Albert Rix

Albert once told me of his days in the German Army during the war and details of the bitter end when their position was overrun by Russian tanks and imprisonment in a concentration camp where a good many died of starvation. He said that having studied the types of insects the bears at the zoo relished, he managed to stay comparatively healthy, so much so he was sometimes accused of collaborating with the enemy. He and the other Officers received harsh interrogations and he quickly learned that those who provided all the information they knew were afterward never seen again so he remained silent figuring he would die anyway. Then one morning they awakened to find the Guards had vanished and then the ordeal of getting out of Russia began. He  sounded bitter when he described his arrival home and finding the same people who had agitated the war still in Office and making large sums of money during the country's restoration. In fact his own family urged him to rejoin the furniture business but decided to return to the Hagenbeck Zoo and at the first opportunity delivered one of the Zoo's arena bear acts to the Ringling Show and remained. PS I wish I could write better and describe the day of his capture. Albert said that aboard the tanks were unkempt Russian farm women bearing scythes and pitch forks, screaming hysterically and hacking away.