At this point, less than two months before Germany invaded Poland, the Morgans still couldn't believe there would be a war any time soon, and the Trib had not yet learned to spell Rosa's name.
I've been looking through William Shirer's Berlin Diary for a counterpoint to Murray and Rosa's impressions. He was older -- 35 -- probably wiser and certainly much better connected in Europe, having lived there since 1925. On a trip back to the U.S. in early July, he was frustrated by the lack of urgency among Americans about the situation in Europe:
July 3 -- The trouble is everyone here knows all the answers. They know there will be no war. I wish I knew it. But I think there will be war unless Germany backs down, and I'm not certain at all she will ... Congress here in a hopeless muddle. Dominated by the Ham Fishes, Borahs, Hiram Johnsons, who stand for no foreign policy at all, it insists on maintaining the embargo on arms as if it were immaterial to this Republic who wins a war between the western democracies and the Axis.
July 4 -- Hans Kaltenborn so sure there will be no war, he is sending his son off on his honeymoon to the Mediterranean, he tells me tonight.
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