Entertainment : Silent Night in Algona features Iowa history during WWII

The Vinton Palace Theatre will be featuring, "Silent Night in Algona" over the weekend. During World War II, from September through December of 1944, Algona, Iowa was the site of a Prisoner of War camp. Holding Germans who didn't want to be involved in the conflict, the prisoners provide much-needed help to offset the shortage of labor caused by the war effort. The prisoners worked on local farms or in small industries. At first, the townspeople don't want anything to do with the POWs, as they get to know them, they realize they have more in common than they'd anticipated.

While World War II raged in Europe, throughout the United States, soldiers, 426,000 of them at the peak. were held in quickly assembled prisoner-of-war camps. Many were in the South, but others were nearby. A camp was located near the Algona Airport, housing 10,000 prisoners. The camp was also the hub for many other smaller camps in Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota and North and South Dakota. And in Iowa, they tell a story that has now become a movie.

It is said that the prisoners came in as what many thought to be enemies, but left as friends. Residents of Algona never feared the escape of the prisoners or violence from them. A local coordinator for the film, Donna Kitzinger, said that the prisoners worked in many jobs including on her family's farm. She remembered them using a rowboat to probe the ground which was covered by water, and how they laid tile to drain the farmland. At the time, much of Kossuth County was swampy, but the prisoners helped to build drainage for the land.

The community discovered that the prisoners were just like they were. There were farmers, doctors, lawyers, bakers and butchers and not ideological Nazis.

The film was written by D.J. Perry. Over the years, some in Hollywood wanted to change the story by fictionalizing it. Taking the rights to the movie back, the film has now been made and released along with the help of Don Tietz who was a young boy in Algona at the time that the POW camp opened. The film was shot in Algona where real-life events happened, but made possible by Collective Development, Inc. and producers out of Lansing, Michigan which include, director Anthony Hornus, writer/actor DJ Perry and actor Shane Hagedorn.

To watch of trailer of the movie, click HERE.