The “bridge character”: Carl Schurz and West German–American rapprochement

In 1952, West Germans and Americans held a joint, year-long observation celebrating the centennial of the arrival of German-born Carl Schurz in the USA. The collaborative, transatlantic celebration served to publicize a historical and cultural relationship between the German and American peoples through the memory of Carl Schurz. State and non-state participants publicly remembered Schurz as the quintessential German–American and a “bridge character” that transcended national borders, occupied an important ideological space, legitimized the Cold War relationship between erstwhile enemies, and perpetuated an on-going process to construct a transnational, cultural identity rooted in Western liberal-democratic political culture. For the US government, the historical character of Carl Schurz also became a means of promoting a liberal heritage in the face of on-going Soviet accusations of American imperialism, warmongering, and poor race relations.