Searcher of possibilities

In 1911 the painter Adele Sandler (1873 Karlsruhe–1946 Jerusalem) published what is probably the first German-Jewish picture book – and a long-standing desideratum – through the Jüdischer Volksschriften-Verlag. It is striking how clearly the 18 illustrated plates reflect the constant interchange between German and Jewish culture. They guide the beholder through the Jewish festival calendar and seasons, through city and countryside, and into both bourgeois settings and ethnic traditions. The work bears the simple title “Bilderbuch” (picture book); only the paratext promises “pictures, verses and more, much of which is Jewish”.

In 1920 the title was included in the repertoire of the recently established publishing house Welt-Verlag, which played a significant role during the Weimar Republic in shaping an understanding of Jewish art and culture. The title has now been changed to “Das Jüdische Bilderbuch” (The Jewish Picture Book) and the number of plates has been reduced to the ten which focused on Jewish festival culture. This is a reflection of the changing Zeitgeist and the concious emphasis being placed on Jewish education.

In 1925 the work was published by BIAS-Verlag under the same title, “Das jüdische Bilderbuch”, but once more featuring the original 18 illustrated plates. Text and illustrations are now separated, with the plates only partially coloured in order to encourage children to use their imagination and colour in the plates themselves. This reprint of the book was available either as a bound edition or as loose sheets on sturdy cardboard.

In spite of the range and number of these modifications, the 1920 and 1925 editions did not attract nearly as much attention from the press as the first edition, though there was no shortage of imitations. As late as 1930 Adele Sandler's work was still being described as “lovely but somewhat neutral and colourless”, and this too reflects the shifting cultural climate.

Bibles for children – with simplified language and suitably adapted content – had been available as early as the beginning of the 19th century. However, by the end of the century many Jewish children were estranged from their faith or even completely unfamiliar with it; media created especially for Jewish children were seen as a way of helping this audience to discover their Jewish roots. Commissions were established to promote German-Jewish children's literature, and competitions were devised specifically with popular genres in mind. This gave rise to works such as the “Sammlung preisgekrönter Märchen und Sagen” (Collection of Award-Winning Fairy-tales and Legends) in 1909 and “Tams Reisen durch die jüdische Märchenwelt” (Tam's Journey Through the World of Jewish Fairy-tales) in 1922.

Quality could essentially be judged by the extent to which the design was child-friendly: In addition to the use of appropriate language, new genres and media formats also played a role – above all the use of illustrations. The aim was to encourage processes which would connect with the daily life of Jewish children and stimulate a sense of Jewish identity. A highly regarded contemporary work incorporating these aspects was “Der Jüdischer Kinderkalendar” (The Jewish Children's Calendar) by the educator and rabbi Dr Emil Bernhard Cohn (1881 Steglitz–1948 Los Angeles), published in 1927 by the Jüdischer Verlag in Berlin.

In 1898, Theodor Herzl claimed that Zionism meant returning home to Judaism before returning to Judaism's own homeland. He went on to define two components of the Zionist movement: the cultural aspect, aiming to “give Jews inner security” (Kurt Blumenfeld), and the political aspect, according to which Zionism envisions “the creation of an officially and legally recognised home in Palestine for those Jews who cannot, or who do not wish to, assimilate elsewhere.” (Basler Programm 1897). Well into the Weimar Republic era, Zionism remained the subject of considerable controversy within German-Jewish circles. The Jewish National Fund (Keren Kajemeth LeIsrael, KKL) and the organisation Keren Hajessod (KH) mobilised Zionists all over the world, and collected donations in order to acquire and cultivate land in Palestine.

In 1925 KKL launched an innovative initiative: The idea was to enable the younger children to understand the significance of land acquisition and settlement in Eretz Israel. The artist Annie Rosenblüth (1890 Berlin–1966 Kidlington Oxford) created the first children's game for KKL, Palestine Domino, a set of 32 topics illustrating what could be achieved with the donations collected by KKL and KH.

Along with other smaller items such as a Kibbutz Merchavia cut-out sheet, the game was first presented at the1925 Zionist Congress in Vienna, where it was well received. The rules of the game are printed in four languages: Hebrew, German, English, and French.

The initial print-run was set at 10,000 games over three years. However sales proved difficult as the KKL lacked the necessary distribution infrastructure.
From 1924 onward, and in addition to the games, there were also fairy-tale booklets with references to Palestine, mostly written by Irma Miriam Singer, who was already known to the German public for her collection of Jewish fairy tales “Das verschlossene Buch” (The Sealed Book), published in 1915. In 1936, she followed this with a Zionist adventure story “Benni fliegt ins gelobte Land” (Benni Flies to the Promised Land).

KKl emphasised that it was not seeking to impose any particular “bias”. Nevertheless, it was still keen to convey the organisation's goals, such as the “redemption of the homeland soil”.

Rabbis and educators had been discussing the potential of art in Jewish education as early as the turn of the century. In 1910 there had already been a proposal to create a Jewish picture book. In the 1920s the benefits of play and imagery had been explored in various educational supplements to the orthodox journal “Der Israelit”, emphasizing how important it was to show Jewish children pictures of situations they were no longer likely to experience at home. For those still receiving a religious education it was also a way to reinforce and enrich what they had already learnt.

Play, in particular, could be used to encourage religious activity. A prime example of this is the construction of a sukkah, a traditional temporary shelter topped with branches, traditionally associated with the festival of Sukkot and commemorating the journey through the wilderness following the exodus from Egypt. The sukkah symbolises the divine protection once extended to the Israelites on their journey and also warns of the vulnerability faced by those who live without God. In addition to its obvious religious significance, there is also a practical dimension to the game, since in urban environments there is often insufficient space to build a sukkah. In such cases the miniature sukkah could serve to some extent as a substitute. The 1927 wooden sukkah from Jenny Westheim's arts and crafts workshop in Frankfurt am Main is probably the first example of a wooden construction set designed for Jewish children.

Jewish arts and crafts were mainly engaged in the production of ritual objects: Hanukkah lamps, mezuzot (doorpost house blessings), Seder napkins and pouches, and other more practical items like thermos flasks for Shabbat evenings. The challenge lay in finding a new design language capable of incorporating components of modern form while retaining links to traditional elements.

From the early 1920s onwards, arts and craft workshops had already offered children's games. These combined practicality with aesthetic quality, since games were supposed to introduce children to the Jewish festivals while also maintaining a high artistic standard.

Among the leading arts and crafts workshops was that of Rosa Freudenthal (1870 Breslau–1951 Haifa). In collaboration with a number of other artists she developed a whole range of games, such as a cardboard sukkah assembly kit (1921), a children's Hebrew printing set, a Hanukkah game (1922), a Hebrew lottery game (1925), and a Hebrew foursome card game (1932). Rosa Freudenthal presented her games at educational conferences or Zionist congresses; they were extremely well-received by the press, as documented by many traditional, liberal and Zionist journals and community newsletters. Even the celebrated rabbi and scholar Ismar Elbogen recounted how his children played with the sukkah and the Hebrew printing set produced by Freudenthal's arts and crafts workshop.

The importance of children's play was particularly promoted by progressive educators, whose ideas also resonated within Jewish circles. As a result, children's games were included in the listings of Jewish publishers (such as Brandeis, Jüdischer Verlag) or Jewish organisations (such as Agudas Israel, KK). They were recommended as gifts for Jewish festivals, used in Jewish classroom teaching, and adopted by groups and youth movements. Bookshops and exhibitions also spotlighted these items, enabling them to reach smaller communities, mostly under the heading “Das jüdische Buch” (The Jewish Book), as part of a wider cultural programme.

Jewish life as experienced at home by many families around the turn of the century had become so superficial that children had hardly been able to form any deep cultural roots. The sociologist Zygmunt Baumann wrote that it had simply been “reduced to a ritual and stripped of any emotional content”. As a consequence, the newly evolving German-Jewish children's media were aimed at families as the main socialising force. Advertising targeted parents, appearing particularly often in magazines published around festivals and holidays. On the other hand, the children's supplements which had started to appear from the mid-1920s onwards addressed their young readers directly and recognised them as a target group in their own right.

Publications such as “Wegweiser durch die Jugendliteratur” (1905-1914), “Freie jüdische Lehrerstimme” (1912-1920 or “Die jüdische Schulzeitung” (1925-1938) regularly reviewed new titles, and in some cases recommended them for use in the classroom. As the political situation became more precarious, the education process focused increasingly on fostering an awareness of the need for future security.

Youth movements played a crucial role in the socialisation of Jewish children and young people. The Jewish hiking and cultural movement Blau-Weiß was founded in 1913. By 1924, 15 youth organisations had been established, with a total of 40,000 members. By the end of the 1930s, almost all young Jewish people were involved in one or other of these movements, which were responsible for almost a third of all print titles for Jewish children and young people during that decade. These publications also contained advertisements for Jewish children's media; they contained lists of suggested Hanukkah gifts and were even able to offer price reductions.

The effort to create child-friendly content made Jewish media more colourful. This is particularly striking in the context of the Jewish Bible, as rabbinic tradition regards the Torah as the literal transmission of the word of God, rendering it sacred and immutable. However, as early as the Jewish enlightenment, Moses Mendelssohn had already broken the rule prescribing Hebrew as the only permitted text form, thereby making the content more accessible for all, including children. In the 1920s and 1930s biblical material was again more freely adapted for children and brought closer to secular concepts.

Cheskel Zwi Kloetzel transposed the biblical story of Moses into a contemporary adventure novel about a Jewish boy who finds himself abandoned on a steamship bound for the United States. The “Biblische Puppenspiele” (Biblical Puppet Plays) by Käte Baer-Freyer and Albert Baer transform biblical stories into dramatic scenes for children, with striking illustrations by Käte Baer-Freyer. She also created figurines which could be purchased together with the book, encouraging children to recreate the scenes themselves. Otto Geismar produced an illustrated Bible, and with considerable pedagogical skill he reduced the complexity of the deeply symbolic pictures to a few simply strokes. This often then encouraged the children to colour them in. The Bible adaptation produced by the liberal rabbi Joachim Prinz draws heavily on the Midrash, the traditional oral version of the Torah. This allowed the rabbi more flexibility with the text, which subsequently takes on the character of an adventure story, brought to life by Heinz Wallenberg's numerous illustrations. A particularly unusual example is “The Child's Haggadah”, with moving images activated by pulling a tab, vividly illustrating how the Red Sea parted for Moses and the Jewish people.

The Weimar era led to the flourishing of Hebrew culture in Berlin. Leading Hebraists, dedicated to developing a modern spoken Hebrew language, gathered here and founded Hebrew publishing houses such as Dwir, Eschkol, Klal or Omanuth. Omanuth also published Hebrew picture books for children, though these probably only reached a fairly small number of German-Jewish children. Most Jewish children brought up in liberal households only had a few hours of religious instruction dedicated to the study of Hebrew, with little connection to the language in their daily lives. Teaching Hebrew to children as a spoken language through play thus became one of Jewish education's most important goals.

Hebrew card games, such as העיר (The City), published in 1918, appeared early on. Even more important were Hebrew primers, which seemingly appeared in unlimited quantities and artistic forms. However, press reviews showed that ambitious Hebrew projects were generally considered too difficult. As a result, there was a growing demand for translations. Otto Geismar's “Megilat Esther” (1926), which was published as a scroll featuring Hebrew typography and matching dynamic illustrations by Dr Herbert Loewenstein Verlag in Berlin, was followed merely a year later by a further edition (Robert Alter Verlag, Berlin), which included a German translation alongside the original Hebrew text.

Games depict actions. Clear rules help players understand and strengthen principles through repetition, something travel games illustrate particularly well. In the 1920s Palestine was presented as a tourist goal in games featuring both historical and contemporary sites.

Adele Sandler's 1921 game begins in Jaffa harbour, where players discover a multicultural land of Jewish markets and agricultural colonies together with Arab territories to the east of the Jordan river. Correct answers to knowledge-based questions allow the player to advance on the board. Religious sites such as Rachel's tomb are brought to the fore. The final goal of the game is to travel back aboard the ship “Zion” von Rosh Pinah. The players take away from the game “travel impressions”: the beauty, progressive nature and diversity of Eretz Israel. The game challenges at least one stereotype: that of Palestine as an empty land waiting to be cultivated by Jewish settlers. In the 1930s Palestine was no longer merely a destination for visiting tourists. It had become both a refuge and the most important emigration destination. The travel game “Alijah”by KKL (1935) simulates the emigration route to Palestine. The players begin in the KKL office in Meineckestrasse 10 in Berlin, where they receive migration papers before embarking on the many stages of their arduous journey.

Rabbis such as Joachim Prinz or Max Nussbaum remember how biblical stories were imbued with a new layer of meaning under the impact of exclusion, caprice and repression. The seemingly hopeless struggle of the Maccabees at Hanukkah, or the foiling of Haman's plot to annihilate the Jews, commemorated in the festival of Purim, became symbols for a resolute Judaism and unwavering faith.

What was conveyed by the synagogues in easily understandable form through the medium of Midrash verses, could, in the 1920s, still be openly expressed in literature. Contemporary parallels are unmistakeable in the Purim theatre (1925), aimed at children between six and twelve: the Persian setting is reminiscent of the city of Berlin; Haman voices anti-Semitic prejudices all too familiar to Jewish children of the time; he is exposed by Mordechai and ultimately overthrown with Esther's help. The play ends with an act of educationally mindful attenuation; following the stage directions, Haman is not actually hanged, but ends up as a puppet suspended by a string from the finger of the narrator.

In the 1930s there was no choice but to read what could only be hinted at between the lines. “Spatz macht sich” (Sparrow makes her way) by Meta Samson (1894 Berlin–1942 Auschwitz) is a striking example.

This children's book became known as one of the last Jewish publications. It was still allowed to be printed in 1938 but was not permitted to be sold. Jewish press reviews recognised the considerable potential of the novel, whose author had succeeded in painting a sensitive and realistic portrait of an adolescent Jewish girl in the Berlin of the late 1930s. However, it was not explained why the father was absent, why the mother struggled in a precarious job, why with each move the apartments kept getting smaller, and why siblings and friends were emigrating.

In the 1930s, Jewish libraries and reading halls adopted a role of considerable importance: they became places of refuge and took on an invaluable social function. However, a close look at library catalogues reveals that children's literature was severely under-represented, and new titles in this field could rarely be acquired. Library holdings were largely generated through book donations and the merging of smaller library collections, while the acquisition of newer literature remained challenging.
In any case, libraries could only be maintained in areas where significant numbers of Jewish readers were to be expected.

Local community organisations such as the Preußischer Landesverband jüdischer Gemeinden (PLV), or associations like the Centralverein deutscher Staatsbürger jüdischen Glaubens (CV) or the Reichsausschuss der jüdischen Jugendverbände (RJJ) organised travelling libraries to provide support for small and medium-sized communities.

The PLV started in 1935 with a collection of 950 works, each title purchased in a set of 2,500 copies. A book box consisted of 100 titles, which were sent out on loan to each community for an average of three to four months. Readers were explicitly encouraged to submit requests for particular books. Books for children and young people were apparently in high demand, since work on an annotated selection list of such titles was already under way in 1936. The intention was to compile a list of 300 works, arranged by reading age. The response was so positive, that the number of subscribing districts had almost doubled by 1938, and books were also being sent to the Hakhshara training centres in which emigrants were being prepared for life in Palestine. An attempt was also made to address the lack of suitable children's and young people's literature in the travelling libraries of the CV (from 1935) and RJJ (from 1937), with a particular focus on youth movements.

A surviving set of user statistics from the CV travelling library provides a fascinating insight across various regional associations: school children and apprentices were the main users, with fluctuations in the loan statistics caused not least by emigration and by readers requesting titles which did not explicitly reference Jewish content.

Dolls have always been popular children's toys. Käthe Kruse became particularly well known for her dolls after winning a competition in 1910 for “Handmade toys” run by the Jewish department store Tietz. Her fabric dolls were praised for their natural appearance and soon became famous.
Dolls reflect the era of their creation, and this is also true of Käthe Kruse dolls, some of which were also produced in the 1930s wearing the uniforms of the Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM) and Hitlerjugend (HJ). It should therefore come as no surprise that Jewish communities began to express a desire for specifically Jewish dolls.

The “everyday” dolls produced by the young doll-maker Edith Samuel (1907 Essen–1948 Rischon LeZion) were not designed explicitly as Jewish dolls, but as the daughter of Essen's rabbi Salomon Samuel the artist soon began to reflect the traits of the people around her in her designs, resulting in dolls primarily depicting Jewish children.
During the 1930s in particular, Edith Samuel was well known in Germany for her child dolls. For many, these portrait dolls became cherished companions in dark times.

Little Marion and Little Ulla
Two dolls in the hands of their young owners, a gift dating from 1934. Sisters Marion and Ulla Freyer packed their dolls when they emigrated with their parents to Baltimore, Maryland, in 1939, and these remained their close confidantes throughout their lives.