Rosa Bodenheimer

Rosa Bodenheimer (born December 6, 1876 in Büren ; died March 24, 1938 in Jerusalem ) was a German suffragette .

biography

Like most Jewish women's rights activists, Rosa Dalberg came from a family of the Jewish assimilated bourgeoisie . Endeavoring to gain recognition, Jewish girls were often even more obliged than non-Jewish girls to comply with civil norms and, as a rule, were not allowed to take up a profession, which is why many were involved in the civil women's movement.

In 1896 Rosa Dalberg married the lawyer Max Bodenheimer from Cologne , a staunch Zionist . Bodenheimer later recalled their meeting: “I was talking about Zionism, and Miss Dalberg turned out to be a women's rights activist. Both ideals sprang from the same sense of justice and the same desire for freedom. The lively spirit, the interest in art and their feeling for the oppressed attracted me immensely. “The couple had three children in quick succession, the daughters Henriette and Ruth and the son Friedrich Simon Bodenheimer . The family lived at Belfortstrasse 9 in 1931, father Max and daughter Ruth had a joint law firm at 74 Hohenzollernring.

After the birth of her children, Rosa Bodenheimer began to get involved in the Cologne women's movement and became one of its most prominent representatives. Although she mainly felt more like a German than a “Jew”: “She wanted to enforce her ideas of social reforms and political and societal equality for women for all women.” On the other hand, she was confronted with the growing anti-Semitism in Germany, so that she the Zionist Congress in The Hague in 1907 , at a time when many Jewish women were still rejecting Zionism, suggested the establishment of the Association of Jewish Women for Cultural Work in Palestine , the forerunner of the Women's International Zionist Organization (WIZO).

In 1903 Rosa Bodenheimer founded the Cologne branch of the General German Women's Association (ADF) together with Elisabeth von Mumm and Adele Meurer , in 1911 she became secretary , in 1923 second chairwoman and from 1927 to 1933 first chairwoman . Its work differed fundamentally from the charity of earlier associations in the 19th century: "Social activity has become a civic auxiliary activity that ultimately searches for the causes of misery and wants to eliminate these causes."

Bodenheimer represented moderately feminist positions. She proceeded from an essential difference between men and women and emphasized the role of women as “biological and social mother”. The work of the ADF aroused the interest of many women in local politics and subsequently in women's suffrage . After Rosa Bodenheimer had heard a lecture by the chairwoman of the Federation of German Women's Associations , Marie Stritt , in 1907 , she took part in the founding of a Cologne electoral group in the same year. The Women's Suffrage Association for West Germany initially limited itself to preparing women for politics, but Bodenheimer called for a large advertising campaign for women's suffrage in 1912, which, however, did not prevail. In 1919 women were able to vote for the first time in the election to the National Assembly , but Bodenheimer had to recognize in the following years that this did not mean any significant social improvement for them.

During the First World War , Bodenheimer was a member of the board of the National Women's Movement . For this commitment in favor of the war aid she received a cross of merit. In 1922, together with Adele Meurer, she founded the shop in Cologne, a sales agency for the impoverished due to the war and inflation.

Growing anti-Semitism soon drew the attention of Rosa Bodenheimer and other committed Jewish women to other issues. Soon after the seizure of power by the Nazis , the family thought Bodenheimer to emigrate. After their daughter Ruth was barely able to save herself from an attack on Jewish lawyers on March 31, 1933, the family fled to Palestine via Antwerp and Amsterdam in April . There Rosa Bodenheimer made contact with the women's suffrage movement and agitated against gender injustice in the Talmud . In 1938 she died in Jerusalem after a brief, serious illness .

literature

• Yvonne Küsters: Bodenheimer, Rosa, b. Dalberg . In: Manfred Asendorf / Rolf von Bockel (ed.): Democratic ways. German CVs from Five Centuries: A Lexicon . JB Metzler, S. 72-74 .
• Ulrich S. Soénius (Hrsg.), Jürgen Wilhelm (Hrsg.): Kölner Personen-Lexikon. Greven, Cologne 2007, ISBN 978-3-7743-0400-0 , pp. 63/64.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Küsters, Rosa Bodenheimer , p. 72.
2. ↑ The house was destroyed in the Second World War, today the Hotel Mercure is located here .
3. ^ Greven's address book from Cologne and the surrounding area 1931 , Volume 1, p. 93.
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Küsters, Rosa Bodenheimer , p. 73.
5. ↑ Kölner Personen-Lexikon , pp. 63/64.
6. ^ Kölner Personen-Lexikon , p. 64.
7. ^ Küsters, Rosa Bodenheimer , pp. 73/74.