HUGO ECKENER - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED CIRCA 1947 - HFSID 264491

HUGO ECKENER
Signed ALS promising (1947) an autograph in exchange for sending relief packages to war-devastated Europe.
ALS: "Dr. H. Eckener", 1 page, 3¼x5½ postcard. Akron, Ohio, 1947 July 25. In German, fully translated. To Mr. R. Schoendorf, Glendale, N.Y. In full: "I have been inundated by autograph collector requests and generally reject these requests, however, if you promise the sending of food packages in return, I will be glad to autograph the respective letters because the situation over there is awful. Please mail me the letters, thus, and I shall return them." He probably is referring to the acute shortage of food, fuel and housing in Germany and the rest of Europe in the aftermath of World War II. Hugo Eckener (1869-1954) went to work for the Zeppelin Company in 1908. A skilled airship captain who trained most of Germany's dirigible pilots during World War I, he was Commander of the airship ZR-3 in a transatlantic flight in 1924, the year he became President of the firm. He built the airship USS Los Angeles for the US Navy in repayment of a portion of Germany's reparation debt. Because the German government of the Weimar era could not afford to fund airship construction, Eckener toured the nation raising money by voluntary donations. With these funds, Eckener built the Graf Zeppelin, in which he circled the Earth (1929) and made a polar flight in 1931. Eckener was an outspoken anti-Nazi, who had considered running for President on an anti-Nazi platform in 1933. Because he was a hero to the German people, the Nazis did not arrest him, but they removed him as captain of the Hindenburg prior to the disaster at Lakehurst, New Jersey. (In haste to extract propaganda from airship flights, they also ignored safety rules imposed by Eckener, a contributing factor in the calamity.) When this letter was written, Eckener was working for the Goodyear Corporation in Akron. (He did not, however, design the Goodyear blimp.)Nicked in lower right corner. Otherwise, fine condition.