Guide to the Papers of John Stern

John (Hans Ulrich) Stern was born in Hamburg, Germany where he attended school until July 1933. Moving to Morocco with his parents, he attended French school in Casablanca from October 1933 until May 1935 and then a Spanish primary school in Tetuan, where he graduated in June 1937. He then moved to Tangier where he attended the French Lycee and obtained a French Baccalaureat of Philosophy in 1945. During this time, Stern maintained a journal in which he described life in Tangier during a period of Spanish annexation and Nazi propaganda. He lost his father early in life, and worked as a buying agent for his mother.

Encouraged by his mother, he moved to the United States in 1949. He served in the U.S. Army from 1951-53, serving as a supply clerk in an infantry company, and later as an interpreter at a U.S. Army base in Stuttgart, Germany. Upon his release from the Army in 1953, he went back to New York and resumed his business interests there.

A devoted son, Stern moved to Tangier in June, 1955 in order to care for his sick mother. There, he met and married his wife Alia Azancot Stern (the daughter of a former Rabbinic Judge from Tangier) in 1957. Their son James was born in 1958. Once Tangier was integrated into Morocco in 1960, he and his family moved back to New York. He continued working as a buying agent for Jewish customers in Morocco, and joined the company Dicker International in 1968. He purchased the business with a partner in 1974, and continued as its sole owner in 1992. Stern died in New York (Rosh Chodesh Tamuz).