Letter #6
Mr. Peter W. Gross Apr. 15, 1964
Princeton, N.J.
Dear Pete,
may I please call you by your first name, and you do the same with me? I thank you for the magazin and your mentioning me in your article. It seems a long time since we heard from each other. I guess we both waited for the issue. Now it's here - finally; I find it good; I can't think of any major corrections to make.
Now to your letter from April 2. No, I never saw the late Pfalz Parasol nor do I have a picture of it. I would like to have one if you have it and while I'm asking please a cop0y of the following: E-V with Wi??niers, You mit Widmung bitte, the Otto Pusher, the Clerget exp.biplane. (which I too have flown), the E-IV showing the double-row Gnome page 17; my D-IV (no fin), and my Dr. with Y strut. I have some nice big fotos of Udet's D-XV, which I had made to a two-seater and stunted with passengers in Bs.As. and Rosario Sa.Fe.Argentina 1921/22; I will send you this and other pages out of my album to make copies.
No, I don't know Otto Augst and know little or nothing about the types build after my time in Speyer besides the types I mentioned to you I have flown. I came to the Pfalz-Werke in April 1915 and a 2nd time after Walter Eversbusch's dead in June 1916; I left Speyer in October 1916 when I was called back to Schleissheim by then Obln. C.O. Schleich and send to the newly formed Bav.Flieger Schule 4, lager-Lechfeld, Augsburg. C.O.Oblt. Krug; when in summer 1917 under Oblt. Euringer things went not to my likeing I went to Jasta 16 where I had friends like my first parasol-pupil Hanstein. The story of this new chapter will be told an other time. But first say something in answer to my letter of Feb. 1st.
I have been susy in the meantime and rehearsed with Lonnie Raidor my cue-sheet some 50 stories of my carrier as a flyer from 1913 till the E.O.W. On March 13. I told it to a large audience of C.&C, which received it with great interest and all were well pleased with it including me naturally. I have a tape of the interview and want to have an otherone to send to Germany to Imrie (who is english) or to Novarra who could also translate and use it in Germany. What do you think of it? You would like to have a copy, could you or Hastings make them? Here are some copies of my cue-list, about 50 stories I hnope you read the abreviations? The whole interview took about 1 hour and 20 minutes. I knew and had told Raidor that it would take to long to tell all in full; so the 2nd par (Summer 1917, Jasta 16 to the EOW) I had to make lots of cuts and leave out stories. That part will be told again in full and with pictures out of my album and front-line chart projected to a screen in a future meeting of C.&C. this year. part I came out fine; it tells mostly amusing stories of the early days and my crashes of which I had many, mostly were amusing too and fortunately of no bad effect on me. So funny that at the end of the talk one fellow asked me, "Did Max crash enough planes to qualify for the Allies as an Ace"......to which Raidor had immediately the answer; "Yes, Max crashed enough (German) planes to qualify as a triple ace; for the French, the British and the Americans."..... That gave all a big laughter and so ended my talk and this letter for today. Thanks again for all you do for me.
Sincerely,
Max Holtzem
submitted by his son, Donald M. Smith, holder of estate.
