAD. MSs, woman doing somersault, crowd at beach, swimming, dog in water. Group of boys, shot from below. AKT=SCHLUSS Ende.
The Hess Family in Germany and on vacation