Krefeld (Germany)

This collection is composed of the papers of Arthur Bluhm, chief rabbi of Krefeld, Germany between 1928 and 1938, and rabbi of Temple B'nai Israel in Amarillo, Texas. It documents his professional life and also holds records related to the Krefeld Jewish Community and the Jews in Westphalia. In addition, the collection contains the papers of Abraham Sutro, chief rabbi of Westphalia from 1815-1869.

This collection documents the history of the Weiss family with a focus on Gerald Weiss’ parents Jacob and Selma Weiss née Falk and their siblings. Jacob (alternatively Köbes) Weiss (1883-1965) was born the second of nine children to the cattle dealer Albert Weiss and his wife Mathilde Amalie née Michel. As a young man, he lived in Cologne and started a bed linen manufacturing business, S & J Weiss, with his brother Siegmund. As the situation for Jews in Germany worsened in the 1930s, he and Siegmund smuggled money from the business to banks in Holland to aid in the Weiss family’s emigration. Jacob Weiss emigrated with his wife and children in 1939 and settled in New York. This collection contains family trees, family correspondence, translations of family correspondence, vital records, immigration and naturalization records, correspondence and legal documents concerning restitution claims, correspondence and legal documents concerning the estate of Hermann and Carolina Michel née Frank, and correspondence and photographs concerning family gravesites and the restoration of a Jewish cemetery.

Records from "Gesamtarchiv der deutschen Juden" regarding the communities of Krefeld, Koenigsberg, Pommerania, Posen, Bromberg, Schoppe, Dessau, Pilsen, Czernowitz, Galicia and Stockholm, Sweden; correspondence between police department of Paris, France, and the police department in Berlin, 1848, regarding German refugees in Paris.

This collection contains mostly Hannelore Daniel’s diaries which reflect her everyday life, childhood memories, and Holocaust experiences as well as her creative writing on similar topics. Most of the material is written in old German script.

The bulk of the collection consists of published materials from the 1980s describing the former Jewish community in Krefeld and its fate during the Holocaust. Also included are genealogical tables of the extended Neuberg family.

This collection holds materials relating to the life of Hedwig Strauss, a Jewish woman who perished during the Shoah. Although it is primarily composed of letters and postcards to her son Walter dealing with her life in Germany between 1939 to 1941 and her attempts to escape, it also includes further correspondence with and between family members as well as personal and official documents on Hedwig Strauss and her son Walter.

The collection contains correspondence and other documents, pertaining to Herbert Heineman(n), his brother Eric(h) and their parents, Lisette and Max Heinemann. The bulk of the collection pertains to Lisette and Max Heinemann’s correspondence with their sons and their imprisonment in the Theresienstadt concentration camp.

This collection contains documents pertaining to the family history and biography of Ilse Strauss in Krefeld (Germany), England, and Australia. Included are family trees, manuscripts, diaries, photographs and correspondence.

This collection documents the life and work of the law librarian Kate Wallach. Contained in this collection are papers relating to her personal life, mainly her correspondence between her and her parents and her brother when she was already in the United States, as well as official documents and professional correspondence between her as a law librarian and members of other academic libraries. Kate Wallach was among the first 150 women to practice law in the state of Wisconsin.

The collection comprises documents related to the Meyer family and Jewish life in Württemberg as well as newspaper clippings from the 20th century. Mostly it features materials about Jewish life in Southern Germany from the 18th century to the 19th century. Moreover, personal notes from Max Meyer on religious topics, Festschriften and items related to the Jewish graveyard in Stuttgart-Hoppenlau are part of the collection.

The bulk of the Rudy Appel family collection holds detailed family trees of the Appel family; the Appel-Loewenstein families; the Willstätter-Appel families; the Hofmann family; the Stein family; and the Stein-Hofmann families, all created by Rudy Appel, 1966-1969. Also included is a 2 page typescript with the biography of Ephraim Willstaetter (1761-1829), written originally by his son Rabbi Elias Willstaetter (1796-1842) and translated by Rudy Appel. There is also a page with Yiddish notes on noteworthy events in Krefeld (1805-1811), and Rudy Appel’s letter to the LBI, explaining his donation.

Unpublished manuscripts on the genealogy of the various ancestors of Walter S. Hertzmann.