Erich-Klibansky-Platz
The Erich Klibansky Platz in Cologne District Old Town North , located at the Helen Street, named Erich Klibanskys , the former and last director of the Jewish Reform Real Grammar School ( Yavneh ) . It got its name in 1990.
location
The area of the square area is small, it was due by the last war given urban changes. The square is reserved for pedestrians only, at the western end of Helenenstrasse, between St.-Apern- Strasse and Albertusstrasse, opposite the main entrance of the Pullman conference hotel . It is the area of the property of the Jewish community Adass Jeschurun , which used to be built on with several school buildings and a synagogue .
Prehistory of the place
As early as the middle of the 19th century, St.-Apern-Straße was a “dignified” residential and business district valued by wealthy citizens. Antique shops dominated here , in which jewelery or valuable furniture was for sale by mostly Jewish owners. These residents built a house of worship in 1884, and the synagogue of the Orthodox community of Adass Jeschurun was built . In the same year, a teachers' seminar was set up as part of it . At the same time as the Jewish elementary school, the Morijah , the seat of the district of Cologne was built by Carl Moritz in 1907–1909 on the neighboring property on St.-Apern-Straße (today's district gallery). Around 1919 the community built the reform high school "Jawne" in St.-Apern-Strasse, which was also private and only maintained by the community . The interior of the synagogue was destroyed in November 1938 , the school buildings were closed in 1942. All buildings were destroyed at the end of the war.
Lion fountain
A fountain symbolically decorated with the “Lion of Judah” , a Gur Aryeh ( Hebrew for young lion ) on this square commemorates 1100 murdered Jewish children in Cologne, whose names are written on the bronze plates surrounding the fountain basin. The fountain erected in 1997 as a memorial also commemorates Erich Klibansky, who was able to save 130 of the students entrusted to him by organizing an escape for them to Great Britain in 1938 . One of these children who escaped at the time, Hermann Gurfinkel, created the lion fountain.
In July 2020, activists of the “Animal Rebellion Cologne” polluted the well water with red paint, which led to sharp criticism from Jewish associations and the Cologne synagogue community due to the character of the well as a memorial site. The activists later apologized. It is regretted that Jewish culture was unintentionally wronged here.
Changing exhibitions
Since the 1980s, after years of research by the couple Dieter and Irene Corbach, who campaigned for the discussion of Nazi history in Cologne, extensive material was viewed and saved. On the basis of this collection, which went to the NS Documentation Center of the City of Cologne after Dieter Corbach's death , a first exhibition, Die Jawne zu Köln , has already taken place. After the death of her husband, Irene Corbach continued the work as synodal representative for the Christian-Jewish conversation in the church district on the right bank of the Rhine. She also kept in contact with Jawne students all over the world.
The current exhibition (2007), with its motto “The children in the school yard next door”, also refers to the former buildings of the Jewish-Orthodox community Adass Jeschurun at St.-Apern-Straße 29–31. With the support of the Cologne NS Documentation Center ( EL-DE-Haus ), of which historical photos and documents from the Corbach Collection (since 2006) have been made available, it is hoped that the authentic illustrations and the a large number of translated texts that make everyday life at a Jewish school in the 1920s / 1930s understandable.
Literature / sources
- Kirsten Serup-Bilfeldt: Between the Cathedral and the Star of David. Jewish life in Cologne from the beginning until today , edited by Ulrike Mast-Kirschning and with a foreword by Ralph Giordano , Verlag Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne, undated (2001), ISBN 3-462-03508-8
- Carl Dietmar: Die Chronik Kölns , Chronik Verlag, Dortmund 1991, ISBN 3-611-00193-7
- Adolf Kober : The religious instruction of the synagogue community Cologne . In: Yearbook of the Synagogue Community Cologne 1934
Remarks
- ^ Carl Dietmar: Die Chronik Kölns, p. 265
- ↑ Ulrike Mast-Kirschning, p. 163 ff.
- ↑ Jüdische Allgemeine: Synagogue community appalled by blood-red colored well. July 13, 2020, accessed July 13, 2020 .
- ↑ "Animal Rebellion" - animal rights activists color fountains blood red - Jewish community appalled. In: Deutschlandfunk. Retrieved on July 13, 2020 (German).
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from October 8, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Accessed December 20, 2007
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 56 ′ 23.5 " N , 6 ° 56 ′ 41.4" E