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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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24

SATURDAY

24

At the mercy of Nazi authorities

Bureaucratic requirements for emigration

“At the request of Mr. Ernst Aldor, born 05.30.1904 in Wr. Neustadt [a district of Vienna], right of residence in Wr. Neustadt in Vienna, resident at 3 Weimarer Street, it is hereby confirmed, for the purpose of obtaining his American immigration visa, that no adverse information is on record against him.”

Vienna

Not long after power was handed to the Nazis, the motto “Police – your friends and helpers,” which already during the Weimar Republic often reflected a hope rather than reality, lost any hint of meaning for opponents of the regime and for the country’s Jews. A law introduced as early as February 1933 stipulated that police officers who resorted to the use of firearms against people perceived as enemies of the regime were to go unpunished. As part of an unholy trinity, in tandem with the SA and SS, the police quickly became an instrument of Nazi terror. Therefore, obtaining a police clearance certificate was probably not the easiest of the requirements of would-be immigrants applying for US visas. On December 24th, 1938, this important document was issued to Ernst Aldor, a resident of Vienna.

TAGS: December 24, document, emigration, immigration procedures, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, Vienna, visa application, Weimar Republic

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Renee Aldor Collection, AR 10986

Original:

Box 1, folder 3

Source available in English

21

WEDNESDAY

21

Stigmatizing bureaucracy

The name change becomes official

“I hereby dutifully report that the above-mentioned four persons will as of January 1st, 1939 bear the additional first names ‘Sara’ resp. ‘Israel’ in accordance with legal requirements.”

Schwandorf, Bavaria

On August 17th, a provision was added to the Law on Alteration of Family and Personal Names, forcing German Jews to identify themselves as Jews by adding the name “Sara” or “Israel” to their given names. This provision was slated to come into effect on January 1st, 1939. The registry office in charge and local police were to be notified of the implementation of the provision until the end of January. This notification by the Friedmann family, dated December 21st, 1938, to the local police authorities in Schwandorf, Bavaria, falls into this context. It also communicates that the registry offices in charge have been notified of the imminent name changes of Amalie, Bruno, Lillian and Georg Friedmann.

TAGS: antisemitism, bureaucracy, December 21, document, letter, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, Schwandorf

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

George and Lillian Friedman Collection, AR 7223

Original:

Box 1, folder 3

20

TUESDAY

20

Emigration as a condition for release

Freedom only after emigration

“For presentation at the consular section of the US Embassy in Vienna, the Chief of Police in Vienna (Central Registry Office) confirms that the following information is available regarding the sojourn here of Mrs. Renee Aldor, née Fanto, b. December 30 in Budapest, Hungary, right of residence in Wr. Neustadt, at the Central Registry Office.”

Vienna

On November 10th, in the course of the pogroms sweeping the entire Reich, Ernst Aldor, an electrical engineer, was arrested in his own home in Vienna for the crime of being a Jew. He was deported to the Dachau concentration camp 366 kilometers west of his home town. On December 9th, he was released. During the period of his incarceration, his wife Renée received an entry permit for Bolivia and a telegram from her cousin, Emil Deutsch, in America, confirming that an affidavit was being prepared. Australia was a third option the couple had considered as a place of refuge. To prepare for emigration, Renée Aldor, a native of Hungary, procured this document from the registry office at police headquarters in Vienna, dated December 20th, listing all her residences in the city since 1920.

TAGS: affidavits, bureaucracy, Concentration Camps, Dachau, December 20, document, emigration, family, family separation, immigration procedures, imprisonment, kristallnacht, November Pogrom, South America, transnational networks, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Renee Aldor Collection, AR 10986

Original:

Box 1, folder 3

16

FRIDAY

16

Total arbitrariness

Jews in the police state

“Condition: you are to report immediately to your local police authority State Police Authority Potsdam.”

Sachsenhausen

One of the tools in the hands of the Nazis to terrorize Jews was arbitrary incarceration: the Enabling Act of March 24th, 1933, handed the regime the legal basis for the perfidious institution of “protective custody”: persons deemed to “endanger the security of the people” could be detained without concrete charges. Ostensibly, the policy was aimed at political adversaries. In fact, however, it was frequently used against Jews. The salesman Hans Wilk was among its first victims: in 1933, at 24 years of age, he spent over four months at the Lichtenburg concentration camp. During the November pogroms of 1938, he was among the roughly 30,000 Jewish men incarcerated in concentration camps. On December 16th, he was released from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg near Berlin. The requirement to report immediately to the State Police in his home town of Potsdam indicated that the harassment was not yet over.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, Concentration Camps, December 16, document, imprisonment, kristallnacht, Lichtenburg, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, November Pogrom, persecution, Sachsenhausen

SOURCE

Institution:

Jüdisches Museum Berlin

Collection:

Certificate confirming Hans Wilk‘s release from the Lichtenburg concentration camp; Hans Wilk Collection, Gift from Loni Wilk

13

TUESDAY

13

With the blessings of the Nazis

A Jewish press product with the blessings of the Propaganda Ministry

“Reich Ministry for Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda (Dept. 2A) There are no objections to the publication of this issue (no. 6, 12/13/38). The ‘Jüdische Nachrichtenblatt’ is authorized for distribution among the Jewish segment of the population in the territory of the German Reich. Berlin, 12/12/38 Signed, Hinkel” [from the Berlin edition of the paper]

VIENNA

Until 1938, dozens of Jewish periodicals managed to withstand the mounting pressure of the regime. However, even since 1935, they were no longer publicly for sale, and since 1937, their freedom of reporting had been severely curtailed. After the Pogrom Night of November 9th to 10th (later known as “Kristallnacht”), a comprehensive prohibition brought the over-130-year history of the Jewish press in Germany to an abrupt halt. In order to be able nevertheless to spread official communiques through a paper aimed specifically at Jews, a Jewish newsletter, the “Jüdische Nachrichtenblatt” was established, the first issue of which was published on November 23rd in Berlin. Albeit edited by Jews, it was under total control of the Reich Ministry of Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda. On December 13th, the Vienna edition appeared for the first time.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, December 13, document, Journalism, kristallnacht, Nazi policies, November Pogrom, persecution, persecution of Jewish professionals, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Jüdisches Nachrichtenblatt (Berlin, Germany: 1938-1943)

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

24

Thursday

24

Art in crates

An art collector's heiress prepares for emigration

“I have no objections to the emigration of Spitzer, Hanna, private teacher.”

Vienna

Had Austria’s history taken a normal course, Hanna Spitzer, a private teacher, would probably have stayed in Vienna and grown old there as a respected member of society. As a daughter of the late jurist and patron of the arts, Dr. Alfred Spitzer, she was co-heir to a major art collection comprising works by such greats as Kokoschka and Slevogt. Egon Schiele was represented too – among other works, with a portrait of Alfred Spitzer, who had been his sponsor and lawyer, and later his estate trustee. But the flood of anti-Semitic measures which had been unleashed by the “Anschluss” (the annexation of Austria to Nazi Germany) made it unbearable and dangerous to stay: this copy of a tax clearance certificate dated November 24, 1938 testifies to Hanna Spitzer’s efforts to gather the papers required for emigration. Already in January, she had arranged for the shipping of 11 containers of household effects and paintings to Melbourne and a delivery to the address of her sister, Edith Naumann, in Haifa.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, bureaucracy, document, emigration, family, Jewish property, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, November 24, prominent people, tax clearance certificate, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Hanna Spitzer Collection, AR 25537

Original:

Box 2, folder 2

22

TUESDAY

22

Banned from his art

Not suited for the advancement of German culture

“According to the results of my examination of the facts grounded in your personal circumstances, you do not possess the requisite aptness and reliability to participate in the advancement of German culture with responsibility towards the people and the Reich.”

Berlin/Dresden

The works of the Expressionist painter and graphic artist Bruno Gimpel were classified as “degenerate” during the Third Reich. Neither his voluntary service as an aide in a military hospital during World War I nor his “mixed marriage” with an “Aryan” woman spared him the usual repressive measures. On November 22nd, 1938 he received a letter from the Reichskammer der Bildenden Künste, the Nazi authority in charge of the visual arts, which yet again denied him membership and banned him from all branches of his profession. In 1935, this institution of the Third Reich had once before rejected a request for admission by the Dresden artist. Since 1937, he had no choice but to make a living by giving drawing lessons to Jewish children.

TAGS: antisemitism, artists, Berlin, children, cultural life, document, Dresden, impoverishment, letter, Nazi policies, November 22, persecution, persecution of Jewish professionals, WWI

SOURCE

Institution:

Deutsches Historisches Museum

Collection:

Letter of Bruno Gimpel's membership application, issued by the president of the "Reichskammer der bildenden Künste" (the Third Reich's Imperial Chamber of Fine Arts)

Source available in English

23

SUNDAY

23

A joyous occasion in difficult times

A wedding as a respite

“For this marriage, consecrated by God, we fervently request salvation, peace and blessings.”

BERLIN

In a year marred by numerous alarming anti-Jewish measures, the wedding of Frieda Ascher and Bernhard Rosenberg on October 23rd in Berlin must have provided a much needed reprieve for their families and friends. The officiant at the ceremony was Dr. Moritz Freier, an orthodox rabbi. Many young Jews, unable to find work as a result of the intensification of antisemitism in Germany, approached Rabbi Freier since his wife Recha had already come up with the idea of helping Jewish youth to immigrate to Mandatory Palestine and settle in Kibbutzim, a project known as “Youth Aliyah,” in January 1933.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, document, emigration, immigration, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, October 23, persecution, prominent people, rabbis, refugees, religion, transnational networks, welfare organizations, Youth Aliyah

SOURCE

Institution:

New Synagogue Berlin – Centrum Judaicum

Original:

Trust deed for Bernhard Rosenberg and Frieda Ascher; 7.5

16

SUNDAY

16

A man of many talents

Actor, director, designer: Friedel Dzubas' many roles

Groß-Breesen, Silesia

When Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s tragedy “Emilia Galotti” was put on at the non-Zionist agricultural training camp run by the Reich Representation of Jews in Germany in Groß-Breesen (Silesia), the talented and energetic Friedel Dzubas, 23, was central to making it happen: not only did he direct the performance, design the costumes and design and create the stage decoration, he also played the role of Odoardo, the tragic heroine’s father. Lessing, the son of a Lutheran pastor and a central figure of the German enlightenment, had taken up the cause of the Jews early on in life and eternalized his close friend, the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, in his play “Nathan the Wise.” His determined stance earned him a place of honor in the hearts and minds of German Jews as well as in their libraries.

TAGS: advocates, artists, cultural life, document, Groß-Breesen, October 16, prominent people, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

Dzubas Estate

Original:

Courtesy of Dzubas Estate

14

FRIDAY

14

New company, old network

What does emigration look like for an entrepreneur?

“In connection with my affidavit permit me to point out that I did not state my yearly income, as the Hochhauser Leather Co Inc. has been founded only a short time ago.”

NEW YORK/VIENNA

In Vienna, Hans Hochhauser, together with his brother, had been a successful manufacturer and exporter of leather goods. But just one day after the “Anschluss,” he had packed up his life and fled Austria with his wife, Greta, and his daughter, Ilse, on adventurous paths: turned back at the Czech border, the family traveled to Switzerland by train and from there to England on a chartered flight, from whence the family finally made it to the United States. Having arrived in New York, Hans Hochhauser had to start from scratch: his new company was called “Hochhauser Leather Co. Inc.” In this letter to the US Consulate General in Vienna dated October 14, 1938, accompanying an affidavit for his cousin, Arthur Plowitz, he pointed out that while his new company was still in its beginnings, he was able to take advantage of his old business network.

TAGS: affidavits, Anschluss, bureaucracy, displacement, document, emigration, family, immigration, immigration procedures, letter, New York, October 14, refugees, transnational networks, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Hans and Grete Hochhauser Collection, AR 12070

Original:

Box 1, folder 4

Source available in English

12

WEDNESDAY

12

Doctors become “caregivers of the sick”

Discriminatory regulations for Jewish doctors

Nazi authorities were now referring to Jewish doctors as “caregivers of the sick” and forced them to clearly mark their practice signs as those of Jews.

BERLIN

The dimensions of the triangles of the Star of David which Jewish “caregivers of the sick” were to add to the signs for their offices was from now on to be 3 1/2 cm. The specifications in the letter dated of October 12th, 1938, from the Berlin Reich Physicians’ Chamber were meticulous. And they did not end with specifications down to the millimeter: The background color was to be “sky-blue,” and the Star of David in the top left corner was to have a “lemon” color. On September 30th, according to the Reich Citizen Law, licenses for Jewish doctors had expired. Only a few got permission to continue to practice as “caregivers of the sick” of Jewish patients exclusively. The authors hinted that the patronizing had not yet reached its peak: in order to do justice to the requirements of the “Law on the Alteration of Family and Personal Names” (coming into force Jan. 1, 1939), it was advisable to add the name “Israel” or “Sara” to the practice sign already now, to avoid future costs.

 

TAGS: antisemitism, Aryanization, Berlin, bureaucracy, document, economic persecution, letter, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, October 12, persecution of Jewish professionals, politics, public sphere, segregation

SOURCE

Institution:

Jüdisches Museum Berlin

Collection:

Hirschberg Family Collection

7

FRIDAY

7

A household in 11 boxes

Sending the household ahead

Fee for official customs clearance on site and SS supervision committee three 1/2 days: RM 75

VIENNA

Already a few months back, the dentist Max Isidor Mahl and his wife, Etta, a textile worker, had submitted their visa application to the American consulate in Vienna. Ever since, they had been waiting. Etta was a native of Poland, Max Isidor a native of Ukraine. The American immigration quotas for both these countries were already filled. But time was of the essence: this bill shows that already in October, the Mahls had their entire household shipped to the United States in order to bring it to safety. Transportation from Vienna to Hamburg and then, on a freighter, to New York was expensive. It cost almost 800 Reichsmarks for the couple to send the 11 boxes containing their household effects out of the country.

 

TAGS: Anschluss, bureaucracy, document, emigration, immigration, immigration procedures, October 7, Polish-born Jews, refugees, Vienna, visa application

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Lucie Blau Family Collection, AR 25419

Original:

Box 1, folder 15

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

27

TUESDAY

27

Paragraphs and paragraphs…

Prior oral and written inquiries and petitions are useless.

Prior oral and written inquiries and petitions are useless.

VIENNA

The lives of many Jews had become undone within the span of half a year, through occupational bans, Aryanization, dispossession, and denaturalization. After the Anschluss, many Austrian Jews again found themselves in an unstable and chaotic situation. It was all the more cynical then that many of them seemed to be confronted with a complicated, in some ways pedantic bureaucracy regarding visas. A September 27th, 1938 letter from the American Consulate General to Tony (Antonie) and Kurt Frenkl gives example of this: “Your visa application can be accepted at the earliest within months.” The quotas for Central European immigrants were filled. In order to be put on a waiting list for a visa, applicants had to fill in a pre-registration form. And, in order to “avoid delays,” an individual affidavit had to be submitted per person. So Tony and Kurt had to wait even longer, bracing themselves for the next bureaucratic hurdle.

TAGS: affidavits, Anschluss, Aryanization, bureaucracy, dispossession, document, emigration, immigration, immigration procedures, Jewish property, letter, Nazi policies, politics, September 27, Vienna, visa application

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Tony Frenkl Collection, AR 11032

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Chronology of major events in 1938

Remaining Jewish lawyers disbarred

In this anti-Semitic cartoon, a Jewish lawyer is seen swindling money and goods from German peasants. Elvira Bauer, Trau keinem Fuchs auf grüner Heid und keinem Jud auf seinem Eid (Nuremberg: Stürmer Verlag, 1936). Leo Baeck Institute.

The already precarious situation of Jewish lawyers and other legal professionals takes a turn for the worse. Many are forced to close their practices as their gentile clients take their business elsewhere and their Jewish clients flee the country. In early 1937, about 1750 “non-aryan” lawyers or other professionals with legal training were still active in Germany. On September 27, the Nazis issue a complete ban on Jews practicing law, which enters into effect on November 30 in Germany and December 31 in Austria. After this, only a tiny number of Jewish lawyers remain active in a restricted capacity. As so-called Konsulenten, they are permitted to advise and represent only Jewish clients.

View chronology of major events in 1938

24

SATURDAY

24

Stateless from now on

The number of denaturalizations grows

Berlin

Alfred Basch, born September 27th, 1915, in Magdeburg, was henceforth stateless. With the publication of his name in the Gazette of the German Reich, he was deprived of German citizenship. The basis for this was the “Law on the Revocation of Naturalizations and the Deprivation of German Citizenship.” It had been valid for five years. Yet in recent months the number of denaturalizations had clearly risen, often affecting persons and families, who after World War I thanks to the comparably liberal naturalization policy of the Weimar Republic, had become German citizens. On the basis of this law, in September 1938 alone, 116 families became stateless from one day to the next. And that wasn’t enough. The publication of their full names and places, as well as dates of birth, set them up as targets for discrimination, making it impossible for them to go on living a normal life, even if only temporarily.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, document, family, immigration, Magdeburg, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, persecution, Polish-born Jews, public sphere, September 24, Weimar Republic, WWI

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Gesamtverzeichnis der Ausbürgerungslisten, 1933-1938 : nach dem amtlichen Abdruck des "Reichsanzeigers"

Original:

f JX 4231 S8 M5 Copy 1

10

SATURDAY

10

Not noted for panhandling

A good conduct certificate from the police in 1938

“...herby it is confirmed, that within the last five years there are no suspicious matters noted that would prohibit travel, especially not panhandling.”

VIENNA

At first glance it may seem abstruse. A certificate of good conduct from the police confirms to an employee of an insurance company, Franz Resler of Vienna, that he has not made himself suspicious, especially “not by panhandling.” At second glance, however, it is exactly the emphasis on panhandling that points to all the existential crises in which many Austrian Jews increasingly found themselves in 1938. With the “Anschluss” the Nazis had massively increased the economic pressure on Jews living in Austria. “Aryanisation” of companies and occupational bans deprived numerous people of their livelihood. As a result, Franz Resler and his wife Anna planned their emigration to Argentina, where Franz Resler’s sister Fanny had been living since the 1920s.

TAGS: Anschluss, Aryanization, document, economic persecution, emigration, family, immigration, immigration procedures, impoverishment, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, politics, September 10, South America, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Jüdisches Museum Wien

Original:

Good conduct certificate for Franz Resler issued for the purposes of his immigration to Argentina; Archive Inv. No. 5769/3

8

THURSDAY

8

A full-time job

The laborious preparations for emigration

Basel

In her short life, Hilde Lachmann-Mosse already had a few relocations behind her. The 26-year-old grew up in Berlin. Other stops were Woodbrooke in Great Britain (school), Freiburg (studies in medicine) and Basel (medical doctorate). Now she was facing another move: to the United States. She had already had the certificate of employment regarding her time as an assistant gynecologist at the university hospital in Basel translated into English, although that was only one step of many. Even if the actual certificate is only a few lines long, the three stamps of authentication from various institutions is evidence of how many appointments with authorities must have been necessary for Hilde Lachmann-Mosse finally to hold this document in her hands.

TAGS: Basel, Berlin, displacement, doctoral certificate, document, emigration, immigration, immigration procedures, prominent people, refugees, September 8

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Mosse Family Collection, AR 25184

Original:

Box 3, folder 35

Source available in English

29

MONDAY

29

Resistance through passport forgery

The postal ID of Felix Perls

Berlin

The Jewish businessman Felix Perls was born in Beuthen (Upper Silesia) in 1883. By April 1st, 1938, following Nazi regulations, he had to relinquish his position as director of the Upper Silesian Lumber Industry Corporation. Two months later, he and his wife, Herta, moved to Berlin-Grunewald, in order to escape the hostility in Beuthen. Perls tampered with his 1938 postal ID. He changed its date of issue and its validity period. Postal ID cards were needed for receiving confidential mail but were accepted as identification documents elsewhere too.

TAGS: antisemitism, Aryanization, August 29, Berlin, Beuthen, displacement, document, ID, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, persecution of Jewish professionals

SOURCE

Institution:

Die Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand

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

21

SUNDAY

21

For an 18th birthday, current events

Hugo Jellinek congratulates his daughter and gives commentary on current events

"Bohemia is a tough nut on which this gang of criminals will break their teeth, or let's call it a Buchtel [sweet, filled yeast roll] on which these maniacal devils will choke. Despite the many local traitors, the government and the people are unified in their unflappable will to defend freedom and the achievements of democracy to the last drop of blood."

Brünn/Rishon LeZion

Hugo Jellinek was proud of his daughter Gisella, who had become a glowing Zionist during Hakhsharah and just months before had immigrated to Palestine as part of a group of daring youngsters. For her 18th birthday, not only did he send his first-born daughter congratulations, he also shared his thoughts about current events with her. From his new vantage point in Brünn/Brno (Czechoslovakia), where he had fled from Vienna after a warning, German maneuvers alongside the Czechoslovakian border were worrying him. But he was convinced that, unlike in the case of Austria, the Wehrmacht would face fierce opposition. He felt very bitter about the suspicion of and lack of solidarity with needy Jewish refugees among wealthier members of the Jewish community in Brno. Moreover, he was greatly worried by the eviction notices Austrian Jews were receiving, among them his relatives. Among all the worry and complaint was a silver lining, an acquaintance with a woman.

TAGS: Anschluss, August 21, Brünn, bureaucracy, children, commentary, displacement, document, emigration, family, family separation, hakhsharah, immigration, impoverishment, letter, Munich Agreement, Palestine, refugees, Rishon LeZion, transnational networks, visa application, welfare organizations, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

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

Collection:

Letter from Hugo Jellinek to Gisella Nadja Jellinek

20

SATURDAY

20

650 reichsmarks and 50 pfennigs

Aboard the Columbus New York-bound

"Boat tickets, train tickets, plane tickets to all countries"

Berlin/Bremen/New York

Just a few doors down from the Palestine Office of the Jewish Agency, at No. 2 Meineke Street in Berlin, was the travel agency “Palestine & Orient Lloyd,” which closely cooperated with the Palestine Office in assisting thousands of Jews with emigration from Nazi Germany—and not only to Palestine. One of these emigrants was Dr. Rolf Katzenstein. On August 20th, 1938, the “Palestine & Orient Lloyd” issued this bill to him for passage to New York on August 27th aboard the Columbus from Bremen.

TAGS: August 20, Berlin, Bremen, displacement, document, emigration, New York, Palestine, refugees, Zionism

SOURCE

Institution:

Jüdisches Museum Berlin

Collection:

Receipt "Palestine & Orient Lloyd" for Rolf Katzenstein, Ruther Gützlaff née Katzenstein Collection

18

THURSDAY

18

A questionnaire

Anti-Semitism in the Saxony town of Merseburg drives Bernhard Taitza to emigrate

"Means for establishing a life, provided that export will be authorized; means to cover travel costs: 'None. RM 8000, confiscated in Germany and which I am seeking to have released. Otherwise, my relatives in America will provide me with sufficient means of subsistence.'"

Prague

The negligible number of Jews (50 out of a total of 31,576 in 1933) in the town of Merseburg, in Saxony, did not dissuade local Nazis from terrorizing them. As early as 1934, Bernhard Taitza, a local merchant, reported on Jewish residents’ anguish at Nazis marching past their homes while singing anti-Semitic songs. The atmosphere became so unbearable that in 1938 he made his way out of Germany to Prague. Days later, on August 18th, he submitted this questionnaire to HICEM, founded in 1927 as a coalition of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, the Jewish Colonization Association and Emigdirect, another Jewish migration organization. With two children already residing in America, Taitza was fortunate enough to have an affidavit and didn’t have to worry too much as to whether he would regain possession of the money confiscated from him by the Nazis.

TAGS: affidavits, antisemitism, August 18, displacement, document, economic persecution, emigration, family, family separation, Hate speech, immigration procedures, Prague, refugees, transnational networks, violence, welfare organizations

SOURCE

Institution:

New Synagogue Berlin – Centrum Judaicum

Original:

Bernhard Taitza, former Merseburg, arrives at CSR ; CJA, 1 C Hi 1, No. 21, #12497, Image 1

17

WEDNESDAY

17

Sara for women, Israel for men

Compulsory first names for Jews

"If a Jew bears a name differing from those which according to § 1 can be given to Jews, as of January 1, 1939, he must adopt an additional first name, namely Israel in the case of a male and Sara in the case of a female."

Berlin

Twice in the course of German history, Jews were forced to change their names: the first time through the introduction of (often stigmatizing) family names during the Emancipation, the second time through the introduction of compulsory first names: “Sara” for Jewish women and “Israel” for Jewish men (August 17, 1938). Thus, Jews were singled out and made to stand apart from the rest of society. If the given name appeared on an officially approved list of Jewish names issued by the Nazis, no additional name was required. The regime also saw to it that Jews who had changed their family names in order to blend in and avoid discrimination had to return to their previous names.

TAGS: antisemitism, August 17, Berlin, document, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, persecution, segregation

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Kurt Hirschfeld Collection, AR 25708

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Chronology of major events in 1938

Jews forced to adopt new first names

A passport for a Jewish woman clearly displays the legally ordered middle name of Sara. Marianne Salinger Collection, Leo Baeck Institute.

Jewish Germans with a first name that the Nazis do not consider “typically Jewish” are forced to adopt an additional first name as of January 1, 1939. Men are assigned the name Israel, women the name Sara. The intent of this policy is to make Jews more immediately identifiable as Jews. This initiative marks the first attempt to mark Jews and to segregate them from the rest of the population. On January 24, 1939, the order is extended to include Jews in Austria and the Sudetenland.

View chronology of major events in 1938

12

FRIDAY

12

Evicted

Housing woes reach Jews in Vienna

“The tenant, whose lease was terminated, is a Jew, and fellow tenants can no longer be expected to live side-by-side with him.”

VIENNA

Until 1938, about 60,000 Jews lived in the Leopoldstadt district of Vienna, a fact that earned it the moniker “Isle of Matzos.” Between the end of World War I and the rise of “Austrofascism” in 1934, the Social-Democratic municipal government began to create public housing. By the time of the Anschluss in March 1938, there was a massive housing shortage in the city. The Nazis began to evict Jewish tenants from public housing. In light of the tendency of the police to ignore encroachment on Jewish property, it was easy for antisemitic private landlords to follow this example. Being a Jew was enough of a reason for eviction. When house owner Ludwig Munz filled in the eviction order form for his tenants Georg and Hermine Topra, he came up with as many as three reasons: his own purported need for the place, back rent, and consideration for the neighbors, who could not be expected to put up with having to live side-by-side with Jews.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, August 12, bureaucracy, document, Fascism, Jewish property, Nazi policies, persecution, Vienna, WWI

SOURCE

Institution:

Jüdisches Museum Wien

Original:

Inv. No. 5171/2

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

8

MONDAY

8

Escape plan with a detour

A travel agency helps Ursula Meseritz with her travel planning to the USA

“Following up on your visit to our office today, we are sending you the itinerary and the bill.”

NEW YORK

As the only member of her family, 18-year-old Ursula Meseritz left Germany in July and embarked from Le Havre to New York aboard the R.N.S. “Britannic.” Adolf Floersheim, a former neighbor and a resident of the U.S. since 1937, provided an affidavit for the young woman. Her parents, Olga and Fritz Meseritz, who had arranged for her emigration, remained in Hamburg. A travel agency, Plaut Travels, on Madison Avenue in New York, apparently run by German-Jewish immigrants, prepared the itinerary for Ursula’s next journey to the West Coast, with a leisurely detour to the capital, and sent it to her on August 8th.

TAGS: affidavits, August 8, displacement, document, emigration, family separation, Hamburg, immigration, immigration procedures, Le Havre, letter, Los Angeles, New York, refugees, transnational networks

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Ursula Meseritz Elgart Family Collection, AR 25544

Original:

Box 1, folder 14

6

SATURDAY

6

Take a number

Helina Mayer is number 9443 on the waitlist for an appointment at the US Consulate

“You are registered in the waiting list of visa applicants under no. 9443 and should promptly notify us of any change of address.”

Stuttgart

Jews were hardly the only “undesirables” the US Immigration Act of 1924 aimed to keep out of the country. When the law was introduced, efforts to exclude certain nationalities, especially Chinese, Japanese, and other Asian immigrants, had been going on for half a century. In the early 1920s, a quota system was introduced that favored immigrants from Northern Europe. The quotas were not adjusted to address the severe refugee crisis created by the persecution of Jews by Nazi Germany. Even for nationals of the favored countries of origin, just doing all the paperwork to get on the waiting list for an American visa was a major headache, and the waiting could be demoralizing. As documented by this ticket issued to Helina Mayer in Mainz by the US Consulate General in Stuttgart, applicants could expect to be summoned for examination according to their number in line, provided they had submitted “satisfactory proof” that their livelihood in the US was secured.

TAGS: affidavits, antisemitism, August 6, bureaucracy, document, emigration, immigration, immigration procedures, Mainz, politics, refugees, Stuttgart, United States of America, visa application

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Joan Salomon Family Collection, AR 25380

Original:

Box 1, folder 5

4

THURSDAY

4

Selective service

Bruno Blum's Jewish descent exempts him from military service

“We hereby testify that according to the documents presented to our office, Mr. Bruno Blum, born Aug. 11, 1907, in Buczacz, is a Full Jew.” [Volljude was the Nazi term for a person with at least three Jewish grandparents].

VIENNA

Article 1 of §15 of the Nazi Conscription Law (introduced on May 21, 1935) stipulated that “Aryan descent is a prerequisite for active military service.” In the 1936 amendment, the language was even clearer: “A Jew cannot perform active military service.” In order to get permission to leave the country, prospective male emigrants had to present a document to the local military authorities confirming their Jewish descent and thus proving that they were not simply seeking to shirk their duties by emigrating. On August 4, 1938, the registry of the Vienna Jewish Religious Community, based on the documentation available to them, attested to Bruno Blum’s Jewish ancestry on both sides as part of the paperwork he had to submit in order to get permission to emigrate.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, August 4, bureaucracy, document, emigration, Jewish Community, Nazi laws, Nazi policies, segregation, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Blum Family Collection, AR 25132

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

31

SUNDAY

31

Out of respect for the “Volksgemeinschaft”

New law outlaws bequests to Jews

“§ 48 A disposition on grounds of death is null and void if it violates healthy public sentiment in a manner grossly contradicting the respect which a responsible testator must exhibit towards family and ethnic community.”

Berlin

With the Enabling Act (Ermächtigungsgesetz) of March 24, 1933, the newly installed government of Adolf Hitler left little doubt about how it viewed the rule of law. The act allowed the government to suspend the constitution whenever it saw fit, to formulate laws and decrees without the involvement of parliament, and even to create treaties between Germany and other countries without parliamentary consent or compliance with the constitution. The arbitrariness and randomness of the legal system this created were intensified by the frequent evocation of the Gesundes Volksempfinden (“healthy popular sentiment”), a term that implied that the people’s putatively uncorrupted, natural instincts should be the basis of Germany’s jurisprudence. One such case was the “Law on the Creation of Testaments and Contracts of Inheritance” (§48) of July 31. Invoking “the needs of the Volksgemeinschaft“—code for racially conceived German national community—the law invalidated contracts through which a deceased person’s property was bequeathed to a Jew.

TAGS: antisemitism, Berlin, document, economic persecution, July 31, Nazi laws, Nazi policies

SOURCE

Institution:

ALEX - Historische Rechts- und Gesetzestexte Online

Collection:

Reichgesetzblatt, Jahrgang 1938.

29

FRIDAY

29

Rough sea and swell

After seven days of travel, Anton Felix Perl arrives on a new continent

„Civil Examination Stamp“

QUEBEC

In the eyes of the Nazis, the fact that both his parents had converted to Catholicism in the year of his birth, 1912, and that he was baptized as an infant, did not make Anton Felix Perl any less of a Jew. After attending a Catholic high school in Vienna, the Schottengymnasium, he went to medical school, from which he graduated in 1936. Two years into his residency at the Allgemeines Krankenhaus, he was dismissed on racial grounds. In this stressful situation, Dr. Perl contacted high-ranking Catholic clergymen in Canada. With the help of the archbishops of Winnipeg and Regina, his immigration was arranged, and after a seven-day voyage from Liverpool, he arrived in Canada and got his civil examination stamp from the immigration office in Quebec on July 29, 1938. Canada’s immigration policy was extremely restrictive, especially towards those persecuted for religious or “racial” reasons. For once, Dr. Perl’s baptism certificate proved useful.

TAGS: Anschluss, antisemitism, Church, document, emigration, ID, immigration, immigration procedures, July 29, persecution of Jewish professionals, Quebec, Vienna

SOURCE

Institution:

Leo Baeck Institute – New York | Berlin

Collection:

Perl Family Collection, AR 25190

Original:

Box 1, folder 1

Source available in English

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