F�ves-Morganville: the return of the Americans

On the rubble of war, a friendship grew between the residents of F�ves and those of Morganville, Kansas in the United States. This �sister city� relationship, born from helping, has found new momentum. It all started in 1944.

F�ves, a village near Metz, is very well known in Morganville, a small rural town in Kansas. It was during the Second World War and the struggle for the liberation of Metz when the first seeds of this astonishing story were sown by Patton's army.

G�rard Torlotting, first deputy mayor, says, "the people of F�ves had been evicted by the Nazis in 1940. When they returned home in 1945, they found a village that had been more than 60% destroyed. In 1948, under the authority of UNESCO, fifteen ordinary affected areas of Europe were sponsored by American cities. The residents of Morganville, a small farming town in Kansas, chose to help F�ves."

This small town then had around 260 inhabitants, like F�ves. But the residents were grain growers at the head of gigantic farms. Morganville, located near Clay [Center], near the county town of Manhattan (not the one from New York!), organized festivals and cultural events to make the destruction of F�ves known and raise funds to help. A resident had sold an old tea service to raise funds for F�ves. Another had written a play and organized a performance. The small-town offered a work-day festival with dances and raffles.

The first deputy mayor of Feves, G�rard Torlotting, and the hat received in Morganville which indicates its pairing with F�ves. This small town in Kansas had sponsored the war-damaged village in 1945.

They raised 1,000 dollars in cash (a lot of money at the time) in addition to clothing, blankets, daily essentials, powdered milk and seeds and sent them to the Moselle village. More importantly, this emerging friendship began to weave more permanent ties. In 1949, a delegation from Morganville went to F�ves. The people of the villages exchanged addresses, family photos, etc. The Republican Lorrain newspaper published this beautiful story with photos.

In 1951, the Americans give a slide projector to the school and the Feves students wrote thank you letters. In 1948, [correction: 1949] Morganville sends a painting of a typical [Kansas] landscape and F�ves responded with a work by [Albert] Thiam. Then time passed and the two forgot about each other until 1993. The museum director from Clay Center wrote to the mayor in in F�ves. He responded, but then there was nothing until last August when an email was sent to the Mayor�s office.

�My son lives in Houston, Texas,� says Mr. Tortotting. He contacted Art Vaughan, a historian [living near Manhattan.] This man�s wife is Gloria Freeland, a university professor in the department of journalism at [the university in] Manhattan. She had her students work on the history [of] Morganville-F�ves and that raised a lot of enthusiasm. �Every year at Christmas, I go see my son in Texas. So last year I went with him to Morganville. I was received with enthusiasm. In my luggage I had brought two books as souvenirs that were edited by the town of F�ves, last year,� said the Mosellan.

The university has organized a university challenge. The research project on our sister city [twinning] has been submitted that would allow students to obtain scholarships. The Mercury, the regional newspaper, describes those reunions.

"A lady served tea in the old silver tea service used nearly 70 years ago. It was very moving.

"In May, a delegation will come to F�ves and the community would love to pay for the older people (those seen in the photos in shorts or with pigtails) for a trip to Morganville. For that, sponsors are needed,." said Torlotting.

G�rard Torlotting will not run in the next elections. He will focus on the new-found connection between the sister cities. Seventy years after the destruction, the harvest will be beautiful.

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The Phrase - "We'll awaken the association with F�ves and make it live."

The email that came last year to the city of F�ves triggered a chain reaction. G�rard Torlotting knows he alone cannot do the job of joining Morganville with F�ves. "We will breathe new life into the association that has been dormant for some time," he said.

The figure 480 - The village was traditionally one of wineries. Feves in 1945 had around 260 inhabitants, as did Morganville at the end of the war. In 2013, Feves is approaching thousand souls, while her twin in Kansas has dropped to 193 inhabitants. While the area today of Feves is 480 hectares, in Kansas, most grain farmers have operations over 1,000 acres (400 hectares)!

Original in French in PDF format.