Trude Joan Schiff

Trude was born in Cologne on May 28, 1907, the youngest daughter of Adolf Löwenstein and his wife Johanna. Adolf Löwenstein was a merchant by profession and came from the small town of Vendersheim in what is now Rhineland-Palatinate. When the Jewish community there increasingly disintegrated in the second half of the 19th century and his parents moved to Groß-Gerau, near Darmstadt, he found his new home in Cologne. Here he also became engaged in the summer of 1902 to Johanna Mayer, a native of Frankfurt am Main, and married her shortly thereafter. Trude Löwenstein and her older sister Martha grew up in Cologne and experienced a sheltered childhood under the supervision of a nanny. Their home address from this time is not known. At the age of six, Trude Löwenstein started school and initially attended the Städtisches Lyzeum III, the secondary school for girls in Cologne-Lindenthal. She improved from year to year and got very good grades in most subjects. Only "singing" seemed - according to her report cards - rather less to her.

Reformers of the German women's movement had successfully campaigned for secondary education for women at the turn of the century. Thus, since the beginning of the 20th century, girls also had the opportunity to complete upper secondary school in preparation for university studies. In 1920, Trude Löwenstein transferred to the Kaiserin-Augusta-Schule am Kartäuserwall with a very good leaving certificate. She completed her high school career with the "Zeugnis der Reife" on March 8, 1926. As a very good student, she was even exempted from the oral examination. Still in the same year Trude Löwenstein applied for a study place for medicine.

Trude Löwenstein matriculated at the Medical Faculty of the University of Bonn on June 27, 1926, and studied here for two semesters. During this time, she attended several lectures with the highly respected director of the Anatomical Institute, Johannes Sobotta. Her attendance at these events can be seen in Trude's registration book for university events. After the assumption of power, it became apparent that Sobotta was increasingly skeptical of the National Socialists. On several occasions, he was asked by the university administration to correctly answer corresponding questionnaires about his "racial affiliation." In 1935 Sobotta retired.

After her academic year in Bonn, Trude Löwenstein transferred to the universities in Vienna and Innsbruck for one semester each. In 1928, she was examined in the subjects of anatomy, physiology, physics, chemistry, zoology and botany and successfully passed the preliminary medical examination (Physikum). In Cologne, she finally completed her studies with the state examination with distinction in July 1931. In the same year, Trude Löwenstein obtained her doctorate on the dissertation topic "The quality diagnosis of pulmonary tuberculosis with Congo red". After the due payment of ten Reichsmark, she received her license to practice medicine on July 11, 1932, issued by the Minister of Public Health. In order to complete her practical year, she was employed for six months at a time as a medical trainee at the University Clinic in Cologne-Lindenburg, and then at the University Clinic in Frankfurt. On her final internship certificate it was appreciatively noted: "She was popular with the sick and a pleasant co-worker for the doctors.

After her license to practice medicine, Trude Löwenstein worked as a volunteer assistant to the internist and professor of internal medicine Dr. Julius Strasburger (1871-1934) at the University Hospital in Frankfurt am Main. During this time she worked for physical therapy in the clinical department, the outpatient clinic and the university institute. During an influenza epidemic in January 1933, she was also in charge of two departments as an independent ward physician due to the shortage of doctors on site. She was also active in scientific research: she published her third scientific paper in the clinical weekly entitled "Further Experiences in the Treatment of Trigeminal Neuralgia with Radium Manation".

Immediately after the seizure of power in 1933, the systematic exclusion, disenfranchisement and persecution of Jewish physicians by the National Socialists began.  "For the purpose of the unavoidable savings in personnel expenses," Trude Löwenstein was also dismissed by the Frankfurt clinic management on April 12, 1933, for the end of the same month. In 1972, she wrote in her curriculum vitae: "I was dismissed for racial reasons".

Her mentor, Prof. Dr. Julius Strasburger, was also dismissed on September 28, 1934, following the denunciation of a student. Since his grandfather was of Jewish descent, Strasburger was unable to produce proof of Aryan status. He then fell ill with severe depression and died a short time later as a result of a heart attack.

After her dismissal in Frankfurt, Trude Löwenstein took up a position as assistant physician in the surgical department of the so-called "Asylum for the Sick and the Aged" in Cologne on June 19, 1933. Eighty to one hundred Jewish doctors were working here at that time. From April 1, 1935, Trude Löwenstein was the first assistant in the surgical department and headed it independently for many months. She was also responsible for the training and examination of the nurses.

The Rhineland Regional Office of the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians sent Trude Löwenstein the notice for the recognition of her medical specialty on June 25, 1937. The specialty of surgery had been consistently male for generations. In 1933, there were about 19% German female specialists, of whom only 2% had undergone surgical training. After 1933, the number dropped even further. Moreover, because of the reservations of hospitals and clinics, female surgeons often did not find employment.

After the assumption of power, the operation of the asylum suffered from systematically increased repressive measures. Many doctors quickly sought to emigrate. Meanwhile, the Jewish population was also systematically excluded from the public health service. Since the Asylum was finally the only hospital still treating Jewish patients, the influx from Cologne and the region increased sharply. Trude Löwenstein finally brought her father to the Asylum as a patient in 1938. Her mother and her parents' maid were allowed to move into the room assigned to them by the clinic management at Ottostraße 85. During the Reich pogrom in November 1938, the asylum provided a safe haven for Jewish people in Cologne.

On July 25, 1938, Trude Löwenstein, like all Jewish physicians, had her license to practice medicine revoked by the IV. Ordinance of the Reich Citizenship Law. From October 1938, she was the only woman of a total of seventeen physicians in Cologne who were still licensed to provide medical care to the Jewish population as so-called "Krankenbehandler*innen" with a special permit. Trude Löwenstein's mentor, the surgeon Alfred Roseno (1896-1965), had already emigrated to the USA in 1936. In writing, he strongly advised her to leave the German Reich promptly and offered his help to regain her professional footing in the United States. Encouraged by the events of the Reichspogromnacht, Trude Löwenstein finally decided to emigrate with her husband.

On 21.09.1938 Trude Löwenstein married the commercial employee and photographer Hans Schiff in Cologne-Sülz and moved with him after the wedding to the 'Asylum for the sick and infirm'. Hans Schiff, born on November 7, 1907 in Cologne and son of the merchant David Schiff and his wife Sophie, received a commercial education and later worked in his father's company "Schiff & Co". However, he came into contact with the Cologne art scene at an early age. Through his friendship with the son of the photographer August Sander, he became enthusiastic about photography and belonged to Sander's circle of students at the end of the 1920s. There he learned the photographic basics that enabled him to work as a freelance photographer in the 1930s.

He took on commissioned work for Jewish organizations and institutions and documented Jewish life and activity in the city of Cologne, for example through an intensive collaboration with the Cologne 'Kulturbund Deutscher Juden'. His visual depiction of the work of the doctors at the 'Israelitische Asylum für Kranke und Altersschwache' (Israelite Asylum for the Sick and Aged) was also recognized in professional circles. Due to the increasing reprisals Hans Schiff had to suffer as a Jew in Germany, his plans for emigration took shape at the end of the 1930s. In his capacity as a freelance artist, New York possessed a special appeal for him, which is why he chose this city as the destination for his emigration.

After his hasty escape to London in mid-1939, tense and anxious months followed in London before Hans Schiff was able to leave for the United States with his wife Trude in March 1940. In New York, he initially worked as an employee in a photo studio, before later establishing his own photo studio. At the end of 1945, upon obtaining American citizenship, Hans Schiff changed his name to John D. Schiff. He maintained active contact with other German emigrants, among them Albert Einstein, whom he also portrayed photographically on several occasions. In his later professional life, John D. Schiff networked with important New York art galleries and art collectors in order to produce catalog and advertising photographs as well as reproductions of works of art on their behalf. He also attracted attention by photographing famous personalities such as Frank Sinatra and Andy Warhol in his studio. John D. Schiff died in September 1976 in New York.

The plan to emigrate had already matured in Trude Löwenstein before her marriage to Hans Schiff. Together with her future husband, she decided to apply for visas to emigrate to the USA. Hans Schiff registered for an American visa at the Stuttgart consulate on July 30, 1938, Trude Löwenstein on September 21, 1938. After the Progrom Night in November 1938, the couple's efforts to prepare for an orderly departure intensified. Trude acquired knowledge in the field of massage techniques and foot care in Cologne in order to open up an earning opportunity for herself on American soil until her medical training was recognized in the USA. The process of approval and issuance of American visas turned out to be cumbersome and lengthy. Meanwhile, the situation in Cologne became increasingly tense for the couple. Trude Schiff's parents had already fled to London by this time.

On July 08, 1939, Hans and Trude Schiff followed them there with a temporary visa. Already on July 9, 1939, they registered at the American consulate in London. But it was not until August that the registration process could be completed and the transfer of the couple's visa dossiers, which had previously been in Stuttgart, to London could be ordered. Hopes for a quick departure faded. As refugees, Hans and Trude Schiff did not have a work permit in England and could not earn their own income. They were dependent on the financial support of their relatives and got into debt in this way.

Another challenge for Hans and Trude Schiff was managing their unaccompanied removal goods from afar. They had arranged for the shipment of some of their furniture, kitchen utensils, Trude's medical equipment, and Hans's photographic equipment toward the coast in the spring before they fled to London in 1939. A Cologne forwarding company was to bring the removal goods, weighing 5230 kilos, to the German border. The transport, carriage until the luggage was temporarily stored in Antwerp, and storage charges for six months (from April to October 1939) cost the Schiffs over £3790. The Schiffs wanted to avoid sending their extensive removal goods to London, which would have entailed further expense, and wanted them to be transferred to the United States as soon as possible. The Belgian forwarding company in Antwerp, where the removal goods were stored during the ships' stay in London, urged the couple several times to finally give their concrete embarkation date, since only then could shipment overseas take place. Due to the delays in obtaining American visas, the Schiffs were unable to set a definite date for their plans in this regard. An agreement was reached for the time being and the removal goods were sent ahead unaccompanied to New York on November 17, 1939. This carriage was again at a cost of £554.57. 

At the beginning of February 1940, a perspective was opened to Mr. and Mrs. Schiff regarding the issuance of visas. After an initial deadline for the crossing had already lapsed, it now became clear that visas would be granted and embarkation possible by the end of February. Therefore, the Schiffs endeavored to have their extensive hand luggage, which consisted of nine large suitcases containing clothing and personal belongings, shipped from London to Southampton via Liverpool. From this port, Hans and Trude Schiff and their hand luggage left for the United States at the end of February 1940. Their destination was New York City.

In March 1940, the Schiff couple reached New York, the destination of their departure. Trude Schiff immediately made an effort to improve her language skills. As early as April 1940, she successfully passed the language exam. In order to be able to return to her profession as quickly as possible, she took her medical exam in the same year (September 1940) in order to obtain an American license to practice medicine. This was granted to her in February 1941. Although she would have liked to work as a surgeon in a clinic, this wish was denied her as a recent immigrant. Due to the high emigration rate of German doctors, there were high restrictions on admission. Her admission to the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York in the department of cancer research was only temporary. Therefore, as an alternative, she opened a general practice in New York in order to make a living. As she later reported, she had never originally intended to ever work as a practicing physician, since her "aptitude and inclination [...] originally [sic!] lay in the clinical and scientific fields." But circumstances allowed her little leeway.

Her workload as a general practitioner was heavy and her income low (between 1942 and 1945 she earned $8400 in total). The Schiff couple became naturalized citizens of the United States in 1945. After that Trude and Hans changed their names. From now on they were called Trude Joan Schiff and John D. Schiff. In the course of her further career, Trude Schiff often had to struggle with the reservations she faced as a Jewish emigrant. She was only offered her first permanent position in a gynecological hospital department in 1960 after twenty years of residence in the USA. Trude Schiff was already 53 years old at that time.

Since her arrival in New York, she  sought a firm connection to the Jewish community, which gave her much support throughout her life. 

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, Trude Schiff initiated various compensation proceedings in the Federal Republic, which are documented in detail in her estate. In 1954, she filed a first application for reparations with the Regional Council in Cologne, pleading for compensation for "occupational damage" due to the financial loss of service benefits she had suffered from 1938 onward as a result of her leaving the services of the Israelite Asylum in Cologne. The application was postponed until 1960, as the claims that Trude Schiff wanted to assert against the city of Frankfurt first had to be examined and negotiated. Trude Schiff had been an employee of the City of Frankfurt in 1933 (as a volunteer doctor at the municipal hospital in Sachsenhausen) and was claiming compensation for the fact that she would almost certainly have been taken on as a civil servant there if the National Socialist regime had not interfered with her career through reprisals. The city of Frankfurt agreed to Schiff's application by way of settlement and paid her a monthly pension of DM 453.60 for life, retroactively from Jan. 1, 1954, according to "principles of civil service law."

Regarding her application for reparation to the Regional Council in Cologne, she received a decision on July 20, 1960, that she would receive compensation in the amount of DM 4,663.72 because of the "occupational damage" she had suffered. Her application was justified because she had lost her position in Germany due to "National Socialist violent measures and had been forced to emigrate". Trude Schiff received a further DM 8200 in compensation in 1963 on application because of "damage to property" which she had suffered as a result of emigration and transit costs in England and the USA or as a result of the special taxes (e.g. the "Jewish tax") on emigration. Trude Schiff worked until old age in various hospitals in New York and died on June 11, 2003 at the age of 96 during a visit to Israel.