It was May 17, 1945, not long after Nazi forces had surrendered, ending Word War II in Europe, when miners dug through the wall of rubble with picks and shovels in Altaussee, Austria. There was a 12-meter thick layer of debris blocking the entrance to the salt mine, and though no one knew what was inside, they all hoped they would find what they were looking for.
Corporal Lincoln Kirstein was the first to crawl through the opening. Inside, it was dark and eerily quiet. The entrance was covered in dust and debris, and an iron security door hung shattered on its hinges. Deep inside the earth, Kirstein finally found what he had sought for so long: Europe's cultural legacy. The wooden crates were coated with a thick layer of dust, but otherwise undamaged.
In the years prior, Kirstein had been a writer and critic in New York, working on a number of projects that included launching a ballet ensemble in Dec. 1941. But when Pearl Harbor was bombed, the intellectual put his plans on hold and joined the military. He didn't end up battling with weapons, though.
The 36-year-old intellectual has a special task in Europe. As one of the "Monuments Men," he was tasked with preventing the destruction of Europe's cultural treasures. The Allied commanders created a "Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives" section after the 1,200-year-old Monte Cassino Abbey was destroyed by a hail of allied bombs in February 1944. Their orders were to protect churches, antique ruins and cultural monuments -- a meritorious task that would lend a moral dimension to a military victory.
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