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Off base, Elinor was refused service at a Woolworth's lunch counter. On base, she suffered further indignity, forced to tend German POWs, soldiers from the army gobbling up territory to expand Hitler’s white supremacist regime.

There was a shortage of nurses to treat American wounded, but hundreds of black nurses were turned away. Elinor wanted to use her skills to aid men who'd been wounded fighting the Nazis. But the army posted her to the Arizona desert at a hospital for German POWs who rarely needed medical care. The army figured there was little risk of fraternization between black nurses and white German POWs. 

And for the most part, that was true. But one day Elinor walked into the mess hall for a meal and was approached by one of the German men. Frederick Albert was a baker in the kitchen and when he saw Elinor, it was love at first sight.  He walked up and introduced himself. "You should know my name. I'm the man who's going to marry you."

I imagine Elinor was not moved at the moment. She may even have suspected she was the butt of a joke. But Frederick didn't hold with Nazi doctrine. Like many German soldiers, he'd been drafted and forced to serve in the military. And he was a persistent man.

He volunteered to work at the hospital. He organized baking classes and Elinor attended. She saw that he was kind and he made her feel desirable. Soon they were meeting in secret. Enemies in love. 

Their love story is told by Alexis Clark in her book Enemies in Love: A German POW, A Black Nurse and an Unlikely Romance. It's not all hearts and roses. Fredrick was caught sneaking out of Elinor's barracks and punished with a beating. Not because he was a POW consorting with an American, because he was a white man dating a black woman.

 According to the publisher, Enemies in Love " paints a tableau of dreams deferred and of love struggling to survive, twenty-five years before the Supreme Court's Loving decision legalizing mixed-race marriage—revealing the surprising possibilities for human connection in one of history’s most violent conflicts."

You could understand how this romance might fade away when the war ended, and Frederick was shipped home to Germany. But these two concocted a daring plan. They got pregnant, hoping that would help Frederick get a visa to come back to the states.

Elinor hid her pregnancy until she was discharged from the Army, then went home to her proper family in her proper New England town. Her mother was furious, disappointed and probably ashamed. Honestly, I can't blame her for thinking her daughter was being duped by a cad who might never return, and if he did, might just want a green card, not a biracial family.

But Frederick was true. He got permission to return to the U.S. and the couple married, for better or worse, knowing their interracial marriage was against the law in 29 states. Initially, they moved to Germany settling with Frederick's wealthy family where he was poised to take over his father's engineering company.

But Frederick's mother wouldn't accept her African American daughter-in-law and treated her rudely. The townspeople didn't take to Elinor, either. Author Alexis Clark told NPR, "People were pointing, taunting her when she was walking down the street. She remembers that a man dropped his groceries when he saw her and the fruit just rolled down the lane. He couldn't believe it! She said she felt like an animal in a zoo."

The family moved back to New England, where their troubles continued. Frederick had trouble finding jobs because he was German. They had trouble finding a place to live because Elinor was black.

But their love persevered. Eventually, they discovered a place where people had consciously chosen to live in an integrated community. They made a home in South Norwalk, Connecticut, where a diversity of mixed-race couples, Jewish families, gays and other misfits of post-war America were welcome.

Pepperidge Farms baking company was located in Norwalk, and I knew there was a reason I love those cookies! The company, founded by a woman during the Depression, hired Frederick as a baker.

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