Porcelain factory - Julius Edelstein

Julius Isaak Edelstein was born on November 9, 1882 in Groß Kummetschen. He was married to  Margaretha Pagel, born on November 19, 1892 in Soldin. The Berlin address book from 1912 contains the following  entry: I. Edelstein GmbH, Porzellan Engr., S42. Alexandrinenstr.95,96. From 1912 at the latest, Julius Edelstein was active as a porcelain and glass wholesaler in Berlin-Charlottenburg. In 1919, Julius Edelstein and Isidor Grünebaum bought the "Oberfränkische Porzellanfabrik" in Küps. After the purchase, the factory was modernized and renamed "Porzellanfabrik Edelstein GmbH". In 1923, the company was transformed into a public limited company. Sales were handled by Edelsteinsche Handelsgesellschaft Glas-, Porzellan- und Steingut-Handels AG, based in Berlin, Alexandrinenstraße 95/96. Julius Edelstein also owned another porcelain factory in Allenstein, which opened up the market in East Prussia for him. Edelstein developed into a leading brand in Germany. In addition to the porcelain manufactory and painting shop of A. Ravn & Co, acquired in Eidelstedt in 1923, expanded and extended to include crystal, porcelain and earthenware as a porcelain wholesaler with a sample warehouse, a representative office was opened at the important trade fair location in Leipzig in 1924. There were even "Edelstein" showrooms in New York. The collapse of the domestic market in the fall of 1923, a 50% drop in sales in England in 1926 and finally the global economic crisis from October 1929 led Edelstein-AG into bankruptcy on September 20, 1932. Isidor Grünebaum had withdrawn from the business in 1926. In 1936/1937, Julius Edelstein sold his business far below its value in the course of the beginning Aryanization efforts. Julius and Margaretha Edelstein were deported from Berlin to Riga on November 27, 1941 and murdered there. Father-in-law Max Pagel died in the Theresienstadt ghetto in 1943, mother-in-law Rahel Pagel in Auschwitz in 1944. Isidor Grünebaum died in the Theresienstadt ghetto in 1942.