Women's Lives - In the Footsteps of Jewish Women in Hamburg

The building of the former Talmud Torah School has been used by the Jewish community again since 2004, in addition to the Roland Lauder Kindergarten and the Joseph Carlebach School, it also houses premises of the administration. Today the Jewish community in Hamburg counts about 2,340 members. Standing in front of the building, Joseph-Carlebach-Platz is on the right, where a floor mosaic designed by artist Margrit Kahl commemorates the former main synagogue of Hamburg's Jewish community. Currently, a reconstruction or new construction of the historic Bornplatzsynagoge is discussed.

As the first woman elected to the board of the municipality, Gabriela Fenyes also served in this place during her third term (2007-2008). Previously, the administration of the municipality was located in a complex of buildings at Schäferkampsallee 27/29. Until its sale in the early 2000s, the houses there had an important significance for Jewish life in Hamburg, for example, the Jewish old people's home built by the architect Hermann Zwi Guttmann was also housed here. Information indicating these former uses does not exist, due to alterations and changes the appearance of the building has changed considerably. Since 2008 it has been used by a Montessori school. The Stolpersteine embedded on the sidewalk remind us that Jews were deported and murdered from here during National Socialism - as well as in front of the building of the former Talmud Torah School. Read more about Gabriela Fenyes' board activities at: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station3/6

Now walk across Carlebach Square, which is to the right of the school and where the main synagogue of the Jewish community once stood, towards the university campus, the next stop is on the green area behind the "Pferdestall" building.

This inconspicuous trail, which is now part of the University of Hamburg campus, was once Beneckestraße. In 1895, the Neue Dammtor Synagogue was built here, which was desecrated during the November pogroms in 1938 and destroyed by a bombing raid in 1943. Today, only the small memorial plaque commemorates the former building. However, there was not only a synagogue on this site, but also a "Judenhaus" (Jewish House) from 1942 onwards, which housed the remaining Jewish community. Käthe Starke-Goldschmidt (1905-1990) and her sister Erna Goldschmidt (1902-1977) were forced to move into the building complex at Beneckestraße 2-6 in September 1942. Their last (forced) residence was also the starting point of their deportation to Theresienstadt, which took place on June 23, 1943. In her memoirs published in 1975, Käthe Starke-Goldschmidt describes this day:

"No one was there anymore who could have taken care of us, we had to do our own funeral. Since June 11, we were also under house arrest, which extended to the Benecek Street 2-6 complex. Since September 1942, the Jews who had been scattered throughout Hamburg had been gathered in these houses, which belonged to the community. On the first floor of No. 2 were the remaining offices of the community, which had also been closed and sealed since June 11, not without having been thoroughly searched beforehand. [...] When registering for the transport list, an unusually conciliatory tone prevailed. No blows, not even loud commands, no one's head was held under the water pipe for fun. The Gestapo secretaries, two attractive girls, handed us back our Jewish identification cards with pointed fingers, in which they had stamped that the holders of these cards were evacuated with today's, and checked us off their list. Thus crossed out of the book of the living, we were allowed, against all custom, to return once more to our room in order to spend the remaining waiting time there. We used this reprieve to send distress signals to friends in neutral foreign countries, fleeting lines whose tenor read: I move my residence today to Theresienstadt, Protectorate." (Starke-Goldschmidt, Käthe, Der Führer schenkt den Juden eine Stadt, (Bilder, Impressionen, Dokumente, Reportagen), Berlin, 1975, pp. 23f.).

        
Käthe Starke-Goldschmidt survived Theresienstadt and returned to Hamburg in July 1945. For more on her memoirs and biography, see: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station3/5

To get to the next station, cross the university campus, keep to the right and walk along the small path to the left of the State and University Library towards Grindelallee.

The public library system has a long history in the city of Hamburg. Already at the end of the 15th century such a library is documented. This developed into the so-called City Library in 1751, which took on the task of a university library when the University of Hamburg was founded in 1919. In 1945 the library moved to the present building of the former Wilhelm-Gymnasium. The name State and University Library Hamburg Carl von Ossietzkyit was given in 1983 on the 50th anniversary of the Nazi book burning in honor of Carl von Ossietzky, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and victim of National Socialism from Hamburg. Currently, the collection comprises around four million media (print and electronic). Every year, about 65,000 works are added. The State and University Library also preserves the Dehmel archive since 1939. It contains documents of Ida (1870-1942) and Richard Dehmel (1863-1920), including manuscripts, letters, music pieces, a library and much more. The archive is dedicated to the artist Richard Dehmel and can be considered a mirror of German-Jewish cultural history between 1890 and 1920.

Ida Dehmel was an important patron of the arts, women's rights activist and philanthropist. Originally from Bingen am Rhein, she had run a Jewish salon in Berlin and had lived in Blankenese since 1901. Together with her husband Richard Dehmel, who was a well-known poet, she was part of a European network of renowned artists. In addition, Ida Dehmel was active in various clubs and associations: she was a co-founder of the Hamburg Women's Club, a member of the North German Association for Women's Suffrage and, together with Dr. Rosa Schapire, headed the Women's Association for the Promotion of German Fine Art. After the death of her husband, she founded the interdisciplinary women artists' association GEDOK in 1926. Since Ida Dehmel was of Jewish origin, she was successively banned from all public activities from 1933. Until 1938, she still undertook several boat trips, but never left Hamburg permanently. In 1942 she took her own life. In addition to the Dehmel Archive, the family home can still be visited in Blankenese. Further information at: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station4/5

Walk along Grindelallee in the direction of the Dammtor train station to get to the main building of the university, passing the "Square of Jewish Deportees", where a stone sculpture by Ulrich Rückriem and memorial plaques commemorate the deportation and murder of Hamburg's Jews.

You are standing in front of the main building of the University of Hamburg, which was donated by Edmund Siemers as a "lecture building" and inaugurated in 1911. This donation supported Werner von Melles' plan to establish a university in Hamburg. It was to take a few more years, but eight years after the completion of the representative building, the University of Hamburg was founded in May 1919. The motto on the facade above the entrance "DER FORSCHUNG - DER LEHRE - DER BILDUNG", which was already carved in stone in 1911, has also been part of the university's logo since 2010. Also since 2010, there are eleven stumbling blocks on the sidewalk in front of the building. They are intended to commemorate members of the university who were killed by the Nazis because of their Jewish origin or political conviction including the Germanist Agathe Lasch (1879-1942) and the Arabist Hedwig Klein, who will be introduced later.

Lasch's life is both a reflection of the limited educational opportunities for women in the first half of the 20th century and an impressive testament to overcoming those barriers. While Lasch graduated from high school in her native Berlin, she had to move to Heidelberg in 1907 to study. Women were not to be admitted to study in Berlin until the winter semester of 1908/09. After completing her doctorate, she left Germany and researched and taught at Bryn Mawr College (Pennsylvania, USA) until 1916 as associate professor, where she became head of the German Studies Department of the German Seminar. Her return to Germany led to a career setback: at the German Seminar in Hamburg, which was still under construction, she initially had to start as a "research assistant." However, her excellent education and the fact that the university first had to make a name for itself as a young institution opened up opportunities for advancement for Agathe Lasch: in 1926, she was appointed to the chair of Low German philology that had been created especially for her. She thus became Germany's first female professor of German studies. The seizure of power by the National Socialists heralded the end of her (researcher's) life. In 1935 she lost her professorship and was no longer allowed to publish. Her private library was also confiscated. On 15.8.1942, the deportation to Riga took place, where she was murdered on August 18.

In addition to the stumbling stone in front of the main building of the university there is another one in Gustav-Leo-Straße 9, her former residence in the Eppendorf district. In addition, the Agathe Lasch Prize was established in 1991; it is awarded to young scientists for extraordinary work in their field of research. In the main building itself, a lecture hall (B) has also been named after her since 1999. You can learn more about Agathe Lasch here: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station2/3

Passing the main building on your right, you will cross the campus to Rothenbaumchaussee, onto which you turn left. With house numbers 19 and 38, there are two more buildings on this first section that are closely linked to Hamburg's Jewish history. In Rothenbaumchaussee 19, rabbis are trained today. Rothenbaumchaussee 38 was the Jewish Community Center, and during World War II the building was used by the Gestapo as a Jewish department. After the war, the Jewish Community in Hamburg was reestablished at this location in 1945.

This Art Nouveau building, characteristic of Rothenbaumchaussee, once housed Erike Milee's dance school. Milee (1907-1996, originally Erika Michelsohn) discovered her love for dance as a child. From 1926 she trained as a dancer with Rudolf von Laban and Albrecht Knust in Berlin and Hamburg. Two years later, at the age of 21, she opened her own dance school at Rothenbaumchaussee 99: the Milee School at Rothenbaum. In 1930 she was in Essen for an engagement. From 1934/35 she was in charge of the dance section in the newly founded Jewish Cultural Association of Hamburg. After the Kulturbund in Hamburg was temporarily dissolved, she went to Berlin in 1939 and was again active as a dancer and choreographer in the Kulturbund there. A short time later, with the help of an Italian dance company, she managed to leave the country for Italy. She continued via Portugal to Paraguay, where she took over the direction of a dance department she had founded at the Academy for Theater, Music and Painting in Ascunción. Her mother Margarethe Michelson (1877-1942) and her sisters Lili Michelson (1900-1940) and Hildegard Michelson (1904-?) were murdered by the National Socialists. Their fate is commemorated by the Stolpersteine laid in front of the house in the sidewalk.

Erika Milee returned to her hometown in 1959. In Eimsbüttel, she once again opened a dance studio. She left her mark on the cultural landscape of Hamburg for almost four decades. She died on June 30, 1996, and was buried at the Ilandkoppel Jewish Cemetery in Ohlsdorf under the name Erika Anita Michelson. You can learn more about Erika Milee and her dance school here:https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station4/1

Depending on your time and desire, you now have two options: For the longer walk, go along Rothenbaumchaussee past Hallerstraße and then walk left down Hansastraße until you reach Parkallee. There you go again right along until you are in front of the house number 26.

For the smaller round you go back the Rothenbaumchaussee to the Binderstraße, cross this right and remain at the corner to the Schlüterstraße.

The Parkallee in the district of Harvestehude, whose appearance is characterized by stately mansions, runs parallel to Innocentiapark. Number 26 was the home of the Klein family. Hedwig Klein was originally born in Antwerp in 1911, and since 1914 the family lived in Hamburg. Here Hedwig Klein passed her Abitur in 1931 and studied at the University of Hamburg the subjects Islamic Studies, Semitic Studies and English Philology. Despite successfully completing her doctorate in 1937, she was denied the award of a doctorate in 1938. Through the support of acquaintances and scholars of the subject, she obtained a visa for India in the summer of 1939, but the departure failed at the last moment due to the imminent start of the war. In the following months and years, the house in Parkallee was the family's retreat, where they lived in increasing isolation. Hedwig Klein and her sister Therese were mainly responsible for securing the livelihood and care of their mother as well as their grandmother. Hedwig Klein earned money by working on an Arabic dictionary for the written language of the present. Since Hitler's "My struggle" was to be translated, this work was classified as "important to the war effort." However, she was denied a job in the editorial office, so she had to do her job from home.

After her sister Therese had already been deported to Riga on December 6, 1941 and murdered there, Hedwig Klein was taken directly from Hamburg to Auschwitz on July 11, 1942. She was probably murdered there a short time later. Today, Stolpersteine in front of her home and the main building of the University of Hamburg commemorate the Arabist Klein. Her collaboration on the Arabic dictionary for the written language of the present was concealed until the 6th edition in 2020.

Do you want to know more? Then read on here: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station2/2

Now walk back along Parkallee, turn left along Hallerstrasse across Hallerplatz to Schlüterstrasse and follow this to the corner of Binderstrasse.

The Schlüterstraße, corner Binderstraße was until January 1931 the headquarters of the North German Broadcasting Corporation (then still NORAG), before it moved to the Rothenbaumchaussee, where the NDR headquarters are located to this day. Grete Berges belonged since 1928 to the staff of the Nordische Rundfunk Aktiengesellschaft in Hamburg, short NORAG. Berges,who was born in Hamburg in 1895 and grew up in the Eppendorf district, practiced several professions in her life: Foreign language correspondent, publishing staff, author and journalist.

With the National Socialist takeover in 1933, the broadcasting station was renamed Reichssender Hamburg and was brought into line as early as April of the same year. Influential cultural institutions such as the NDR did not protect their employees of Jewish origin, but subscribed to the National Socialist ideology very early on. As a result, Berges lost her employment because of her Jewish origin. After losing her job, Berges could no longer make a living in Hamburg and fled in 1936 first to Copenhagen and from there with the help of Swedish writer and Nobel laureate Selma Lagerlöf 1937 further to Sweden. In Stockholm, where she lived until her death, she built a frahlingur.

In 1953 Grete Berges visited her former hometown for a few days. She wrote an article about it in the Hamburger Abendblatt, which was published on July 22, 1953. In it she also mentions her visit to the Norddeutscher Rundfunk: "I was in the Rundfunk, at which I had worked for years before 1933 and spoke with one of the current employees about the fact that the first broadcasting rooms of the ,Norag' would have been in the post office building in the Binderstraße. This was completely unknown to him." Even though she planned to pay Hamburg another visit - "And my first visit will not be the last" - she was not able to realize this, she died in 1957. More about her visit to Hamburg: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station4/7

Now walk along Schlüterstrasse at the current post office building and keep left at Hartungstrasse until you reach numbers 9-11.

Hartungstraße 11 was the address where Otto Eduard Ferdinand Pfennig had his villa built in 1863. This was 1903 acquired by the "Henry Jones Lodge" and the building was extended to the adjacent property.  On a total area of 1,200m ² thus arose the "Logenheim". After the house was initially sold at the end of the 1920s in the wake of the Great Depression to the Anthroposophical Society - the Jewish clubs and lodges continued to use the rooms - the "Jewish Community House GmbH" acquired the building in 1937, which had been released for purchase by order of the Gestapo. The subsequent remodeling created a theater hall with about 450 seats on the second floor. As late as 1939 the building served as a Jewish Community House, in which, for example, the Jewish Cultural Association organized guest performances or concerts, and thus as a meeting place for the remaining Hamburg Jews. Just two years later, it was used as a provision and supply point for the deportations that began. On 11.7.1942, the building was the assembly point for a transport to Auschwitz, Hedwig Klein also had to meet here for her deportation.

After the Second World War, the building became the place of activity of a Jewish woman known far beyond Hamburg and thus also the scene of German-Jewish post-war history: Ida Ehre (1900-1989) was a well-known actress since the 1920s. After a failed emigration attempt, she had lived in Hamburg since the fall of 1939 with her Catholic husband, the physician Bernhard Heyde, and their daughter Ruth. At first, the so-called "privileged mixed marriage" protected her. In 1943, however, she was sent to the police prison in Fuhlsbüttel. With the help of her fellow actress Marianne Wischmann, she managed to go into hiding and thus escape her deportation in February 1945. After the Allies had liberated Germany, Ida Ehre realized a long-cherished plan in the summer of 1945: the founding of a theater. The Jewish community leased her the former community center in Hartungstraße for this purpose. The name "Hamburger Kammerspiele" was inspired by the first Hamburg Kammerspiele, founded in 1918 by Erich Ziegel at Besenbinderhof. Within a short time, the theater gained a high reputation, which was equally due to the ensemble as well as the repertoire. The theater gained special significance through the premiere of Wolfgang Borchert's play "Outside the Door" on 21.11.1947. Learn more about it under: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station4/6

For the last stop walk Hartungstraße further to Arie-Goral-Platz (since 2019 named after the Jewish poet, painter and publicist Arie Goral) and keep left, then follow Grindelhof towards the university campus until number 59.

readings, lectures, concerts or discussion events about cultural, historical and contemporary Jewish life in Hamburg, Germany and the world, have since 2008 again a place in the Hanseatic city, in the Jewish Salon in Hamburg. The Grindel in the Hamburg-Rotherbaum district became the center of Jewish life in Hamburg at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, with numerous Jewish stores, schools, residential homes and synagogues dominating the streetscape. Many of these traces are no longer present today or can only be discovered with the appropriate knowledge. Meanwhile, a Jewish infrastructure has begun to develop again, this includes the Joseph Carlebach-Bildungshaus or the synagogue in the Hohe Weide as well as the Jewish Salon or the Café Leonar, in front of which you are now.

The current building at Grindelhof 59 was completed in September 2014 and designed by architect Andreas Heller. On a small podium, lined with beige curtains, several rows of chairs line up in the event space, creating an inviting coffeehouse ambience. The Jewish Salon also includes Café Leonar, which serves dishes from Levantine cuisine. One of the initiators of this place of living Jewish culture was Sonia Simmenauer. Together with other people she developed the idea of creating a common place for Jewish culture. Thus, the self-imposed goal is "to promote Jewish culture and traditions in the broadest sense, to present them and to convey them to an interested public." Furthermore, the salon is seen as a possibility to give back a piece of Jewish life to the formerly Jewish Grindelviertel. Another small feature is located in the back of the house. The hotel "Das kleine Grindel." With just two hotel rooms, it is probably one of the smallest hotels in Hamburg. Sonia Simmenauer's personal thoughts on the opening of the Jewish Salon can be read here: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#station5/6

This brings you to the end of the tour. Perhaps you will let the impressions sink in over a coffee or cool drink at Café Leonar. There are many more stories about Jewish women who could not find a place here. You can find them at: https://juedische-geschichte-online.net/ausstellung/frauenleben#