As of: March 18, 2024, 9:00 a.m
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Looking at the new memorial stones together: Second Mayor Michael Lindmair, Benjamin Sherak, Naomi Brauner, Christoph Schnitzer, Raphael Sherak, Melanie Chitwood and Hannah Sherak.
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The descendants of the Jewish Hellmann hotelier family came to Bad Tölz from the USA.
The city erected new memorial stones for family members who were persecuted and murdered by the Nazi regime.
Bad Tölz –
Almost 80 years after the end of the war, descendants of the Tölz Jewish hotelier family Hellmann who live in the USA paid a visit to the city.
Even decades after the mass destruction of Jewish life, survivors of the Shoah no longer wanted to have anything to do with the places from which they were expelled or deported.
The mental wounds were too bad, too unbearable.
The family now embarked on an encounter with their ancestors' former homeland.
Hannah Sherak from the grandson generation of Paula Hellmann (the youngest sister of hotelier Julius Hellmann) came accompanied by her sons Benjamin and Raphael, along with partners Naomi Brauner and Melanie Chitwood, who live in New York and New Haven.
The Tölz journalist and historian Christoph Schnitzer made a significant contribution to establishing contact with his years of research.
At the warm and moving reception in the city's historic meeting room on Saturday, Hellmann's descendants met with city representatives, other guests and high school students from the Gabriel-von-Seidl-Gymnasium, who are working on a short film on the subject as part of a seminar paper.
Bad Tölz: City walk in the footsteps of the Hellmann family
After the memorial service, people gathered outside in front of the city museum, where there are now three new memorial stones for members of the Hellmann family, whose tragic fates have now been clarified.
With the solid stone bronze plaques, the city preserves the memory of Tölzer murder victims of the Nazi terror.
Afterwards, Christoph Schnitzer and other Tölz residents explored the city with the guests - looking for traces of the Hellmann family and their former park hotel in the bathing area.
The number seven also has great symbolic meaning in Judaism.
It was no coincidence that seven speeches (mostly bilingual with high school teacher Elisabeth Willis as translator) were aimed at the Jewish guests.
It started with Mayor Ingo Mehner, who expressed his joy that a Jewish family with Tölz roots had made the long journey back to their old homeland.
Aware that it must “never again” happen that people are threatened by exclusion, hatred, war and death, society and every individual must work for peace and oppose any aggression.
For Mehner, this includes treating other people with respect, being willing to listen and being open to different opinions and other lifestyles.
“But the discussions are becoming fewer.
Too many people only represent their own opinions.
But a conversation also includes listening.
None of us own the truth.
You can learn something from almost everyone.
Anyone who thinks they know everything will learn little.”
Jewish family thanks city for welcome
Second Mayor Michael Lindmair then spoke, who, together with Schnitzer, had put a lot of time into preparing the event.
He said it was a "great honor for the city" and expressed his gratitude for the visit: it was "a painful path in your family history and a dark path in our city's history."
And he thanked Schnitzer, who processes the history of our darkest times and makes it tangible.
Even if the memory of the monstrous crimes of the National Socialists is painful and uncomfortable: it is necessary, emphasized Lindmair, combined “with the promise that we will work every day for more tolerance, compassion and respect, and that we will resolutely combat every form of discrimination and hatred and will do everything we can to ensure that such horrors can never be repeated.”
Historian Christoph Schnitzer talks about extensive research
Schnitzer recalled how, as a student, he explored the ruins of Hellmann's “Park Hotel” and how, after an initial report in the Tölzer Kurier about the Jews in Bad Tölz, this topic stuck with him.
Step by step he approached the truth and what actually happened.
Some remarkable twists of fate also brought him closer to his goal: for example, a letter to the editor from the New York Times from Hannah Sherak's father Alfred, who had experienced the expulsion of Jews as a child and identified Bad Tölz as the perpetrator's country.
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From there it was still a long way until Hannah Sherak wrote to the Tölzer Tourist Information Office in May 2023.
Schnitzer also found out about this, and with that “all the dominoes fell” - and the history of the Park Hotel and the fate of the Hellmann family could have been traced.
“And that’s why we’re here today,” he emphasized.
Three of the six Hellmann siblings were deported and murdered.
“Today, three new memorial stones are being added to the existing Tölzer memorial stones for 30 murdered people: for Bertha, Julius and Max Hellmann.”
Hannah Sherak showed photos of her family.
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With family photos, Sherak gave a face to the persecuted and murdered as well as the surviving members of her family.
She emphasized that it wasn't just about the persecuted Jews of that time, but "about all people - including those living today who are discriminated against, hated and persecuted for whatever reasons."
She thanked city representatives and civil society for the “warm” welcome.
The Sheraks then traveled to Hungary to meet descendants from their mother's line.
Students are involved in a film project in order to cultivate an active culture of remembrance
Another highlight of the celebration: With the students Aviva Hägele, Kilian Widmann, Moritz Gehr and Sara Schott, those who represent the young generation and who contribute to cultivating an active culture of remembrance with their project also had their say.
Gehr reported an “impressive change in our perception” during the seminar, which was led by teachers Anita Bittner and Julia Rau.
The film will be shown publicly soon.
(Rainer Bannier)
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