If you ask, most authors will tell you why they wrote their books. Hans J. Massaquoi’s reason has more to do with others. “My friends knew about my life, and they kept asking me if I was going to write a book,” says Massaquoi, retired managing editor of Ebony magazine. “I wrote it partly so they would stop asking.”
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Like many German schoolboys, Massaquoi initially embraced the Nazis, who had come to power in 1932. It was part of being a good German, and more than anything else Massaquoi wanted to fit in. He and his classmates “were attracted to marches, the military bands,” he says. “Those things really attract young boys. We were really gung-ho. None of us, however, had the slightest idea what National Socialism meant. We were slowly and imperceptibly seduced.”
Despite his attempts to blend in, Massaquoi couldn’t change his skin color in a land promoting the idea of Aryan superiority, and he was subjected to regular taunts from his classmates. His applications to join the Hitler Youth and later the army were rejected. The worst harassment came from Wriede. The principal, who grew a Hitler-style mustache and always wore his Nazi uniform to school on special days, constantly reminded Massaquoi that he didn’t belong and relegated him to the sidelines of school activities.
The bodies of Hitler and Eva Braun were found in a bunker on April 30, 1945. “When the news flashed repeatedly over the radio at our shelter, it was met with neither jubilation nor sorrow, just monumental, yawning indifference,” Massaquoi writes. “I was surprised by the reaction,” he says now. “Here was a man who was regarded as a demigod. Most people said ‘good riddance’ when he died. At that point, however, jobs were scarce, young men were coming home in caskets, and there wasn’t much food.”
