Kurt Masur was a German conductor. Called "one of the last old-style maestros", he directed many of the principal orchestras of his era. He had a long career as the Kapellmeister of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, and also served as music director of the New York Philharmonic. He left many recordings of classical music played by major orchestras. Masur is also remembered for his actions to support peaceful demonstrations in the 1989 anti-government demonstrations in Leipzig; the protests were part of the events leading up to the fall of the Berlin wall.
Gerhard "George" Lachmann Mosse was a German-American social and cultural historian, who emigrated from Nazi Germany to Great Britain and then to the United States. He was professor of history at the University of Iowa, the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and also in Israel, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Best known for his studies of Nazism, he authored more than 25 books on topics as diverse as constitutional history, Protestant theology, and the history of masculinity. In 1966, he and Walter Laqueur founded The Journal of Contemporary History, which they co-edited.
Leo Baeck was a 20th-century German rabbi, scholar, and theologian. He served as leader of Reform Judaism in his native country and internationally, and later represented all German Jews during the Nazi era. After the Second World War, he settled in London, in the United Kingdom, where he served as the chairman of the World Union for Progressive Judaism. In 1955, the Leo Baeck Institute for the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry was established, and Baeck was its first international president. The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 to those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.
Sir Ernest Joseph Cassel, was a British merchant banker and capitalist. Born and raised in Prussia, he moved to England at the age of 17.
Ernst Akiva Simon was a German-Jewish educator and religious philosopher.
The Nathan Israel Department Store was a department store in Berlin. The business was started in 1815 by Nathan Israel as a small second-hand store in the Molkenmarkt. By 1925, it employed over 2,000 people and was a member of the Berlin Stock Exchange, and in the 1930s was one of the largest retail establishments in Europe. Because it was owned by Jews, the store was boycotted by the German government when the Nazi Party came to power in 1933. It was ransacked during the Kristallnacht in 1938 and then handed over to a non-Jewish family by the Nazis. The descendants of the original owners began to receive compensation for their losses after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. The last owner and manager from the Israel family, Wilfrid Israel, was active in the rescue of thousands of Jews from Nazi Germany and played a significant role in the initiation of the Kindertransport.
The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 by the Leo Baeck Institute of New York City, an international research institute devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. It is the highest recognition the Institute bestows upon those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.
Jüdischer Kulturbund, or Der Jüdische Kulturbund, was a cultural federation of German Jews established in 1933. It hired over 1,300 men and 700 women artists, musicians, and actors fired from German institutions. According to Jonathan C. Friedman, it grew to approximately 70,000 members, while Saul Friedländer tallies its roster as high as 180,000.
The Leo Baeck Institute, established in 1955, is an international research institute with centres in New York City, London, Jerusalem and Berlin, that are devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. The institute was founded in 1955 by a consortium of influential Jewish scholars including Hannah Arendt, Martin Buber and Gershom Scholem. The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded since 1978 to those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.
Paul Oppenheim was a German chemist, philosopher, independent scholar and industrialist.
Leipzig, a city in the German state of Saxony, has historically been a center for Jews. Jewish communities in Leipzig existed as early as the 13th century. Discrimination against the Jews of Leipzig was recorded as early as 1349 and perpetuated under Nazi influence. Despite mass Jewish deportations and emigration forced by the Nazis in the 1930s and 1940s, Leipzig's Jewish community began to grow again in 1945 and continues to grow today.
Arthur Löwenstamm was a Jewish theologian, writer and rabbi in Berlin and in London, where he came in 1939 as a refugee from Nazi Germany.
The American Federation of Jews from Central Europe was established in New York City in 1939 to coordinate services to German-speaking Jewish refugees entering the United States. It was incorporated in 1941. The Federation offered social services, assistance with immigration paperwork, and support with education and job placement. It also put on cultural activities. The Federation focused on issues of immigration between 1939 and the end of World War II, after which it shifted towards issues of restitution. The first branch of the United Restitution Organization was founded in 1948 as part of the American Federation of Jews from Central Europe, and the federation helped distribute funds from the Jewish Restitution Successor Organization and the Jewish Trust Corporation.
Berthold Beitz was a German industrialist. He was the head of the Krupp steel conglomerate beginning in the 1950s. He was credited with helping to lead the re-industrialization of the Ruhr Valley and rebuilding Germany into an industrial power.
Curt C. Silberman was a German-Jewish and American attorney, community leader, and member of Jewish organizations in both Germany and the United States. Born Kurt Leo Silbermann in Würzburg, Germany, he and his wife Else fled due to the rampant antisemitism in Nazi Germany and settled in New Jersey. His legal career in the United States focused on restitution work for the victims of the Nazi government.
The Leo Baeck Institute New York (LBI) is a research institute in New York City dedicated to the study of German-Jewish history and culture, founded in 1955. It is one of three independent research centers founded by a group of German-speaking Jewish émigrés at a conference in Jerusalem in 1955. The other Leo Baeck institutes are Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem and Leo Baeck Institute London, and the activities of all three are coordinated by the board of directors of the Leo Baeck Institute. It is also a founding partner of the Center for Jewish History, and maintains a research library and archive in New York City that contains a significant collection of source material relating to the history of German-speaking Jewry, from its origins to the Holocaust, and continuing to the present day. The Leo Baeck Medal has been awarded by the institute since 1978 to those who have helped preserve the spirit of German-speaking Jewry in culture, academia, politics, and philanthropy.
Selma Stern-Täubler was one of the first women to become a professional historian in Germany, and the author of a seven-volume work The Prussian State and the Jews, her opus magnum.
The Leo Baeck Institute London is a research institute dedicated to the study of German-Jewish history, politics and culture, founded in 1955. It belongs to the international Leo Baeck Institute with further research centres in New York City, Berlin and Jerusalem.
Arnold Paucker, OBE was a Jewish German-English historian. He was the long-time editor of the Leo Baeck Institute Year Book, published by the Leo Baeck Institute London.
Hirschlandplatz is an underground station of the Essen Stadtbahn in the Stadtkern district, Essen near the Grillo theater. Today, lines U11, U17 and U18 call the station.
