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The Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin presents the year 1938 through the eyes of Jews, whose personal documents detail their experiences and the hardships they suffered as well as the growing tensions in Europe and diminishing hope for Jews in Germany and Austria.

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31

SATURDAY

31

Embracing tomorrow

A refugee gives advice to refugees

“We remain fighters for a free, just, clean Germany. This underworld must come to an end, it will come to an end! A humane Germany will live. Not only are the real Germans hoping for this real Germany, but the Jews are hoping, the world is hoping.”

New York

For four years, Aufbau, the newsletter of the German-Jewish Club in New York, had served immigrants as a cultural and emotional anchor and as a source of useful information. The December issue brings a gushing report on the Club’s newly established weekly radio program. Among the prominent speakers who were asked to contribute speeches to inaugurate the program was Dr. Joachim Prinz, a former Berlin rabbi and outspoken opponent of the Nazis. Forging a bridge from the days of the exodus from Egypt via a history of emigrations to the present predicament, he made no attempt to minimize the emigrants’ plight. At the same time, likening the situation of his community to that of Jewish refugees from the Spanish Inquisition, he saw the potential in the challenges of emigrant life in America. The new program, he felt, was “an important instrument of education as Jews and as people of freedom.” The call of the moment was clear: “We must embrace Tomorrow and bury Yesterday. We must try to be happy again.”

TAGS: Berlin, commentary, December 31, displacement, Jewish Community, Journalism, New York, press article, prominent people, rabbis, refugees

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

"Vom Rundfunk des G.-J. Club" Aufbau, Vol. 4, No. 13, p. 7

1

Thursday

1

Last resort: emigration

The Joint Distribution Committee's report after the November Pogroms

[original, p. 1] “The plight of the Jews in the Reich is indescribable. Robbed of their means of livelihood, thrown out of their homes, not being able to buy in Aryan stores, terror-striken [original spelling] by the latest excesses, threatened with arrest and hard labor at concentration camps, there exists for them no other solution but to emigrate.”

Berlin

Sent to take stock after the November Pogroms in Germany, the American Joint Distribution Committee’s emissary to Germany, George Rooby, traveled to several cities to collect first-hand impressions. His findings were deeply disturbing: Berlin, Nuremberg, Fürth, Frankfurt-on-Main, no matter where he went, he saw synagogues burnt down, Jewish shops demolished and ransacked, Torah scrolls desecrated, and was met by terror-stricken Jews whose leadership had been forbidden to operate or taken to concentration camps. Non-Jews extending a helping hand exposed themselves to the danger of Nazi reprisals. The almost complete absence of small children and babies was explained to Rooby as a result of the fact that nativity among Jews had receded considerably since the Nazis’ accession to power. Leaders of Jewish communities had assured him that there was enough money to cover immediate welfare needs. Those organizations, however, whose goal was to advance emigration, were facing a serious lack of funds. Generally, hope prevailed that the Reich Representation of Jews in Germany would soon be allowed to operate again and play its part in accelerating emigration. Its success, of course, depended on the willingness of other countries to receive German Jews. Rooby’s conclusion was unambiguous: the only hope to escape the violence was emigration.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, children, Concentration Camps, December 1, document, emigration, Frankfurt am Main, Fürth, impoverishment, imprisonment, Jewish Community, Jewish property, kristallnacht, November Pogrom, Nuremberg, religion, Synagogues, violence, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

George Rooby Collection, AR 6550

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

30

WEDNESDAY

30

Painful uncertainty

Worrying about loved ones in Germany

“The feeling of uncertainty about your personal well-being is so immense and the helplessness, regardless of all efforts, so dismal, that I really don't know what to write.”

Cleveland, Ohio/Stolzenau

Many Jews in Germany reacted to the November pogroms with despair, existential fear, and even suicide. But the situation was also highly vexing for those who had managed to flee abroad. From afar they had to watch how their synagogues went up in flames, how Jews were arrested by the thousand and locked up in concentration camps, how Jewish property was stolen or destroyed. The worst, however, was the uncertainty about the well-being of beloved relatives and the torture of not being able to help them quickly enough or at all. One of the many emigrants expressing such feelings was Erich Lipmann. In this letter from Ohio to his mother and grandmother in Lower Saxony, he describes his helplessness but also mentions efforts to get support from official places.

TAGS: antisemitism, Cleveland OH, commentary, Concentration Camps, displacement, emigration, family, family separation, imprisonment, Jewish Community, Jewish property, kristallnacht, letter, November 30, November Pogrom, refugees, religion, Stolzenau, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Martha Lipmann Collection, AR 6355

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

29

TUESDAY

29

Their only hope

Africa as a refuge

“My parents only hope, to get them out, is me.”

Rongai/Nairobi

In 1903, in the wake of the Kishinev pogrom, the British government agreed to allow European Jewish settlement in a territory then known as the “East Africa Protectorate,” today’s Kenya. Due to massive opposition from within the Zionist movement, the plan, known by the misleading name “Uganda Scheme,” did not come to fruition. 35 years later, Paul Egon Cahn, most recently a resident of Cologne, found himself in Rongai, Kenya. After the November pogroms, the 20-year-old car mechanic began to try to get his parents out of Germany. While European settlers and members of the local Indian community in Kenya opposed the immigration of Jewish refugees, the “Kenya Jewish Refugee Committee,” which had facilitated his immigration, was supportive. Thus, the young man turned to its secretary, Israel Somen, for help: he urgently needed the £100 the British Colonial Office charged for two entry permits.

TAGS: antisemitism, Cologne, displacement, emigration, family, family separation, immigration, impoverishment, Jewish Community, kristallnacht, letter, Nairobi, November 29, November Pogrom, persecution, politics, refugees, Rongai, violence, welfare organizations, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Paul Egon Cahn Collection, AR 25431

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

25

Friday

25

The limits of hospitality

Asylum for Jewish children

The children will be housed there until arrangements for placing them in private homes and for their education have been completed.

London

The news of the brutal acts of violence perpetrated against German and Austrian Jews during the November pogroms sent shockwaves through Jewish communities. On November 15, a group of Jewish leaders in Britain requested that their government grant temporary shelter to Jewish youngsters who were to be returned to their countries later on. On November 25, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported on the planned opening of a camp for 600 child refugees from Germany on the east coast of England. The British chapter of the World Movement for the Care of Children from Germany was to recruit families to offer foster homes for 5,000 children. The plan had government approval – provided the children were under 17 years of age and the costs of their support would not be a burden to the public.

TAGS: advocates, children, displacement, emigration, immigration, Jewish Community, Journalism, JTA, kindertransport, kristallnacht, London, media coverage, November 25, November Pogrom, refugees, violence, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Original:

91.13

Source available in English

23

WEDNESDAY

23

Placing trust in strangers

Aid organization takes its responsibility seriously

A man who is good enough to fill out affidavits would certainly not take advantage of these people.

New York/Boston

Could Willy Nordwind of the Boston Committee for Refugees—an organization not dealing specifically with unaccompanied child immigrants—be entrusted with the well-being of a 16-year-old girl? The Relief Organization of Jews in Germany was not ready to take chances: rather than just sending Frieda Diamont on her way, the organization turned to the National Council of Jewish Women in New York to ascertain Mr. Norwind’s integrity. The Council’s Merle Henoch passed on the case to Jewish Family Welfare in Boston, Mass., where Nordwind, too, was based. For her there was no doubt: as generous a helper as Willy Norwind must be a trustworthy ally.

TAGS: advocates, Berlin, Boston, children, displacement, ethical dilemmas, family, immigration, Jewish Community, letter, New York, November 23, refugees, transnational networks, welfare organizations, Women

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Willy Nordwind Collection, AR 10551

Original:

Box 1, folder 8

Source available in English

21

Monday

21

For all eternity

The end of a beautiful illusion

Dresden

Among the over 1,400 German synagogues destroyed on and around the pogrom night of November 9th to 10th (later known as “Kristallnacht” or “Night of Broken Glass”) was the Semper Synagogue in Dresden, named after its architect. While neo-Romanesque on the outside, the building featured an interior in Moorish Revival Style – a design imitated by numerous other architects of synagogues in Germany. When the building was burnt down by both the SA and SS, 98 years had passed since its festive opening in 1840, at which Rabbi Zacharias Frankel had consecrated it to the service of God “for all eternity” and extolled the “respect for religious freedom inspiring this people.”

TAGS: antisemitism, Dresden, Jewish Community, Jewish property, kristallnacht, November 21, November Pogrom, photo, prominent people, public sphere, rabbis, religion, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Dresden Synagogues; Exterior, Jewish Community Collection, AR 140

Original:

F 17962

17

THURSDAY

17

No reprieve

The wave of violence continues

A new wave of arrests, accompanied by violence, has netted hundreds of Jewish victims in the last 48 hours in Frankfurt-am-Main and other provincial centers.

Berlin

Whoever had hoped that peace and quiet would return after the pogroms on and through the night of November 9th to 10th (later known as “Kristallnacht” or “Night of Broken Glass”) had been mistaken. In its November 17th dispatch, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency gives account of a new wave of arrests and violence. The initial round of violence had been orchestrated to look like a spontaneous outburst of popular rage after the assassination of an employee at the German Embassy in Paris, Ernst vom Rath, at the hand of a 17-year-old Jew. The pogrom was followed by a series of legislative measures eliminating Jews from commercial life in Germany and forcing them to “restore the streetscape” after the arson attacks on synagogues and the destruction of Jewish businesses. Apparently, the diplomat’s funeral in Düsseldorf was now serving as a subterfuge for renewed violence. The US consulate in Berlin was flooded by Jews seeking asylum for fear of additional assaults—in vain, as the article states.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, economic persecution, emigration, Jewish Community, Journalism, JTA, kristallnacht, media coverage, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, November 17, November Pogrom, persecution, prominent people, religion, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Collection:

“Hundreds Seized in New Wave of Arrests, Violence; 3,000 Jews Seek U.S. Protection”

Source available in English

14

Monday

14

Shattered splendor

A house of worship goes up in flames

Wiesbaden

On August 13th, 1869, the synagogue on Michelsberg in Wiesbaden had been officially opened in a festive ceremony. The building was meant to serve the increased spatial needs of the congregation but also testified to its increased wealth and civic self-assurance. In the presence of representatives of other faith communities, Rabbi Süskind had referred to the liberal house of worship as a “planting ground for patriotic virtues” which was to prove its unifying power not only within the circle of one’s own co-religionists, but “also in the wider circles of humanity.” After the pogrom that took place through the night of November 9th into 10th, 1938 (later known as “Kristallnacht” or “Night of Broken Glass”), all that was left of the magnificent building in Moorish-Byzantine style was the external wall. The interior was entirely gutted.

TAGS: antisemitism, Jewish Community, Jewish property, kristallnacht, November 14, November Pogrom, persecution, photo, public sphere, rabbis, religion, Synagogues, violence, Wiesbaden

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Wiesbaden Synagogue Burning; Kristallnacht Synagogues; Destroyed

Original:

F 3216

11

Friday

11

Arson

Nazi bureaucracy

“A permit for the rebuilding of the synagogue in the same place is out of the question.”

Chemnitz

As Jews in Chemnitz were struggling to come to terms with the brutal violence they had experienced two days before – the magnificent synagogue had been set on fire and destroyed during the November Pogroms, in the night from November 9 to 10 (later known as “Kristallnacht” or “Night of Broken Glass”), and 170 members of the community deported to the Buchenwald concentration camp – the community’s representative, the merchant Josef Kahn, was contacted by the town’s mayor. With mind-boggling cynicism, he demanded the removal within three days of the ruins of “the synagogue […] which caught fire in the night from November 9th to 10th, 1938.” If the order wasn’t carried out within the prescribed time, the municipal building inspection department (Baupolizei) would arrange clearance at the owner’s expense.

TAGS: antisemitism, Buchenwald, bureaucracy, Chemnitz, Concentration Camps, economic persecution, imprisonment, Jewish Community, Jewish property, kristallnacht, letter, November 11, November Pogrom, public sphere, religion, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Chemnitz; Jewish Community Collection, AR 813

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

5

SATURDAY

5

More mosquitoes than in Palestine

Texan hospitality helps refugees ease into new beginnings

“The second thing is the almost unbelievable hospitality which is extended to everyone in this country. And yet, no major fuss is being made. Rather, people let you live with them in their homes, as if you were part of the family. The police officer or the salesclerk - no matter who - they're all accommodating, because they can't do it any other way.”

Houston, Texas

With a documented presence reaching back as far as the 12th century and as the second largest community after Berlin, Jews in Frankfurt were a profoundly established part of society. But under the Nazis, Frankfurt Jews, like all of German Jewry, were made to feel like unwelcome strangers in their own city and country, and large numbers of them were leaving Germany. The November issue of the “Jüdische Gemeindeblatt für Frankfurt” shows the omnipresence of the topic of emigration. Numerous ads were offering services and equipment specifically for emigrants. The “Aid Association of Jews in Germany” offered the latest news regarding immigration requirements to various countries but also a warning not to fall into the trap of fraudsters charging would-be emigrants hefty fees for useless advice. However, one contribution sticks out; in a letter from Houston, Texas, a former resident of Frankfurt shares her first impressions. The heat was challenging, potatoes didn’t feature prevalently enough on the menu, mosquito nets (“more mosquitoes than in Palestine”) and plastic flowers required some getting used to, not to mention giant spiders and flying cockroaches. On the other hand, there were built-in cupboards and large beds, as well as, best of all, the “almost unbelievable hospitality” of the locals.

TAGS: antisemitism, displacement, emigration, Frankfurt am Main, Houston TX, immigration, Jewish Community, Journalism, media coverage, November 5, press article, refugees, transnational networks, United States of America, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Goethe Universität Frankfurt am Main

Collection:

Gemeindeblatt der Israelitischen Gemeinde Frankfurt am Main

4

FRIDAY

4

A girl leads the way

Hope for a future in Palestine

“I imagine that you are doing well there. According to your letter, it seems like a paradise to me. Dear Lotte, you can believe me, I'd like to be in your place, as life here is very sad and boring, especially now that Benno is not at home.”

Vienna/Gan Shmuel

The arrival of Gertrude Münzer’s first letter from Palestine was a cause for joy, relief and hope to her family that had remained behind in Austria. The Münzers were a well-integrated family, but after the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany, the tide turned and they had to endure increasing hardship, starting with their eviction from their home and Moses Münzer losing his job. With parental encouragement, Gertrude was the only member of her family to go to Palestine with a Zionist youth group. Inspired by her example, her older brother, Benno, had gone on hakhsharah. In his reply to Gertrude, dated November 4th, her father pleads with the 15-year-old girl to recruit support for him at the kibbutz or elsewhere to enable him to follow with the rest of the family.

TAGS: Anschluss, children, displacement, economic persecution, emigration, family, family separation, Gan Shmuel, immigration, Jewish Community, letter, November 4, Palestine, refugees, transnational networks, Vienna, Youth Aliyah, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Gertrude Knopf Family Collection, AR 11692

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

21

FRIDAY

21

Looking toward Palestine

The Münzer family hopes for a reunion in Palestine

VIENNA

This photograph, taken in October 1938, shows Moses Münzer, a tailor in Vienna, and his wife Lisa, with their five children, Elfriede, Benno, Nelly, Gertrude and Siegfried. After the “Anschluss,” Moses Münzer, like many Jews, lost his job. Lisa Münzer started working as a cook in the soup kitchen of the Brigittenauer Tempel on Kluckygasse, sometimes assisted by her children. By October 21st, 15-year-old Gertrude was on her way to Palestine on Youth Aliyah, an organization founded by Recha Freier, the wife of an orthodox rabbi in Berlin, before the Nazi rise to power. Its goal was to help Jewish youth escape anti-Semitism in the Reich and settle in Palestine. Gertrude left on her own, but the intention was for the family to reunite in Palestine.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, Berlin, children, displacement, economic persecution, emigration, family, family separation, impoverishment, Jewish Community, October 21, Palestine, photo, rabbis, refugees, Synagogues, transnational networks, Vienna, welfare organizations, Youth Aliyah

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Gertrude Knopf Family Collection, AR 11692

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

5

WEDNESDAY

5

A time for pause

Berlin

“Where circumstances permit, the teacher should also use gramophone records in this lesson. For the high holidays, there's a range of good recordings of synagogue music available.”

Berlin

In 1938, Yom Kippur fell on October 5th, a Wednesday. The educational department of the “Reich Representation of Jews in Germany” had published a booklet this year which contained numerous suggestions as to how the holiday could be observed in schools. It reads like a didactic handout which could have been written exactly the same way in earlier or in later years. There is no reference to the difficult circumstances in which Jews and, not the least, Jewish schoolchildren found themselves in Germany in 1938. In the previous five years, the Nazis had gradually implemented “racial segregation” in public schools. Already by 1936, the ratio of Jewish students in public schools was nearly half of what it had been before.

 

TAGS: Berlin, children, document, Jewish Community, Jewish holidays, October 5, public sphere, religion, schools, segregation, Synagogues, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Eliezer L. Ehrmann, Arbeitsplan fuer Rosch Haschana und Jom Kippur, Berlin: Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland, Schulabteilung, 1938

Chronology of major events in 1938

Jews’ passports invalidated

The passport of a Jewish woman stamped with the obligatory "J" for Jew. Siegmund Feist Collection, Leo Baeck Institute

The Reich Ministry of the Interior invalidates all passports owned by Jews. From now on, only those marked with a prominent red letter “J” will be considered valid. The measure is another step in the Nazis’ campaign to permanently separate Jews from the rest of the population

View chronology of major events in 1938

1

SATURDAY

1

Desecration and devastation

The Mellrichstadt synagogue is desecrated

The mob had it in for the Jewish congregants. When they didn't show up, people broke into the synagogue and desecrated it.

Mellrichstadt

During the night of September 30th going into October 1st, the synagogue of Mellrichstadt in Lower Franconia was completely devastated. In fact, the mob had it in for the congregants: Sudeten German refugees had incited the public to ambush worshippers on their way to the synagogue. However, the Jewish congregation had been warned with sufficient time and services canceled. Now the angry mob of Sudeten Germans and residents of Mellrichstadt stood before the door of the synagogue. Stones were thrown, the door was broken open and the interior destroyed. The mob did not spare the Torah scrolls and other ritual items. After that night, the synagogue could no longer be used.

TAGS: antisemitism, Jewish Community, Jewish property, Mellrichstadt, October 1, photo, public sphere, religion, Sudetenland, Synagogues, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Exterior of the synagogue in Mellrichstadt

Original:

F 3335

28

WEDNESDAY

28

“For the last time”

Farewell at a Bar Mitzvah

They celebrated nonetheless. Many of the families with members whose Bar Mitzvah was taking place during this September would not be in Berlin much longer. However, on this day they all came together in the synagogue for one last time.

BERLIN

It was more of a wistful farewell than a joyful Bar Mitzvah: Rabbi Manfred Swarsensky seemed to be fully conscious of the situation in which his congregants at the Prinzregentenstraße Synagogue in Berlin found themselves. In his address on the occasion of the Bar Mitzvah of 15 teenagers, he captured the mood of this day of celebration: everything clearly bears “the stamp ‘for the last time.’” Many families, whose sons celebrated their Bar Mitzvah on this day, sat on packed suitcases. One family was departing the very next day. The synagoge, in Berlin’s Wilmersdorf neighborhood, had been one of the only synagogues first built during the Weimar Republic. It had also quickly developed into a center of Jewish culture. Now, at the end of September 1938, it was clear to the rabbi that his congregation was facing major changes: “In a few years, much of what’s here today will be gone and perhaps also forgotten.”

TAGS: Bar Mitzvah, Berlin, cultural life, emigration, Jewish Community, public sphere, rabbis, refugees, religion, September 28, Sermon, Synagogues, Weimar Republic

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Gerhard Walter Collection, AR 11826

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

25

SUNDAY

25

Fluent English!

Language barriers in exile

“Fluent English in a couple weeks. Original, simple, scientific method.”

New York

Speak English fluently! This may have been among the resolutions of Jewish immigrants in the United States for the upcoming Jewish new year. The September edition of “Aufbau” featured a whole array of offers for learning English. Sundry advertisements wooed immigrants with, for example, “a low fee” and “original” methods in order to improve one’s English within a few weeks. These advertisements hit on a market. Because, to those who’d come to the United States, the English language posed an initial and legitimate, yet essential hurdle. Whoever wanted to work in the American environment and build a new life had to be able to be understood.

TAGS: advertisement, immigration, Jewish Community, Journalism, Language skills, New York, politics, refugees, September 25

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Unterricht, Aufbau, Vol. 4, No. 10, p. 10

Source available in English

22

THURSDAY

22

Abandoned synagogues

The congregations of Gliwice feel the consequences of emigration

“Many small congregations that belong to our association are completely abandoned. We must deal with their disbandment. Venerable houses of worship must be dispossessed of their purpose and sold.”

GLEIWITZ

On Rosh Hashanah, Arthur Kochmann had two wishes for the Association of Synagogues for Upper Silesia: that in the new year, every member’s wishes would be fulfilled, but also that Jews in Upper Silesia “would maintain their inner unity at all times” – two wishes which unfortunately had to come into conflict with each other many times in the fall of 1938. The number of emigrants from Gleiwitz had risen considerably over the past few months. Arthur Kochmann points at the dramatic consequences for many smaller synagogues in and in the vicinity of Gleiwitz: many would have to be closed and sold. For a long time, a provision for the protection of minorities from 1922 had protected many Jews in Gleiwitz from the anti-Semitic laws of the Nazis, but with its expiration in 1937, the reprieve came to an end.

TAGS: displacement, emigration, Gleiwitz, Jewish Community, Jewish holidays, Jewish property, Journalism, media coverage, Nazi laws, press article, refugees, religion, September 22, Synagogues

SOURCE

Institution:

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Original:

Auf Deine Hilfe hoffe ich, Gott, in: Jüdisches Gemeindeblatt, vol. 3, no. 18, p. 1. Courtesy of USHMM

19

MONDAY

19

Worldwide networks of aid

Kurt Grossmann and refugee aid

“If you receive a request from Mrs. Erna Winter (and child), who was until now supported by Democratic Refugee Relief in Prague, I ask you to respond with goodwill.”

PARIS

Jewish refugee organizations had wide networks. This was due to individuals such as Kurt Grossmann, who steadily made more connections with contacts and developed cooperation on an international level. Kurt Grossmann, a journalist and General Secretary of the German League of Human Rights from 1926 until 1933, had escaped from Berlin just before an arrest. He fled to Prague, where he established and developed Democratic Relief for Refugees. Grossmann knew how to use his network for the increasing number of Jewish refugees, who had reached Prague. Even in Paris, where he had lived since 1938, he campaigned for support from the local refugee aid organizations. For example, in a letter from Grossmann on September 19th, 1938, he urges M. Gaston Kahn of the Parisian Comité d’Assistance aux Réfugiés juifs to help Erna Winter and her child.

TAGS: advocates, Berlin, displacement, emigration, immigration, Jewish Community, letter, Paris, persecution, Prague, prominent people, refugees, September 19, transnational networks, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Kurt Grossmann Collection, AR 25032

Original:

Box 1, folder 8

4

SUNDAY

4

A last class photo

Gisela and her family right before emigration

DRESDEN

Gisela Kleinermann (top row, right) had recently turned 10 years old. With her arm around her classmate, she looks, with a slight smile, into the camera. At this time, Gisela may already have known that she will not be part of this class of the Jewish school in Dresden any longer. In late summer 1938, her mother Erna prepared her family’s emigration to the United States. Step by step, in recent years the Nazis forced segregation in public schools. In many Jewish communities—as well as in Dresden—new Jewish schools were founded as a result.

TAGS: antisemitism, children, Dresden, emigration, family, immigration procedures, Jewish Community, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, persecution, photo, schools, segregation, September 4, visa application

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Class picture of Gisela Kleinermann, Erna Weingold Kleinermann Collection, AR 11787

Original:

F 001

2

WEDNESDAY

2

Traitor!

Harsh judgment of Schuschnigg

“As I said before […] I consider Schuschnigg a traitor and if he were to fall into my hands today, instead of Hitler's, his fate would be even crueler.”

Paris

“A traitor!” The journalist and author Joseph Bornstein left no doubt with regard to his opinion of the former Austrian chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg. Indeed, with friendly but very pointed words, he made it clear in a letter to his friend Bosch that Bosch’s “faith in the good faith in Schuschnigg” is totally wrong. Many Austrian Jews had long placed their hopes in Schuschnigg, who had tried as Chancellor to defend Austria from the influence of National-Socialist Germany. After the sender of this letter, Joseph Bornstein, lost his German citizenship in 1933, he immigrated to Paris. There he very quickly joined the intellectual milieu of other German journalists and authors in exile. He continued his collaboration with Leopold Schwarzschild and was active as editor-in-chief for the intellectual journal “Das neue Tagebuch” (The New Diary).

TAGS: commentary, displacement, emigration, immigration, Jewish Community, Journalism, letter, Paris, Polish-born Jews, politics, prominent people, refugees, September 2

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Joseph Bornstein Collection, AR 4082

Original:

Box 2, folder 1

1

THURSDAY

1

“Israel” and “Sara”

When names become political...

“If the motives on which this regulation is based were not so abysmally cruel, there would be nothing from its content about which to complain. ‘Israel’ means ‘Fighter for God’ and ‘Sarah’ or ‘Sara’ […] means 'Princess.’

NEW YORK

In August 1938 a new decree had been issued. Jewish people with names that were—in the perspective of the Nazis—not “typically Jewish” were to bear (starting January 1, 1939, the latest) a second given name: “Sara” for women, “Israel” for men. The September issue of Aufbau put the perfidy of this regulation in a nutshell: “If the motives on which this regulation is based were not so abysmally cruel, there would be nothing from its content about which to complain. ‘Israel’ means ‘Fighter for God’ and ‘Sarah’ or ‘Sara’ […] means ‘Princess.’” Not only did the Nazis help themselves to the content of Jewish culture, but they also misused it in order to restrict the private sphere of Jews on a massive scale.

TAGS: antisemitism, commentary, Jewish Community, Journalism, media coverage, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, New York, press article, public sphere, segregation, September 1

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Israel und Sarah, Aufbau, Vol. 4, No. 10, p. 5

30

TUESDAY

30

Ma’ayan Tsvi

The Maccabi Movement in Germany prepared founding members of the settlement

Ma'ayan

The increased influx of European Jews seeking safety from the Nazis to Palestine led to resistance on the side of Palestinian Arabs. In 1936, an armed revolt erupted. During this period, Jewish settlers made use of a law from the times of the Ottoman Empire, according to which an unauthorized structure could not be demolished once it had a roof. By cover of night and with prefabricated pieces, they erected a fence surrounded by a stockade, so that, in the event of discovery by officials from the British Mandate, nothing could be done about it. At the same time, a structure of this kind was immediately defensible against attacks by local Arabs. One of these settlements was Ma’ayan (later known as Ma’ayan Tsvi), situated west of Zikhron Ya’acov on the northern coastal plain. Its 70 founding members, as members of the Maccabi Movement in Germany (and, since 1935, in Palestine itself), were prepared for pioneer life in the land.

TAGS: August 30, hakhsharah, immigration, Jewish Community, Ma'ayan, Palestine, photo, refugees, transnational networks, violence, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Courtesy of Kedem Auction House

Original:

Photograph Album – Establishment of Ma'ayan Tzvi Kibbutz

28

SUNDAY

28

“Illegal” immigrant

Gisella Jellinek becomes Nadja in Palestine

"Belated congratulations on your 18th birthday and I wish you whatever you wish for yourself, long life, health, heroism, courage, to be a good Haverah, and that your ideal will be realized, and not to forget (...) plenty of work."

Brünn/Rishon LeZion

It was under adventurous circumstances that Gisella Jellinek made her way to Palestine in June 1938. As part of a group of several hundred youths, she was smuggled into the area of the Mandate. The moment she came ashore in Palestine, she had to make use of the Hebrew language skills she had acquired at the Zionist agricultural training camp in Austria, in order to avoid being identified as an illegal immigrant by the British authorities. Roughly two months after her arrival, Gisella, who now called herself Nadja, turned 18. In this belated birthday note, her sister Berta wishes her “heroism, courage, and to be a good Haverah (kibbutz member).”

TAGS: August 28, Brünn, children, commentary, emigration, family, family separation, hakhsharah, immigration, Jewish Community, Language skills, letter, Palestine, Rishon LeZion, transnational networks, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Letters, Documents and Images of the Jellinek Family Confronting the Holocaust, created by Paulette Jellinek

Collection:

Berta Jellinek [to her older sister] Gisella Nadja Jellinek

27

SATURDAY

27

Contacts worth more than money

Agnes Graetz uses her network to help her daughter emigrate to the USA

"I ask you to write to me, if at all possible, in the near future, as to whether you see a possibility which does not - as seems to be customary now - require implausibly high guarantees and legal fees."

Lucerne

An illness during a journey forced Wilhelm Graetz to extend his stay in Switzerland. In light of the escalating situation in Germany, he decided to relinquish his home in Berlin. The formerly well-off couple was in no position to help out their four children financially but benefitted from widely spread contacts. Wilhelm Graetz had been a member of the board of the Berlin Jewish Community, and as the chairman of the German “ORT,” he knew potential helpers in many places. In August, a trip took him to Hungary. On the 27th, his wife Agnes made use of her time by asking the well-known territorialist and “ORT” leader, David Lvovich, to help one of her three daughters, who urgently needed an affidavit in order to be able to emigrate to America.

TAGS: affidavits, antisemitism, August 27, Berlin, bureaucracy, displacement, emigration, family, family separation, immigration, immigration procedures, impoverishment, Jewish Community, letter, Lucerne, refugees, transnational networks

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

William Graetz Collection, AR 4121

Original:

Archivbox 1, Ordner 3

26

FRIDAY

26

Recent arrivals

The Boston Committee for Refugees does what it can

"ISAAC BIRNBAUM, age 53, retail tobacco and clothing merchant. (speaks no English whatever)"

Boston

Of the American-Jewish self-help groups assisting Jews in leaving Europe and rebuilding their lives in the United States, the Boston Committee for Refugees was the first. Established in 1933, it consisted entirely of volunteers. Under the leadership of Walter H. Bieringer and Willy Nordwind, the Committee chiefly endeavored to obtain affidavits for would-be immigrants and see to it that they would find employment upon arrival in the U.S. Since the Great Depression, the State Department had orders to keep people “likely to become a public charge” out. It was of great importance to ensure the livelihood of the refugees. The annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany and the colossal failure of the Évian Conference on Refugees reinforced the urgency of helping the desperate asylum seekers. On August 26th, 1938, the Committee’s Acting Executive Secretary sent Bieringer a list of recent arrivals in need of placement.

TAGS: advocates, Anschluss, August 26, Boston, document, emigration, Evian conference, Great Depression, immigration, impoverishment, Jewish Community, letter, refugees, transnational networks, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Willy Nordwind Collection, AR 10551

Original:

Box 1, folder 38

Source available in English

25

THURSDAY

25

Adversity the mother of innovation

Intellectuals plan a housing project in the USA for unemployed Jewish physicians

"You know that as of October 1st, all of us will no longer be doctors; German medical licenses have been revoked for all those of our faith. Of course, there are many who won't know how to make a living and won't be able to continue living here."

BERLIN/NEW YORK

The existential crisis of Jewish doctors in Germany, which had passed through various stages (exclusion from public service and health insurance funds, prohibition of cooperation between Jewish and “Aryan” physicians, etc.) escalated with the employment ban in July 1938 and required a creative approach. On August 25th, Dr. Felix Pinkus, a renowned Berlin dermatologist, wrote to his friend, Dr. Sulzberger, in America, in order to win him over as a fellow campaigner in an aid project. The sociologist and national economist Franz Oppenheimer had come to the idea of establishing a kind of residential colony for former doctors from Germany. The funding for this would be covered by contributions from American-Jewish doctors. According to Oppenheimer’s calculations, roughly 1,000 physicians would use this remedy. (Dr. Pinkus estimated that it was closer to 3,000).

 

TAGS: antisemitism, August 25, Berlin, commentary, displacement, economic persecution, emigration, immigration, Jewish Community, letter, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, New York, persecution of Jewish professionals, prominent people, segregation, transnational networks

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Felix Pinkus Family Collection, AR 25456

Original:

Box 1, folder 41

19

FRIDAY

19

To Haifa? Not now.

Uncle Alfred advises his nephew against visiting

"To my way of thinking, the moment when we should come here will be designated by a higher authority. Fate will show us when we should come here. I have never seen as many unhappy people concentrated in one country as here."

Haifa/Merano

After six years in Palestine, Alfred Hirsch’s verdict was unequivocal: given the country’s political, climatic and economic structure, even people of the highest intelligence and stamina could not achieve much. He did not mince words in trying to dissuade his nephew, Ulli, from coming. Living in the very secular Haifa, Alfred Hirsch was convinced that for a young, Orthodox Jew like Ulli, life in Palestine would be a big disappointment at that point in history. Between the atmosphere generated by the collective misery of a large number of uprooted, depressed people and the political unrest, which led to major economic problems, the timing just didn’t feel right to Uncle Alfred. (The political unrest mentioned is the 1936-39 Arab Revolt in reaction to the massive influx of European Jews and the prospect of the establishment of a national home for the Jews in Palestine, as stipulated by the Balfour Declaration in 1917.)

TAGS: August 19, commentary, displacement, emigration, family, Haifa, immigration, Jewish Community, letter, Merano, Palestine, refugees, religion, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Julius and Elisabeth Hirsch Family Collection, AR 25585

Original:

Box 1, folder 10

16

TUESDAY

16

Jewish workout

Response to an anti-Semitic stereotype

Frankfurt am Main

A classical anti-semitic trope of the 19th century was the notion that Jews are weak, unathletic and effeminate. In order to counter this stereotype, the Zionist physician, writer and politician Max Nordau created the antithetical concept of the “muscular Jew” at the Second Zionist Congress in Basel (1898). Drawing on paragons of Jewish fighting spirit like Bar Kochba and the Maccabees, he called for the regeneration of the Jewish people through physical exercise. Barely two months later, the Jewish sports club Bar Kochba was founded in Berlin. More and more Jewish sports clubs came into being, many of which were affiliated with the Zionist movement. The Frankfurt/Main chapter of the Bar Kochba Club was established in 1904. One of its teams can be seen here posing for the camera.

TAGS: antisemitism, August 16, Frankfurt am Main, Jewish Community, photo, prominent people, Sports, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Bar Kochba, Frankfurt am Main, Collection, AR 11260

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

15

MONDAY

15

Vacation idyll

A sunny letter to father

"We're having a great time. The sun has been shining for two days now, so we were able to go swimming, but the radio is forecasting rain again tomorrow."

Nespeky/Prague

Hitler’s plans for Czechoslovakia could not have been clearer: on May 30th, 1938, he declared to the Wehrmacht (German army) that it was his “immutable resolve” to shatter the country “in the foreseeable future.” Already months before, he had incited the leader of the Sudeten German Party, which was partly bankrolled by Nazi Germany, to conjure up a confrontation by making unreasonable demands on behalf of the German minority in the country. Under the influence of events in Germany, anti-Semitism had increased. But, so far, it had only led to boycotts and physical violence in the border areas of Northern and Western Bohemia, which were predominantly inhabited by Germans. While this crisis was brewing in the background, the psychiatrist and writer Josef Weiner, his wife, Hanka, and their two young daughters were on vacation in the central Bohemian town of Nespeky. Hanka’s letter (in Czech) to her father, the renowned Prague lawyer Oskar Taussig, smacks of a perfectly idyllic holiday atmosphere and spares its reconvalescent recipient anything unpleasant.

TAGS: antisemitism, August 15, children, family, Jewish Community, letter, Munich Agreement, Nazi policies, Nespeky, politics, Prague, prominent people, Sudetenland, violence

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Winn Family Collection, AR 25493

Original:

Box 1, folder 5

9

TUESDAY

9

No prejudicial information

A religious organization confirms they have no concerns regarding Edmund Wachs

"The undersigned pastoral care agency hereby confirms that our office has no prejudicial information regarding Mr. Edmund Wachs."

VIENNA

This certificate, issued by the Rabbinate of the Vienna Israelite Community, was just one among a plethora of documents that Edmund Wachs had gathered in order to facilitate his emigration to the United States. Shortly after the Anschluss, Wachs was put in “protective custody,” a power handed to the Nazis by the “Decree of the Reich President for the Protection of People and State,” also known as the “Reichstag Fire Decree.” The Reichstag Fire of February 27th, 1933, an act of arson involving the German Parliament building in Berlin, served as cause and justification for this law. It was passed on the following day and legalized the arbitrary arrest of anyone suspected of lack of loyalty towards the regime. The law did not stipulate the exact elements of the alleged offence and was widely used against Jews and political opponents.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, August 9, bureaucracy, document, emigration, immigration procedures, imprisonment, Jewish Community, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, persecution, religion, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Edmund and Berta Wachs Collection, AR 25093

Original:

Box 1, folder 2

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