Jewish histories BerIin: Kleine Synagoge in Auguststraße

A drawing on a wall covered at the bottom with chaotic graffiti, this is all what's left from once used to be the Kleine Synagoge in the central area - Mitte - of Berlin, on Auguststraße 10. The synagogue Ahawas Shalom und Mogen David was inaugurated in 1906, aimed to serve 500 members. In this area in Mitte used to live many middle class Jews. 

The synagogue was destroyed during the Kristalnacht in 1938. At the memorial place, besides a detailed plan, a picture during a Simcha Torah celebration is displayed. The remains of the synagoge were used for other construction work so nothing was left from it.

The inclusion of the Kleine Synagoge in Auguststraße 10 in the circuit of Jewish memorial places is relatively recent, as it took place only ten years ago. In the middle of the 1980s, here was a kindergarden. 

Jewish memories in Berlin: Wittenbergplatz

After going out through the exit of the Wittenbergplatz U-Bahn Station in Berlin, after admiring the old adds and the modernist architecture of the station, the traveler will arrive close to the Ku'damm main shopping attraction: the historical KaDeWe retail center. Before that, near the main entrance, a list of places of infamous resonance is mentioned, a reminder of how the Jews were took over in the trains of death in the very center of the German capital city. The list of names was inaugurated there in 1967.

During the anti-Semitic attacks from the 1930s, the area near this station was often the scenery of boycott and vandalism of the Jewish shops. On Ku'damm and Tauentzienstrasse it used to be a high concentration of Jewish shops and businesses. One of the main representative was the KaDeWe, opened in 1907 by the Jewish businessman Adolf Jandorf and later sold to the Jewish family Tietz. The Jews themselves did not give up and openly protested against the situation, without too much chances of changing the overall mood of the population. 

Jewish Berlin: Minna-Schwarz-Heim

On Brunnenstrasse 41, a glass plate reminds of what once used to be a philanthropic Jewish institution in the Eastern part of Berlin. Minna Schwarz was born in Pyritz, Poland, at the end of the 19th century, and died in 1936. In 1888, she created the first Bnai Brith Lodge for women in Berlin. Bnai Brith is the oldest Jewish service organization for social service, philanthropy and mutual aid.  

In the yard of this block of houses was created at Schwarz's initiative a kindergarten for abandoned children and a refuge for single mothers. Between 1932-1940, the 'Heim' was named after the founder, who dedicated her time and energy to help the women and children in need, although herself childless. From 1940, the building was used as a 'Judenhaus', a residence where Jews were living in a kind of ghetto. From here, many of them were sent to death.