Authors: Ben Ruhe
Date Submitted: February 28, 2006
Article Type: Journal

Having flown kites in his boyhood, writer Walter Diem, of Hamburg, Germany, became involved with them again after studying David Pelham’s Kites and Clive Hart’s Kites: An Historical Survey when they became available in Germany. This was some 30 years ago.

Studying meteorology for one of his literary projects, Diem discovered intriguing material on old weather kites. Because of exchange programs among observatories around the world, the material included many documents from Boston’s famed Blue Hill. Diem learned about Werner Schmidt and his interest in the weather observatory at Lindenberg in Germany’s east, contacted Schmidt, and the two started working together.

As the fluent freelance author of 45 books, on a wide variety of subjects, and of magazine articles (“Hundreds, at least,” says Diem), Diem with Schmidt launched a two-year publishing project to put down on paper what’s unique about German kites. Diem did the writing, Schmidt was the main kitebuilder, aided by Achim Kinter and others. Diem organized the art work and arranged for publication of the volume.

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