Egon Fromm Family Collection

The Egon Fromm Family Collection documents the lives of members of the Fromm and Heumann family, with a focus on the families of Walter Fromm and Carola Heumann, the parents of Egon Fromm. Included is family correspondence, songs and speeches from family weddings, a friendship book (album amoricum), passports and genealogy research. Users should note that most individuals' given names in the collection have variant spellings.

Much of the collection consists of the personal papers of family members, including Carola Fromm's friendship book, texts used at her wedding with Walter Fromm and of her sister Paula's with Ernest Katz in 1937, and Carola and Walter Fromm's passports. Her friendship book includes poems written by her siblings and friends, with several poems by her brothers Joseph and Rudolph (Rudi). With the poetry book are two letters by her brothers Julius and Carl while away from home during World War I. Wedding texts includes several songs and speeches written by other family members for the two occasions, along with a photocopy of an invitation to Walter and Carola Fromm's wedding.

Two folders in the collection hold family correspondence (almost all photocopies), nearly all of which is to Walter and Carola Fromm and dates largely from the late 1930s and early 1940s. This correspondence, whose most frequent correspondents were Carola's brothers Rudolph (in Venlo, Netherlands) and Carl (in Bielefeld, Germany) Heumann, portray the many attempts by them to emigrate from Germany with their families, including such places as Venezuela and Cuba. The successful emigrations of Carola's sisters Paula Katz and Lene Kahn with their families are also mentioned. Rudolph Heumann informed the Fromms of the events of Kristallnacht and the arrest of Joseph Heumann. Letters from the mid-1940s include Red Cross letters that mention loss of contact with several Heumann family members and with the World Jewish Congress regarding the search for them. At the end of August 1945 Margot Heumann, daughter of Carl and Johanna (Henny) Heumann, wrote a series of letters to her aunt and uncle from Sweden, in which she described the deportation of herself, her parents and her sister Lore to Auschwitz, as well as her separation from them, her time in various labor camps and in Bergen-Belsen, and her intention to emigrate to the United States. Later letters from the National Council of Jewish Women provide official confirmation of the deportation of Samuel, Rudolph and Regina Heumann from Westerbork. A few later letters contain family news. With the correspondence is an undated copy of a newspaper clipping regarding the restitution of funds of Rudolph and Regina Heumann.

One folder in the collection holds genealogical research. Such papers consist of photocopies of lists of Heumann family members, of participants in World War I from Hellenthal, and of a letter by Egon Fromm with biographical details of Fromm family members, including his grandparents, parents and uncles, as well as himself. In this folder is also a lengthy tree of the Levenbach family that shows the Fromm family along with many others.