Have you ever had sensations certified by a doctor? Yes, there is. On the one hand, a sensation is a sensational event. You know that. For example, if you stand in a house, let’s say in an old pewter foundry like the Wiedamannhaus in Regensburg, and then there is a shelf behind a wardrobe and behind the shelf there is a room. A hiding place for persecuted Jews even during the Nazi era, an Anne Frank room in Regensburg. That would be a sensation!
An event so sensational that newspapers reported on it (“sensational find”) and the culture officer announced that he would turn the room into something like a small museum: “The question is no longer whether, but how.”
And then there is the medical sensation, a “subjective bodily sensation”, that is: a feeling. For example the feeling that it would be incredibly exciting if this secret room in Regensburg were a second Anne Frank room, but stop – and this is crucial – not for sure. Regensburg have a sensation, that’s clear, the only question is which one.
You have to be precise here: no one has claimed that Jews were definitely hidden in the secret room of the Wiedamannhaus. But what city officials suspected sounded like a very probable version of reality, and less like a “product of the media,” as City Hall later called it. One has become cautious. In the meantime, a journalist from regensburg digital found out something.
During the war, the Wiedamanns produced ammunition, employed forced laborers and Richard Wiedamann, the junior manager at the time, is said to have counted it among his “proudest successes” that the “Führer” bought from him. The Americans apparently accused him of being incriminated because of his membership in Nazi organizations. To his relief, a friend is said to have described him as pro-Jewish. Only: Why didn’t he talk about a hiding place for Jews, although that would have been the best relief?
A historian commissioned by the city is to find out how it really was. That would be sensational!