קהילת יהודי קאטוביצה

Max Cassirer (1857-1943), businessman and politician born in Katowice into a German-Jewish business family, his father was a timber manufacturer. After finishing high school in Katowice (then part of Germany), he studied medicine in Breslau and Berlin, Germany.

In 1881 he founded his first company in Danzig (now Gdansk, Poland) a wood export company. In 1887 he moved to Charlottenburg, now part of Berlin. Here he worked in the company Gebr J. & M. Cassirer. In 1899 he founded a pulp factory in Wloclawek, Poland. After the First World War, he founded the Tillgner and Co. KG pulp mills, who worked in Berlin and in Ziegenhals, Silesia (now Głuchołazy, Poland).

From 1893 until 1920 he was a member of the City Council of Charlottenburg. When Charlottenburg was absorbed into Greater Berlin in 1920, he resigned from the City Council. To mark this date, he was awarded by the city of Charlottenburg for his services an honorary citizen. From June 1920 he was a member of the newly formed district council of the district of Charlottenburg.

During his life he supported various artistic and cultural activities. He donated, for example, Entenbrunnen (" The Duck Fountain"), that today stands in front of the Renaissance Theatre in Berlin. He was for many years closely associated with August Gaul, the designer of Entenbrunnen. Gaul was also the architect who built the family villa in 1895. Cassirer supported the family foundation for the poor and the Odenwald School, which was established by his daughter Edith and her husband Paul Geheeb. The Max Cassirer house the Ecole d'Humanité is reminiscent of his commitment. 1928 Max Cassirer was named Honorary Senator of the Technical University of Charlottenburg.

After 1933, the Nazis confiscated most of his fortune. His companies were annexed to the Siemens electric light and power plants in Berlin. 1938 his remaining assets were confiscated and he was forced to sell the villa. First in 1934, he fled with his daughter, her husband and students to Switzerland; In 1939 he moved to Great Britain, where he lived until his death.

In 1941, his German nationality was revoked and the remainder of his assets were stolen. He lost bank deposits of several hundred thousand Reichsmarks, his art collection was auctioned or confiscated. Max Cassirer died two years later in Wales, United Kingdom.

Kurt Goldstein (1878-1965), neurologist and psychiatrist, born in Katowice, Poland. He was educated in Germany where in World War I he directed a hospital dealing with brain injuries. After the war he was professor at Frankfurt, and then at Berlin University but when the Nazis came to power he was dismissed and even imprisoned for a time. He moved to the US where he headed a research laboratory at Montefiore Hospital, New York, 1936-1940, taught at Tufts Medical College, Boston, 1940-45, and was professor of psychology at City College, New York from 1946. He was co-formulator of a test which measures the impairment of function in the event of brain injury concerning abstract and concrete thinking. His writings on the brain have become standard works in neurology.

גרגור פיטלברג (1879-1953) מנצח, מלחין וכנר.

חגיגת מכבי בקאטוביץ, פולין 1937.
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות
באדיבות לוטה לוי, ישראל)

תלמיד בגימנסיה העברית בקאטוביץ,
פולין, 1930-1920.

טקס הצגת הדגל בחגיגת "מכבי" בקאטוביץ,
פולין, קיץ 1937.
הדגלן הוא מר שילר.
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות
באדיבות לוטה לוי, ישראל)

פיצוץ בית הכנסת הגדול,
קטוביץ, פולין, ספטמבר, 1939.
בית הכנסת נבנה במאה ה-19.
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות)

שיעור בכיתה ה', בבית ספר
בקאטוביץ', פולין, 1949 (?)
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות,
באדיבות פסח וחנה זיידנברג, חולון)

רות ויישמן (מימין) וחברה,
קטוביץ, שלזיה, פולין, 1928-1933
נספתה בשואה.
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות,
באדיבות רונית ברסלאור, ישראל)

רות גרסטלר וחברה,
קטוביץ, שלזיה, פולין, 1932
(המרכז לתיעוד חזותי ע"ש אוסטר, בית התפוצות,
באדיבות רונית ברסלאור, ישראל)