Down the Road

Photographs and stories by Jim Grey

Since 2007

Tag: communism

  • Wanted by the FBI

    A story of the time I was wanted by the FBI.

  • Wanted by the FBI

    On my flight to Germany in the summer of 1984, engine trouble forced us to land in Düsseldorf rather than in Frankfurt as planned. Because Düsseldorf expected no international flights that day, nobody was working in customs. My passport went unstamped, and I waltzed into Germany uncounted. How very un-German. Several weeks later, my group…

  • It happened at the Wall

    Germany was still divided in 1984. We could not know that in five years the Cold War would end, marked dramatically on our televisions by video of East Germans spilling over the Berlin Wall and through its checkpoints. We had all seen photos of it in our history books, of course, and maybe even in…

  • Captured: You are now leaving West Berlin

    It was hard to go far in Berlin in 1984 without the Wall hemming you in or blocking your way. My tour group followed it across the heart of the city to the Brandenburg Gate, which in those days stood just inside East Berlin. The white railing was the actual border between east and west;…

  • Wanted by the FBI

    I’m kicking off 2012 with a blatant rerun from May of 2007. It’s a funny story. Enjoy, and happy new year! When I was 16, I spent a summer on an exchange program in Krefeld, Germany with 30 other teenaged Hoosiers. On the flight over, engine trouble forced us to land in Düsseldorf rather than in Frankfurt…