Max Ariowitsch

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Max Ariowitsch (far left) in a group of tobacconists

Marcus "Max" Ariowitsch (born September 26, 1880 in Leipzig , † March 17, 1969 in New York ) was a German-British tobacco merchant (fur trader) and founder .

Life

As the son of the tobacco shop Julius (Judel) Ariowitsch (1855–1908) and Louise Hepner (* July 12, 1856 in Meseritz , then Prussian ; † July 19, 1939 in Paris), daughter of the tobacco shop Mendel Hepner, with her family before 1870 Moved to Leipzig, Max Ariowitsch was born in Leipzig in 1880. From 1891 to 1897 he attended the royal high school in his hometown. His father came from Slonim in Belarus , he moved to Leipzig in 1877 and in the same year founded a tobacco company at Brühl 71, in the old Zum Blauen Harnisch inn , in whose previous building the Jews had a prayer room. However, the entry in the commercial register was not made until June 17, 1892. Max Ariowitsch's grandfather, Mordechai Ariowitsch, ran a tobacco shop in Belarus and was a regular visitor to the Leipzig trade fair.

Max Ariowitsch received British citizenship in 1902 . In 1904 he and his brother-in-law Hermann Halberstam (* 1864 in Brody , † 1941, Dr. jur., Lawyer in Vienna) became a partner in his father's fur trading company and responsible for the subsidiaries in England ( Ariowitsch & Jacob Fur Co. Ltd. , 1905) and in New York Max Ariowitsch & Co (founded 1910). As a German company, the American company was initially closed at the outbreak of the First World War and later liquidated. The immediately formed backup company J. Ariowitsch Corp. also existed only until 1919. It was not until 1932 that the Anglo-American Fur Merchants Corp. as a company with J. Ariowitsch Leipzig, albeit undercover.

After the death of his father, Max Ariowitsch became one of the most powerful and wealthy fur traders on the Brühl. He rarely appeared in public, which earned him the nickname Gray Eminence . He became a member of the Leipzig Lodge XXXIII. No. 496 B'nai B'rith . In 1912 his son Julius was born, two years later his son Eduard, called Eddie (* 1915; † February 12, 1995). Eddie also began his career in the fur trade in Leipzig, the basis of his later work was New York for over 50 years.

In 1933, the year the National Socialists seized power , Ariowitsch transferred the business activities to sister companies in England and the USA. A former employee filed a complaint against him for tax evasion and violations of currency regulations, presumably out of annoyance about a refused promotion. Most recently both had to leave Germany.

In 1935 he emigrated first to England and after the outbreak of World War II in 1940 to the USA, where he founded his company Anglo-American Fur Merchants Corp. expanded to become the second largest American tobacco company. Before his death on March 17, 1969, he lived in seclusion at 1 135 W, 30th Street, New York. Son Eduard (* 1914) continued the New York company, son Julius (* 1912) headed the Sociéte de Pelleteries (J. Ariowitsch) , 3 Cité Paradis, 3, 75 Paris. Louise Ariowitsch emigrated to Paris in 1937 before the increasing persecution and discrimination in Nazi Germany, where she died on July 19, 1939.

Max Ariowitsch's personal property was stored as “English property” in the Hans Klemm auction house, Grosse Fleischergasse 19, where it was largely destroyed in the bombing raid on February 27, 1945. The remaining precious living room and 14 pictures were donated to the Israelitische Religionsgemeinde Leipzig in 1950.

The German company at Brühl was forcibly liquidated in 1941/42, the assets were taken over by the Reich Finance Administration and on December 11, 1943, an “administrator of enemy assets Ariowitsch” was appointed. The company's stock of goods was usually 5 to 6 million marks; according to the last balance on December 31, 1940, it was 636,981.16 marks. Max Ariowitsch had only rented the business premises, but he owned a few houses. Only Färberstrasse 11, where the family synagogue, destroyed by the SA on November 9, 1938 , was located, as well as the old people's home belonging to the foundation, survived the war . The Ariowitsch Villa, Karl-Tauchnitz-Strasse 14, and the apartment building at Ferdinand-Rhode-Strasse were bombed on December 4, 1943 . The property with residential building at Ritterstrasse 44/48, in which he had a half share, was given to the well-known Leipzig family Oskar Seifert by the Reich Finance Administration for 200,000 marks, who sold it to the Soviet government after the war on April 17, 1946 at an undisclosed price . The company was deleted from the Leipzig Commercial Register on May 4, 1998 following applications by the sons.

Julius Ariowitsch Foundation

Building of the former Beth Jehuda Synagogue (2010)

After the sudden death of his father Julius Ariowitsch on November 22, 1908, Max Ariowitsch, his mother Louise and his sister Toni decided to honor the name of their father and husband in a special way. In 1915 Louise Ariowitsch bought the property on Färberstrasse 11, where she lived, and had the courtyard building converted into a prayer and teaching house. In 1921 these rooms were expanded to create the Beth Jehuda Synagogue - also known colloquially as the “Ariowitsch Synagogue”. In the 1920s, the plan was made to build an Israelite retirement home. Louise Ariowitsch acquired the building site at Auenstrasse 14 (today Hinrichsenstrasse), and the Leipzig architect Emil Franz Hänsel was commissioned to build the old people's home, which coincided with the Great Depression. Therefore, the construction could not be completed as planned, the rear building remained a shell.

In order to be able to finance the construction, Max Ariowitsch, his mother Louise and his brother-in-law Hermann Halberstam established the Julius Ariowitsch Foundation , registered in their mother's name , expressly dedicated to the memory of his father. The administration was the responsibility of the Israelite community. On May 17, 1931, the Israelite old people's home was opened. The interior work on the rear building could only be completed in early 1938. Thereafter, the attic floor was expanded until 1940, after which 92 Jewish people lived in the old people's home. All inmates received free accommodation and service, penniless also free food and pocket money. For many Leipzig Jews, the house was the last refuge after 1938. On September 19, 1942, the 350 residents were deported to Theresienstadt and the property was confiscated by the Gestapo.

After the end of the war, American occupation troops were quartered in the building in April 1945, after which the Soviet occupying forces used it. The Saxon state government transferred the property to the Israelite Religious Community in Leipzig in July 1948. Since they could not maintain the building with their own resources, they rented it as a retirement home to the city of Leipzig under the stipulation that "10 places are to be kept free for Jewish people" and from 1997 to the Diakonisches Werk for two years as interim accommodation for the Martha House.

Between 2001 and 2002, the planning for the creation of the meeting and cultural center of the Israelite Religious Community in Leipzig by the architects Weis & Volkmann Leipzig and arch42 Ernst Scharf Berlin, whose design was awarded the contract for the redesign in October 2001, followed. The renovation work, which was supposed to start in 2002, was delayed due to lawsuits, so that the inauguration could only take place on May 15, 2009.

Web links

Commons : Ariowitsch family of fur traders  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Louise Ariowitsch at the Bürgererverein Waldstraßenviertel e. V.
  2. ↑ König Albert-Gymnasium (Royal High School until 1900) in Leipzig: Student album 1880-1904 / 05 , Friedrich Gröber, Leipzig 1905
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Walter Fellmann: Max Ariowitsch (1880-1969) . In: Ephraim Carlebach Foundation (ed.): Judaica Lipsiensia. Edition Leipzig 1994, pp. 268-269. ISBN 3-361-00423-3 .
  4. ↑ Julius Ariowitsch at judeninsachsen.de
  5. ^ Wilhelm Harmelin: Jews in the Leipziger Rauchwarenwirtschaft. In: Tradition. Journal for company history and entrepreneur biography. H. 12/1966, p. 274, Verlag F. Bruckmann KG, Munich 1966
  6. ^ Walter Fellmann : The Leipziger Brühl. Fachbuchverlag, Leipzig 1989, p. 208, ISBN 3-343-00506-1 .
  7. ↑ Max Ariowitsch at judeninsachsen.de
  8. ↑ Eddie Ariowitsch . In: Winckelmann International Fur Bulletin No. 2353 - Sales Report 484 , Frankfurt, London, February 20, 1995, p. 1 (English).
  9. ↑ Harold James: The German Bank and the "Aryanization". CH Beck, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-406-47192-7 , p. 123 f. ( limited preview with Google Book Search )
  10. ^ Christian Böwe: The Jewish Leipzig. A small city guide. (PDF; 1.0 MB) German-Russian Center Saxony e. V., Leipzig 2007, p. 4
  11. ↑ Louise Ariowitsch at the Bürgererverein Waldstraßenviertel e. V.
  12. ^ Sächsisches Staatsarchiv Leipzig, HRA 1396; LVZ from May 19, 1998
  13. ↑ Louise Ariowitsch at judeninsachsen.de
  14. ↑ The Ariowitsch House. Tomorrow the Jewish cultural center will be inaugurated. In: Leipziger Volkszeitung of May 14, 2009, p. 26
personal data
SURNAME Ariowitsch, Max
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ariowitsch, Marcus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-British tobacco merchant and donor
DATE OF BIRTH September 26, 1880
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig
DATE OF DEATH 17th March 1969
Place of death new York