There are always myriad people to thank for their assistance. Like Dad, who was always very generous in giving of his time to others, I too have been the recipient of similar generosity of spirit.
In no particular order I would like to thank the Kwiets, Jane & Konrad, for their friendship, their interest in Dad, in the Holocaust, in reviewing documents, and in particular Jane for reading (several times) letters in German (and Yiddish) covering the period from the 1920s through the 1960s. Due to the current lockdown I am yet to hear what discoveries and insights Jane has found from these correspondences. It is a great regret that Dad never went through these letters, and other documents in German during his lifetime. Had I known they existed well who knows.
To others with whom I have communicated since Dad’s passing, old friends, colleagues and acquaintances I thank you for your recollections and reminiscences.
There are a number of organisations that I would like to place on record my gratitude for making the information held in their collections available to me. They are The Archive of Australian Judaica held at the Fisher Library at Sydney University, in particular Laura Carmichael, https://judaica.library.sydney.edu.au/, the State Library of NSW and both hard copies and the incomplete microfilm of Australian Jewish Newspapers (now all available online via Trove (as of 2021) of the National Library of Australia https://trove.nla.gov.au/collection/ajhs/newspapers/search. I cannot describe the enjoyment in locating references to Dad, and many others, using this collection. To the Australian Jewish Historical Society [AJHS], in particular Sabrina Elias (Senior Archivist), and other communal organisations who searched through their archives to e.g look for photos, in particular The Great Synagogue.
My thanks also go to the late Julius Nadel with whom I had a number of interesting conversations (all off the record of course!). Most importantly, after Julius’s passing through his executor, Robert Gescheit, I received a photo of Dad from the early 1960s and Menachem Begin’s visito Sydney and address at the Sydney Town Hall that Julius had mentioned but had not got around to digging out. I had never seen this photo before, nor do I believe had Dad. For me this was a real treasure, although it is not the best photo I have of Dad.
I, of course, thank Mum and my Brothers although I would say to date they do not have the same interest as do I in the past or delving into and through Dad’s life.
I thank Professor Susan Rutland for answering and correcting as required queries via email and information supplied.
Of course not all assistance is free!. I thank Andrew Host of CD Now for converting at least 58 audio cassettes of Dads, personal and communal, electronically, and is a wonderful, albeit incomplete record of Dad’s voice and events with which he was involved. These can be listened to via the Audio Recordings link.
I also thank Anja Graupeter from Berlin who assisted me greatly in putting this WordPress website together.
Most importantly, I thank Dad for being the hoarder he was. Although his papers are not complete they are a marvelous testament to a life well lived and which I am still sorting through, in particular. Of course, it is a sad fact, that having gone through all these items – family, personal, communal, medical and more that I now have a multitude of questions that can no longer be answered, and is a great pity to me that Dad is no longer around to have some if not all of these questions answered.
I am still on this journey, which I suppose has always been a part of my life, but certainly began with a vengeance after Dad passed away in 2017. It remains my intention to write and publish a book about Dad. I certainly have plenty of material and references.