Please join us on April 29, 2025, from 8 a.m. - 9 a.m. at the Concordia Chamber of Commerce office, 207 W 6th Street, for our weekly Chamber Coffee.
If you are interested in becoming a Chamber member or being a Chamber Coffee sponsor, please contact Annie Bergmann at 785-243-4290 or email info@concordiakansaschamber.com
Join us for coffee and donuts. Donuts provided by Me and Ma’s Bakery. Keep up to date on all the events and activities happening in Concordia and the surrounding area.
Our coffee sponsor for April 29, 2025, is POW Camp Concordia.
POW Camp Concordia was constructed to house German Prisoners of World War II. The camp was constructed in 90 days- including water, sewer, telephone & electric lines along with roads and fences surrounding 308 buildings, all built in 90 days!
POWs worked on local farms, the county road crew, railroad, ice house and various businesses as well as construction projects on the Camp property. Camp Concordia was an Officer’s Camp, the ratio of officers to enlisted men was approximately 3:1. Most officers were highly educated and many volunteered to teach college-level courses to other POWs under the supervision of the Red Cross and proctored by Kansas University, Lawrence, Kansas.
POW Camp Concordia operated under the Geneva Convention Accords, signed in 1929 to establish minimum treatment standards for all POWs. Although the United States was honorable to the standards Germany was not, partially because they didn’t have enough food for the German citizens, so many Allied POWs were starved and mistreated.
People say that German POWs liked America so much that they stayed when the war was over. That would have been a violation of the Geneva Convention which states, “Capturing countries are responsible to return POWs to their home countries when the conflict concludes.” When World War II ended, there were 400,000 POWs that the United States was required to send home!
July 4, 2025— “Old-Fashioned Fourth of July” @ The Broadway Plaza. Approximate time is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
