Henry C. Klingman Papers

Henry C. Klingman was born on August 6, 1925 in Heidelberg, Germany. He was brought to the United States in 1928 by his parents, Oskar and Luise Klingman. Raised in Buffalo, New York, he was exposed to a rich ethnic culture including Poles, Irish and Italian immigrants that provided fodder for countless tales and escapades. Klingman enlisted in the Army on November 24, 1943 in Buffalo and was assigned to the 10th Mountain Division. He began his training at Camp Hale, Colorado before being transferred to Camp Swift, Texas. He achieved the rank of Private First Class and was a member of the Headquarters Company (Communications Section) of the 86th Regiment. Klingman fought with the 10th in Italy, where he was wounded in action on April 16, 1945 at Casa Costa, and earned a Bronze Star Medal the same day for his service. After the war, he attained a degree in Business at Colorado College in Colorado Springs. Returning to New York, he worked for the Pillsbury Company for a decade, traveling extensively in Central and South America and the Mid-East and Africa in the mid 1950's. Attending night school, he attained a law degree from Fordham University in New York City. With the development of containerization in the late 1950's, the Port of New York sought someone to run an office in central Europe and Klingman was hired for the job, partly on the basis of his language skills. He spoke German and Spanish and later acquired French and Italian. He spent the next decade traveling Europe from his base in Zurich, Switzerland where he helped found the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce. He also founded and ran his own trading company in Zurich, then sold his company and retired in 1990, dividing his time between Florida and Switzerland for the next 15 years. He skied, played soccer, rode horses, and played tennis and golf. Klingman was married to Maureen Klingman and the couple had a son, Marcus. Henry Klingman died on January 21, 2013.