Margaret Konteck

Once upon a time, in the city of Berlin, there was a woman named Anita Kelm and a woman named Margaret Konteck. Somewhere in the 1930's Margaret shared with her the message of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ with Anita. Frau Konteck was an insurance client of my great-grandfather Helmut Kelm, Anita's husband. As was the custom of the day, Margaret came to the house to pay her insurance premiums. In 1939 the missionaries began teaching Anita and her children, Wolfgang and Gisela. The story of these three is well documented. They are even mentioned in the book "In Harm's Way, East German Latter-Day Saints in World War II" by Roger M. Minert.  Helmut Kelm was not so keen on the church and would not give permission for his family to be baptized. In 1945 while he was off in the war and Berlin was experiencing air raids, and Anita was taking her children to church. In the words of my opa Wolfgang Kelm, as recorded in "In Harm's Way", on February 3, 1945,

 "There was no public transportation in operation, so we set out early to walk to the meeting room on top of some building on Thaerstrasse. After walking for over an hour through the still burning ruins of Berlin we arrived at our destination, only to find it in ruins too. Young as I was in years [twelve], I had a feeling of great loss. The Church was literally gone out of my life."

But the Church was not really out of his life. On February 25, 1945, Anita, Gisela, and Wolfgang were among the last convert baptisms into the Church in Berlin during World War II.

"It was decided to forgo the customary permission from the father and husband of baptismal candidates and baptize [my family] before the world came to an end. At this time the Russian armies stood at the gates of Berlin, awaiting the order for the final assault on the capital of the crumbling Third Reich. So on February 25 1945, in the little pool in the factory building in Berlin, my mother, my sister, and myself were baptized by one Fredrich Wernick. The water was 7 degrees Celsius. Even though I was young, I did not like the cold water much."

The Kelm family survived the air raids.  They survived Russians. Miraculously their apartment survived the destruction of Berlin while they had a brief escape in Poland. They went on to immigrate to Canada, and then on to the United States.

There is today a continued legacy of multiple generations still seeking to have the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints as a dominating influence in their lives. Just last week, my father, son of Wolfgang, reconnected with a man he taught the gospel to in Brazil in the late 1970's. This man's daughter is waiting for her own call to be a missionary. This tree of influence continues to spread it's branches. For the Kelm family it started with Margaret Konteck.

Sadly, we have very little information about this lady. Her story seems to have vanished. I'm putting this blog out into the world in hopes that maybe, just maybe, somebody will know who this lady was. Because she shared the gospel with a friend in the 1930's, the influence of the descendants of the Anita Kelm's family has touched Germany, Canada, the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Japan, and beyond. Thank you Frau Konteck, we hope to meet you one day.

Anita and Helmut

Wolfgang, Anita, Gisela

Anita 1975