ABSTRACT
Sixty years have passed since the last events described in this book, a quarter of a century since I first wrote about them. I do not longer recall how I envisaged the future at that time, but I am virtually certain that most of my expectations were quite different from what actually happened. At the end of my Introduction I wrote, “I had left my native city for the second, and I suppose last time in my life.” Even this is not true, for decades later I returned with a film crew. This apparently impressed the people working at the reception desk of the hotel so much that they offered us the room in which Adolf Hitler had once stayed. I settled for the room that had been given to Marlene Dietrich during her stay. Many of my friends and coworkers of those years are no longer with us, but my family has considerably expanded and it has become difficult to remember all the birthdays of the great grandchildren.
