Opinion > Columnists > Randy Scholfield

  Randy Scholfield  

One man's journey for world peace

My neighbor Manfred Menking is a quiet, self-effacing man. But he has a powerful story to tell. When Manfred was a boy in Nazi Germany in the waning months of World War II, he and his family went on the run to escape advancing Soviet troops. They made their way to Berlin, hoping to find relatives.

Manfred huddled in a Berlin bunker during an Allied bombing raid, hearing the bombs thud and explode overhead. His family emerged to find devastation. Buildings burning. Death and chaos.

"It was traumatic," he said softly.

He's never forgotten the experience.

At the end of the war, Germany was in ruins. Food was scarce. His grandmother died of starvation.

He's seen firsthand the horrors of war.

That's one reason why, for years, he's waged a quiet, persistent campaign for peace, working to educate Wichitans about the dangers of war.

After World War II, he was an exchange medical student in Ohio. That's where he met his wife, Susan, who like Manfred was training to be a pediatrician.

"He was good with babies," Susan recalled, smiling. She first noticed him rocking a baby in his arms, talking to it, and thought, "What a nice man."

They got married. After living in Hamburg, Germany, they moved to Wichita in 1973, where they established a pediatric practice, nurturing the health of thousands of babies over the years.

It was a good life.

But Manfred's wartime experiences continued to haunt him. Thinking about what Germany had unleashed -- with tens of millions dead, including the horror of the Holocaust -- he wanted to ask his parents and their generation, "Why didn't you do anything to stop it?"

In the early 1980s, Manfred became increasingly troubled by the U.S.-Soviet superpower tensions and the growing threat of a nuclear war.

"The missiles pointed at each side amounted to three to four tons of TNT for every person in the world," he told me.

He shook his head. "It was absolutely insane."

It struck him that "if they start a war now, that's the end of the world."

In 1983, he attended a local meeting of Physicians for Social Responsibility, a group working to promote disarmament. Manfred, an agnostic, came home and told Susan, "I've found my religion."

He would do whatever he could to stop a nuclear holocaust.

Over the years, he's organized meetings and written letters to the editor and tried to educate people about the need to abolish the world's nuclear stockpiles. He's helped bring prominent anti-nuclear speakers to Wichita, such as Jonathan Schell, author of "The Fate of the Earth."

He's also volunteered with Inter-Faith Ministries, the Global Learning Center and other groups that promote understanding among peoples.

One of his heroes is his uncle, Hermann Mai, a German pediatrician who after the war befriended Albert Schweitzer and worked at the great humanitarian's medical clinic in Africa. The essence of Schweitzer's philosophy, for which he won a Nobel Peace Prize, was "reverence for life."

That's been a guiding creed for Manfred, too.

Since 2000, he and his wife have traveled many times to Haiti with Inter-Faith Ministries to provide medical help to children in that nation of desperate poverty.

Make no mistake: Being a peace activist isn't a ticket to fame or popularity in Wichita, or anywhere else. It can be frustrating. Most people don't want to be bothered with these issues. Friends have compared Manfred to Don Quixote, jousting at windmills.

Manfred noted sadly this week's news of the Russian invasion of Georgia. Thousands of people have been killed so far -- as usual, mostly civilians.

War is insane.

Sometimes, he despairs. But he keeps on fighting the good fight.

Is he an optimist?

"I'm not sure," he told me. "I just know that we should work for something that keeps us all together and avoids catastrophe."

He suffered a stroke in 2004, and has slowed down a bit. He and Susan are moving to Nashville, Tenn., in a few weeks to be near their daughter.

They'll be missed here.

I want him to know how many Wichitans admire the tireless work he's done over the years for peace.

Thanks, Manfred, for working to make our community and world a safer, saner place for our children. You've been a wonderful neighbor.

Randy Scholfield is an Eagle editorial writer. His column appears on Fridays. Reach him at 316-268-6545 or rscholfield@wichitaeagle.com.