Andrew Thorndike
Andrew Thorndike ( born August 30, 1909 in Frankfurt am Main, † December 14, 1979 in Berlin) was employed for the documentary of the GDR as a director, screenwriter and scriptwriter.
Life
Thorndike's ancestors belonged in 1620 to the Pilgrims on the " Mayflower ". His father was Dr. Andrew Thorndike III, the Director-General and Chairman of the General Hugenberg ads GmbH (Ala) from 1920 to 1932 and from 1932 to 1944 Managing Director of August Scherl GmbH. The father was Hugenberg's confidence man as head of the office of the General adverts GmbH from 1914 and from 1918 to 1920 Managing Director of Foreign GmbH. July 1915 the father became head of the Krupp news agencies and was a Director of DLG. The son of Andrew Thorndike grew up in Senzig and attended school at King Wusterhausen. After graduation in 1928 he began an apprenticeship as a merchant in the Scherl -Verlag. In 1930 he worked at the " Württemberg newspaper". He was from 1931 employed by the UFA, since 1933 in the advertising film department. From 1939 he performed service in the police reserve. From 1941 he worked as a cultural film director, including for educational films for the High Command of the Wehrmacht. His 1942 film The Mistress incurred culture of the court should show " the versatile and responsible work of a farmer's wife ," but was banned, received after heavy reworking the title of " People's development it " and was premiered on 22 December 1942. Thorndike was arrested on suspicion of " demoralizing " and drafted into the Wehrmacht.
In Soviet captivity he became a member of the National Committee " Free Germany " ( NKFD ) and graduated from the Antifa school. In 1948 he returned to Germany and worked since 1949 as a director at the DEFA Studio for newsreels and documentaries.
While working on the project Stalin and the German people Andrew Thorndike is lured on 9 April 1953 a bogus telegram to West Berlin, arrested for " suspicion of complicity in treason to the Federal Republic of Germany " and brought to Karlsruhe. After international protests against this approach Thorndike is released in July 1953. According to latest research Thorndike was only a suspect among dozens that on 9-10. April 1953 has been arrested in West Berlin and the Federal Republic of Germany within the action " volcano ". Because of the pragmatic attitude of one of his defenders, the GDR lawyers Friedrich Karl Kaul, and the top federal prosecutor Carlo Wiechmann it did not come to the process.
Andrew Thorndike 1961 was a member of the Academy of Arts of the GDR. In 1967 he founded the Association of Film and Television of the GDR and was its president until his death.
The closed in the 1930s first marriage with his wife Irma come from the children of Andrew V., Jan and Peggy. During this marriage also Andrews illegitimate son Gregory was born. Because Gregory did the divorce. 1953 married Andrew Thorndike second wife Annelie Kunigk that he had met with his film work. In his third marriage Thorndike was married to Helga Schrader, from this marriage the children of Catherine and Andrew.