Memories from the First Grand Valley State study abroad
program based in Klagenfurt, Austria
June 29 to August 29, 1971
by Alison McManus Walters Class of 1973
The summer of 1971 is one I’ll never forget but the more I remember
the more I realize I have forgotten. Fortunately I kept a journal
which certainly helps but I now have so many questions that I don’t
know if I ever knew the answers.
I don’t remember there being any planning meetings for the students
at Grand Valley before we departed on or any lists suggesting what to
bring or what we could do once we got to Europe. I obviously knew
enough to get my passport which involved walking around downtown
Detroit to get an official copy of my birth certificate and then to a
bank to get a cashier’s check because the passport office didn’t take
cash. No how-to information on that project! I don’t know if my
parents had received any information either…they never said and I
never asked. I have no idea who arranged and purchased my airline
tickets to and from DTW; I just had them!
Most of the students flew from Detroit to New York JFK to Amsterdam
where we were met by the Professors Seeger (Wilhelm and Mary) who were
our “parents” for the rest of the trip. After our first night in
Europe we had a wonderful day in Amsterdam with a city tour which
included the Rijksmuseum, a canal tour, a windmill, a wooden shoe
factory, a diamond cutters, concluding with lunch at an Indonesian
restaurant. We had some free time in the afternoon and several of us
went to the Anne Frank House. We bought sandwich makings so we would
have food on the train and some how we got from Amsterdam to Rotterdam
where we caught a train which was heading toward Austria.
We had 2nd class seats when we started out from Rotterdam but when we
switched trains round midnight there were NO available seats so we had
to stand until we took over some 1st class coaches and crashed for the
night. About 2:30 am the conductor came around and collected more
money which was only going to get us to Salzburg. Once we got to
Salzburg we had to stand again, so when we arrived in Klagenfurt we
had been on the train for what seemed like forever and had eaten only
the food we had purchased in Amsterdam and had very little sleep or
resting time.
We were met by Professor Gearhart and his wife who had a bus which
took us to Jugendorf which was the complex we would be staying at for
the six weeks. It was a facility with several buildings with dorms
upstairs and classrooms and dining room downstairs. It was not in the
city of Klagenfurt but probably only a mile or two from downtown. We
did have access to the beach down the hill on the Wörther See or Lake
Worth “The Austrian Riviera”.
All of us had traveler’s checks, none of us had credit cards (and I
doubt any of the merchants were using them anyway in 1971) so to get
us started Professor Gearhart gave us each 100 shillings (Austrian
money before the Euro, at that time a shilling was worth about 4
cents; therefore we had $4). We had to wait until the banks in town
were open before we could cash our traveler’s checks so it was a
logistical nightmare between our class hours and the bank’s hours
(almost everything is closed from 12-2:30 Monday through Friday). I
have a record of my traveler’s checks and I had 50 of them for $10
each and usually cashed one or two at a time. When we traveled on
weekends we would usually bunk two to three to a room and pay about $5
each for two nights.
One big problem we had that summer is that the dollar was devalued
twice, once during the first six weeks and the second time during the
last two. That meant that if we had the equivalent of $100 on
Tuesday, it was only worth about $85 on Wednesday—big problem. While
we were at the Jugendorf it didn’t really matter much because our
basics were supplied to us; it was during the weekends and the final
two-weeks of free time that it became a major issue. In hindsight
some of the things I did buy were ridiculous inexpensive, such as the
dirndl I bough for $34.80 and theater tickets for about $1.
Partially due to the devaluation of the dollar but also due to many
“Fly-by-night airlines offering too cheap flights to Europe thousands
of college students were stranded all over Europe but it was most
evident train stations where students would be sleeping on the
platforms or in nearby parks. Many of them had Eurorail passes so
could ride the trains for free but only if there was room.
In addition to no credit cards it was also before any kind of cell
phone. I don’t believe anyone made a phone call home or received a
phone call the entire eight weeks we were gone. I would guess if it
was available it would have been at the post office but I am only
guessing. We did receive mail and of course sent postcards but we
also sent pre-paid aerograms which were available everywhere in the
world at the post office. It was a single sheet of (usually) light
blue paper specifically cut out to be carefully folded into the shape
of an envelope when the inside was completely filled in with a
letter. No enclosures were allowed but it was so light that it was
much less expensive to send then a regular letter.
The local tourist attraction was Minimundus which was similar to
modern day Lego exhibits with 1 : 25 scale models of famous buildings
including the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the White House, etc. It was
between town and Jugendorf so it was very accessible for us. In 2019
it has 159 models.
During the six weeks I was in Austria I visited the following:
botanical gardens, the castle called Mageregg with peacock and elk,
Maria Saal and its open air museum and cathedral, the newly discovered
Roman ruins called Magdalensburg, the mountain Grossglockner and the
church near Heiligenblut, a gun shop owned by Joseph Winkler who
handmade beautiful etched hunting guns that must have been
presentation pieces, spent the weekend in Vienna seeing lots of
buildings but most memorable was St. Stephen’s cathedral where we went
up to the bell tower in a two-person elevator and down into the
catacombs and saw thousands of bones, spent another weekend in
Salzburg, rode a funicular rail car, Innsbruck, Garmisch
Partenkirchen, Linderhof Palace, Oberammergau, Berchtesgaden, the Gurk
cathedral which had such close ties with England that it built a
chapel to St. Thomas Beckett six years after his death and its floors
are the same as Canterbury Cathedral, went to a Vienna Philharmonic
concert in a Rococo church, visited the construction site of the
Kölnbrein hydroelectric dam, attended a movie (Das Arrangement/The
Arrangement), a drama (Die Fledermaus/The Bat), and visited a SOS
Kinderdorf which is one of hundreds of permanent housing facilities
which were started in 1949 and is a village which includes a school,
medical clinic, recreational activities and 6-15 houses each of which
has a “mother” and several children who live in a unit indefinitely as
a family.
In addition to all the excursions we took around Austria both with
the Seegers and on our own we attended three important receptions.
The first was with the Governor of the state of Kärnten which is the
state Klagenfurt is located (first time I ever had caviar!) ; the
second was with President Lubbers and his wife at the Jugendorf; the
third was with the Mayor of Klagenfurt. Aside from the obvious
connection that President Lubbers was the president of Grand Valley he
and Professor Gearhart had both attended/worked at Hope College and
were good friends.
On Monday, August 2, was an extra special treat for all the homesick
Grand Valley students: the Seegers made a feast with REAL hamburgers
(custom ground beef with soft rolls), REAL potato chips, ketchup,
mustard, pickles and tomatoes!!! Oh, it was wonderful!
Before I left the United States I had purchased a two-week Britrail
pass but had to buy my airline tickets from Klagenfurt to London to
Paris (which is why I had so much money in traveller’s checks). I
flew in a four-propeller plane to Salzburg switched planes to fly to
Frankfurt, and landed in London. I immediately got on a train and
headed to Scotland. Those two weeks are another story, however, due
to the devaluation of the dollar I had to get money from home and all
the London and Edinburgh American Express offices were insanely busy.
I went to a post office in Ayr , Scotland, (birthplace of Robert
Burns) and sent the only telegram of my life to my parents who lived
in Birmingham, Michigan, and had them send me $100 at the Birmingham,
England, American Express office because I knew it wouldn’t be busy.
I was right and the money did come but my dad didn’t ask for a copy of
the telegram (apparently they called him and read it to him) so I
never got to see what my telegram looked like which I regret because I
know I would have saved it.
The end of my trip was another adventure. My flight from London
Heathrow was Sunday at 9 in the morning. The underground trains
didn’t start running until after 7 am so I had to go to Heathrow on
Saturday and spend the night in the terminal. The flight took me to
Paris Orly Airport where I had to catch a bus to go to the Invalides
Air Terminal in Paris catch another bus to go out to Paris LeBourget
airport. I did meet up with the Grand Valley group eventually but
only to learn that our flight was delayed which in the end didn’t
matter because we had to land in Gander, Newfoundland, to refuel due
both to our total weight and the fact that a hurricane was crossing
the Atlantic from New York to Europe. We landed at JFK about the time
we should have been landing in Detroit so we had to rebook our tickets
which we did but had to switch to the LaGuardia airport and for me, at
least, once again sleep on the floor of a terminal. We were on a
early morning business flight (almost all men in suits) and five or
six of us GV students in our blue jeans and shirts that had been slept
in. When the stewardesses brought us blueberry pancakes for breakfast
we all cheered.
