Peter Dohmen

Peter W. Dohmen (1904–1977) was a well-known and highly accomplished German liturgical artist who migrated to the United States with his family after the Second World War.

In pre-war Germany, he had won numerous competitions for large frescoes, up to 10 stories high, and art works for public buildings.

When he refused several times invitations to become a member of the Nazi party, which recruited accomplished people, he was put on the "black list" and no longer qualified for governmental contracts.

[citation needed] In 1937, he made an exciting, historic discovery in the dome of the Ursula Kirche, an ancient church in Cologne.

However, a few weeks before taking this position, a law was passed requiring that those teaching at a state school had to be members of the Nazi party.

They and most Germans lived in their basements for months to be protected from the constant bombings, at night by the British, during the day by Americans.

After the war, as soon as the railroad started running again, he and the family took the train to the American Embassy in Hamburg to apply for an immigration visa.

It took five years, and when the visa was granted, the family sold their house and furniture and migrated to the United States.

[2] Dohmen's works can be found in numerous churches in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Oklahoma, North- and South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa and Wisconsin.

[3] Spahn has carried on in the great tradition and has designed many outstanding stained glass windows in his own style over the past 40 years.

The chancel windows constituted the largest stained glass commission in the United States at the time of their installation,[4] each measuring 85-feet-tall by 22-feet-wide.

Dohmen worked closely with Dr. A. R. Kretzmann, the liturgical consultant of the Chapel of the Resurrection to create windows that have since been referred to[by whom?]

A Messianic Rose, along with symbols of the Lion of the tribe of Judah and the Stem of Jesse, all come together to describe the prophetic fulfillment that is Jesus Christ – the word made flesh.

The divisions that follow this depict well-known stories of the New Testament, including Christmas, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter.

This early text, which translates as "Jesus Christ, the Conqueror" comes from an Ephesian tomb from the third century AD.

Also appearing in the center of this window is the Latin "In Luce Tua, Videmus Lucem"' This text from the 36th Psalm is also the motto for Valparaiso University.

The next divisions feature well-known Old Testament stories, from Adam and Eve, to the Ten Commandments and symbols of the ancient kings.

Many instruments also find their way into the window, the entire work set against, "a striking red motif, the symbol of Christ’s saving redemption and of our personal salvation".

He had been a 2-time state chess champion, captain and leading scorer of the Macalester College soccer team, as well as the local Minneapolis Kickers....His parents donated a valuable, large brass and mosaic cross to the Long Beach Memorial Hospital in his honor....The parents published the story of the shooting in an LA-area newspaper, addressed to the people of Long Beach, to make public the coverup of the killing by employees of the City.

In 1970, the Dohmens, citing deep bitterness with the American justice system that did not punish the killers, returned to Germany.