Peter Bönzli

“I have always had people in my life who encouraged and challenged me.”

Peter Bönzli was born in Bern in 1947. After the death of his father, his mother lost parental authority over her four children. One day, two men took Peter Bönzli away while he was playing in the street and brought him to a transitory children’s home. At the age of five, he was taken to the boys’ reform facility “Brünnen” in Bümpliz.

The first year he spent with the home director’s sons and enjoyed a lot of freedom, but this came to an end when school started: henceforth work had priority and there was little time for school. His younger brother Kurt was placed in the same facility. Together they waited for their mother to visit once a month – often in vain. Sometimes the two brothers saw their sisters, who were placed in the adjacent girls’ home, across the fence.

After finishing school, the boys from “Brünnen” were distributed among various jobs. Peter Bönzli was sent to a postman in the French-speaking part of Switzerland. After a year he moved in with his mother in Basel. He had to cancel a trial apprenticeship as a lab assistant after a work accident in 1964. After that he started to train as a salesman which was difficult for him due to his poor schooling in the facility. His professional career led him from various jobs as a salesman to business consulting. In 1992, Peter Bönzli founded his own company which he sold in 2004 and took early retirement.

Nadine Felix

“Look, ask, engage: this is just as important today as it would have been then.”

Nadine Felix was born in Zurich in 1975. Her mother was an alcoholic and she only survived as a baby because her two older half siblings took care of her. Soon after her birth, she was adopted by a couple. Nadine Felix only found out what had happened then at the age of 35, when she met her birth family. Until she was 14 years old, she believed she was growing up with her biological parents. When her adoptive parents separated, Nadine Felix was suddenly placed in care, completely unprepared and in the middle of 5^th grade. After a time in Chur (GR), she was taken to the “Heim Hirslanden” (ZH) at the age of 14. In a letter from the Chur guardianship authority, she learned that she had been adopted as an infant.

Sometimes, Nadine Felix and her colleagues from the facility were allowed to go out, went to parties and danced the night away. Nadine Felix has kept the shoes she wore then to this day. For a housekeeping year Nadine Felix was to be taken to a closed educational facility. Together with her boyfriend she planned to escape to Italy – unsuccessfully: in handcuffs she was taken to the closed ward of the “Loryheim” (BE). Nadine Felix has never been involved in decision-making processes. She was never asked about her needs, despite having met numerous experts and having been in various therapeutic settings.

When her guardian died, Nadine Felix was released from guardianship at the age of barely 20. She was not supported in the transition to an autonomous life and slipped into drug addiction. After seven years of heroin use, she opted to go to rehab. A year later, her now adult son was born, whom she raised on her own. Nadine Felix completed various trainings, most recently as an educational nursery manager. She managed a nursery for ten years. To treat everybody with respect is important to her – and it is just as important to her to talk about it when this not the case.

Tanja Meier*

“Already my mother and my grandmother did not grow up at home.”

Tanja Meier was born in1965 in a region called Zurich Oberland. The mother was only 18 years old and not married when her first child, Tanja Meier’s brother, was born. A year later the daughter was born. Tanja Meier’s father came from Sardinia. At eleven months, she was placed in a foster family that was a member of a pietistic free church and stayed there until she was 25 years old. Her brother was pushed from one place to another.

In comparison to her brother’s childhood, she had fared well, says Tanja Meier. But her foster mother took her aggressions out on her and constantly devalued Tanja’s mother and grandmother. This influenced the girl: she didn’t want to become like her mother. Tanja Meier and her brother were not the first in their family not to grow up at home – her mother, her mother’s siblings as well as her grandmother had already been placed in care after the death of one of the parents. Tanja saw her biological father only on visiting Sundays. On these occasions he molested her and when she did not want to visit him anymore, her guardian threatened to send her to a children’s home.

When Tanja suffered a breakdown at the age of 16, the foster parents declined the support of an educational psychologist. It was not until 2017, that Tanja knew why her health still was poor at times: she suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. As an adult Tanja Meier also experienced psychological violence in her marriage. The father of her daughter tried, among other things, to deprive her of her child. After another breakdown in 2004, she found the strength to leave her marriage in 2007 and to build a new life together with her daughter.

*The name was replaced by a pseudonym.

Annemarie Iten-Kälin

“It is time that the history of the orphanage in Einsiedeln is also investigated.”

Annemarie Iten-Kälin was born in 1956 in Willerzell (SZ) as the eighth child of the Kälin family. When she was between seven and eight years old, she lost both parents in quick succession: the mother died of a serious illness and the father committed suicide half a year later. The family was ripped apart, for the oldest ones jobs were found or they were rented out for work and the four younger ones were placed in the orphanage in Einsiedeln. This was initially run by nuns from Ingenbohl. At the end of the 1960s, the management changed and a male home director took over.

The hope that there would be more space for joie de vivre lasted only a short time. Admittedly, the children received toys and there was more free time. But the home director also punished arbitrarily and with violence. Furthermore, he committed sexual assaults for which he was never prosecuted. When the situation in the orphanage became known through a letter from Annemarie Iten-Kälin and a supervisor was to be appointed, the home director couple resigned. They blamed her and her sister for this.

Annemarie Iten-Kälin had to complete an internship to become a kindergarten teacher. At the children’s home “Klösterli” in Wettingen (AG) she witnessed a loving relationship with the children which showed her that things could be different – even then. During her education at the Seminar in Menzingen, Annemarie Iten-Kälin met her future husband. She then moved back to Einsiedeln, and they started a family. When her daughter got sick, Annemarie Iten-Kälin and her husband with son Michael accompanied her until she died. She recorded her daughter’s life and death in the book “Stefanie, ein Engel auf Erden”.

Now her second book is almost completed. It is her story which stands for many others. Annemare Iten-Kälin fights persistently for justice, also for the history of Einsiedeln’s orphanage to be reassessed. The political decision to do so was taken in summer 2022.

Michael

“A children’s home is not a home – and educators are not parents.”

Born in Zurich in 1964, Michael was the third child of very young multi-addicted parents. To this day, he doesn’t know how many siblings he has. His grandparents cared for the boy until the guardianship authorities of the city of Zurich took him away from his grandmother after the death of his grandfather – even though she would have liked to keep him with her. First, Michael was placed in various foster families and at the age of 9 in the children’s home Heizenholz in Zurich-Hongg. He experienced educators who responded to him and others who were violent. What he lacked was a contact person to whom he could turn to when he had questions or concerns. Even after his release he would have liked to have a contact person to turn to for example regarding questions about money or taxes.

After completing the compulsory schooling, Michael was threatened to be interned again in a home in the west of Switzerland if he didn’t find an apprenticeship quickly. During his training he lived in a studio and managed everyday life independently. In 1984, Michael was released from guardianship. He went his own way, found friends, started a family and experienced joy in his professional everyday life. Michael talks openly about his childhood, also to his daughter. It is important to him that he does not pass on what he experienced to her and thus breaks the circle of violence. Coming to terms with the experienced injustice and acknowledging it, he considers as very important: for those affected but also for society.

Christian Tschannen

“They told us: ‘you are nothing, you can’t do anything, nothing will come of you!’”

Christian Tschannen was born in 1971 in the canton of Solothurn. After his parents divorced, the social welfare office got involved and as a result the mother agreed to a temporary placement in care of her children. Christian and his older brother, Benjamin, were sent to Schangnau (BE) to a farm in the Oberemmental where they had to work hard, slept in a small, poorly heated room, were beaten and abused. At the age of nearly nine, Christian suffered from first symptoms of a rheumatic disease which caused him more and more pain.

In 1986, at the age of 15, Christian was placed in the “Jugenddorf” in Bad Knutwil (LU) where he was forced into a carpenter apprenticeship, from which he dropped out. He also experienced violence in the “Jugenddorf” and in the last year was denied medical care and medication. Christian was released in 1989 and completed an apprenticeship as a car-body painter. Due to his illness and his physical impairments, he was registered with the disability pension for retraining. His request to follow a training that took into account his health condition and abilities was not heard by the authorities that decided on disability pensions.

At the age of 24, Christian reoriented himself professionally and studied art at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. Among other things, he was Artist in Residence of the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia in Cape Town and has exhibited several times in Switzerland and abroad. With the first official records in 2014, his work changed radically and now sheds light on current affairs. Christian is committed to the reassessment of compulsory social measures and also wants to focus on today’s problematic issues in child and youth welfare services.