Werner Simsohn

Werner Simsohn (born December 18, 1924 in Berlin ; † February 6, 2001 in Gera ) is the author of the multi-part work Jews in Gera .

Life

Werner Simsohn came to Gera in 1927 at the age of three. The father, Julius, was a Jew. His childhood and youth were shaped by the persecution of Jewish families. In 1944 his father was murdered in the Auschwitz concentration camp , other relatives were deported and also perished. He himself was arrested as a young man and taken to a so-called "education camp " in the Buna works in Schkopau near Merseburg , from which he fled shortly before the end of the war.

After the war he worked in Gera as a handball trainer. He had learned to play handball as a boy at the Post-SV Gera sports club, a remarkable fact, because as a child with a Jewish father he should not have been allowed to play there during the Nazi era. In Juden in Gera , Volume 1, Simsohn pays tribute to the courageous leader of handball players, Alfred Schindhelm, who protected and promoted him despite the risks for himself.

Author and estate

After the war, Simsohn recognized the need to save the history of Gera's Jewish residents from oblivion. Since there were practically no archival sources on this part of Gera's history, his plan was only possible through extensive research and personal questioning of surviving contemporary witnesses. He dedicated many years of his life to this task and carried out it entirely on his own. The result was the most extensive collection on the subject of Jews in Gera . He also processed his life's work in three volumes in the book of the same name. The first volume was published in 1997, the second volume the following year and the third one year before his death. As early as April 25, 1995, Simsohn donated his collection to the city in order to preserve the results of his life's work for the future and make them available to the public.

Appreciation

On November 1, 1998, he was made an honorary citizen of the city of Gera. Furthermore, on July 10, 2010, a locomotive of the Gera tram was baptized in his name.

Web links

• Curriculum vitae and appreciation of Mr. Werner Simsohn
• Werner Simsohn's estate in the Gera City Archives