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email:
jimwich at anigami dot com

Trench Art Letter Opener Made for my by German POW for U.S. Army Sgt. John C. Leftwich Metz, France - 1945

This past afternoon I've been working on a putting together a few photos that are related to my dad's experiences in World War II.

This is an intricately carved dagger-style letter opener that a German POW carved for him, while being held over at the depot that my dad ran, during transfer on to a prison camp. As German prisoners were captured, they were passed back from the front lines, sometimes stopping for holdovers at U.S. Army Supply Depots.

Dad said that this soldier had been a metal craftsman prior to the war and had made several others like his for other Americans, using old aluminum propeller chunks, bits of brass, and perspex/plexiglas, etc.. The German prisoner carried some of his small tools with him, and my dad gave him cigarettes and chocolate in return for making this dagger-shaped letter opener, which I think is pretty amazing.

The Intricately Carved Eagle atop the Pommel

I've since discovered that there's a growing collectible world of what is called "trench art." There's evidently a lot of trench art from both the World Wars, and other conflicts. Old shell casings carved, or letter openers made from spare chunks of aluminum or brass.

My dad is pushing 80 right now, and he's still pretty sharp on some details, though he never recorded or remembered the German's name. It was in Metz, France though, near the eastern border with Luxembourg, and he said this soldier had made several like this for others, which are most likely out there somewhere with old soldiers or their families. He and I were talking about it and we agreed that maybe if I put some photos of it up on the web along with some details, we might just run into someone else somewhere who has more details, or recognizes the similar style. It would be pretty cool to actually find out who the fellow who made this was and where he ended up, etc..

Here's a few photos from the numerous ones I've taken to document it. If anyone out there knows of a similar letter opener brought back by an Army veteran or knows the whereabouts of any German who may have made this, please contact me via email. I think it is a most fascinating mystery, and one that deserves to be solved. jimwich@anigami.com.
- posted by JIMWICh on 12/24/2001 2:21:04 AM

View from my new office at Pemstar/Pacific Consultants, Inc. Mountain View, CA

Well, I guess a lot of you were beginning to wonder if I'd somehow dropped off the end of the earth.

No, but I have been plenty busy over the past couple of months. At the beginning of October I began my new position as Director of Human Interface Development with Pemstar/Pacific Consultants, Inc. in Mountain View, California. This is an almost indescribably good fit for my interaction architecture skills gained over the past eighteen years. Pacific Consultants is a remarkably broad and deep engineering and analysis consultancy of just under 100 people, which excels in the development of everything from medical to industrial to military to telecommuncation technology, equipment, devices and systems. This year Pacific Consultants was pegged at number 134 in Inc. Magazine's 2001 INC 500 list of fastest growing companies. It's very much the type of broad-based consultancy I've had an eye out for over the past several years. Their new parent corporation, Pemstar, is a world class electronics contract manufacturer. Pemstar itself was ranked number 136 in the INC 500 in 2000.

My new office

EMS (Electronics Manufacturing Services) are a major force redefining the way products are being developed and manufactured these days. See WIRED Magazine's recent article on EMS, and its role in the development of Microsoft's X-Box.

My new office

I feel like I've died and gone to geek heaven! I'm surrounded by software engineers specializing in everything from small and large scale applications, to firmware, to hardware integration, to databases, to wireless. Hardware engineers of every stripe, laser and optical technology, medical doctors, mechanical engineers, and manufacturing specialists.

My new office

I've got a gorgeous office looking out over the courtyard of our California Mission-style campus. Built in the 1940s as the world headquarters of the Seventh Day Adventists, the campus was later home to a publishing business. Laid out in a meandering, park-like style, we have enormous beautiful palms and big trees of many kinds. It's only about five miles straight shot from my condo in Palo Alto, so it's an easy ten-minute hop back and forth.

My new office

As you can imagine, I've been working pretty hard to get things going there, so that coupled with the dismantling of my office and everything at home being still pretty unorganized, has put a serious crimp in my time to work on JIMWICh. But I'm still determined to get back to it because it's so much fun.

Finally I've found a spot where I can ply my architecture at the developmental crossroads where it ALL comes together. This is better than just being a kid in a candy store. This is like being a kid with a candy factory!
- posted by JIMWICh on 12/10/2001 1:52:48 AM

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