The photograph was taken during the Allied advance on Aachen in autumn 1944 and shows local children in front of the characteristic concrete obstacles of the Siegfried Line (Westwall). The Siegfried Line was a German fortification system erected from 1936 onward along the western border of the Reich, which became the scene of heavy fighting in autumn 1944. Aachen was the first major German city captured by Allied troops in October 1944. Lieb’s color footage of this everyday scene at the edge of the combat zone documents civilian life in the immediate vicinity of the front line.