MICHIGAN: The New Ludecke

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A confidant of Hitler in the early Munich days of Naziism was young, smartly dressed, nervy Kurt Ludecke. In 1924 he came to the U. S. as a Nazi newspaper correspondent. When he returned to Germany nine years later, found things no longer to his liking and expressed his opinions, he was thrown into a concentration camp by Adolf. There he even thought of suicide, but escaped instead and fled to the U. S., where he proclaimed. "The old Ludecke is dead."

"Reborn," he applied for U. S. citizenship and wrote a book called I Knew Adolf Hitler. In it he renounced the new course of Naziism, though he retained his belief in Nazi racial doctrines.

Last week he appeared in a Detroit Federal Court to hear a decision on his citizenship application, postponed until Judge Arthur J. Tuttle found time to read his book.

"The old Ludecke is dead," said Ludecke, with by now well-rehearsed emphasis. "The new Ludecke stands before you. He is Ludecke the ex-Nazi, the man who has changed in heart, mind and spirit."

Said Judge Tuttle last week, eying the breast-beating new Ludecke: "I believe I can still see signs of him [the old Ludecke] popping up again," thereupon denied his application "with prejudice." Ludecke will have to wait five years before he can try again.