On 3 March 1921, Minnie Marks applied for a passport for herself and her five-year-old grandson Lloyd Marx to travel to Germany. Her purpose? To visit her three brothers â Julius in Magdeburg, Albert in Plauen, and Leopold in C/Zwickau â and Lloyd’s paternal grandmother, Helene Marx. Little did Minnie know that, close to a … Read more
‘Cousin’ Leo Gassenheimer â on the passenger list of the ship Hansa arriving in New York on 16 April 1939 â caught our attention!  He was sponsoring cousin Ruth Gassenheimer’s immigration into the United States. Ruth Gassenheimer was the granddaughter of Samuel & Lotte Gassenheimer of Themar, and anything connected to Themar interests us. And so started the … Read more
On 1 August 1914, Germany declared war on Russia; on 3 August 1914, Germany declared war on France and marched into Belgium. On 4 August 1914, when Germany did not withdraw from Belgium, Britain, supported by its Commonwealth countries, declared war on Germany. “The War that ended Peace” â the title of Canadian historian Margaret … Read more
We have made significant progress in finding the ‘founding families’ of the Jewish community of Themar in the late 1800s â Baer, Frankenberg, Gassenheimer, GrĂŒnbaum, Kahn, Katz, MĂŒller, Schloss/Sachs, Schwab, Walther, and Wertheimer. All these families share two defining characteristics: first, they were German Jewish families, with roots deep in German history; second, the roots were … Read more
Between June 1942 and February 1949, 67 Jews connected to the families of Themar were transported to Theresienstadt. The first were Georg and Rudolf Gassenheimer, both born in Themar, with their wives, sisters Selma and Thekla (nĂ©e Schwab). The last was Doris Lorenzen, nĂ©e Frankenberg, born in Themar. On 19 September 1942, eight (8) Jews were … Read more
On 12 November 1941, Martha Hahn, nĂ©e Katz, b. 1889 in Themar, was deported from Frankfurt am Main to Minsk Ghetto in Belarus, 1672 km to the east. Martha was a member of the Adolf & Meta (nĂ©e Schwab) Katz family. Martha probably lived in Themar until the early 1900s. We do not know much about her life once she … Read more
16 October 2011 â It is 70 years since the first deportation of members of Themar’s Jewish community to the ‘east.’ On this day in 1941, Hugo and Eva (nĂ©e Kahn)  Friedmann were deported from Luxemburg-Trier to the Ghetto in Lodz, or Litzmannstadt as it had been renamed by the Nazis. The Friedmanns lived in Themar in … Read more
15 December 2023: This post has been updated with documents made available online in the Arolsen Archives. Initial post, 26 June 2011: Ever vigilant to discover any new traces about Themarens, a recent google search for “Meta Krakauer” brought lots of news! Six months ago [2010], Anne Prior of Dinslaken published a book about the … Read more
For the third time, Themarens commemorated Kristallnacht 1938. Barbara and Arnd Morgenroth began the city’s examination of the painful chapter in its past with the 2008 exhibit, “Sie Waren Themar/They were Themarens.” This year, they invited Julia de Boor to present her lyrical-musical conversations with three young German women, Anne Frank, Selma Meerbaum-Eisinger and Lisa … Read more
September 6, 2010 marked the 70th anniversary of the arrival of HMT Dunera into Sydney Harbour. The Dunera Scandal has not received a great deal of attention in countries other than Australia. But two men from Themar â Julius Kahn, b. 1896, and Adalbert Stern, b. 1917 â were among the 2500 men jammed on … Read more