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“This is a meticulous and finely written account of Dina Gold’s struggle to seek belated justice for her mother, with all the twists and turns one would expect from a fictional detective story — but it is all true.”

—E. Randol Schoenberg
Attorney (“Woman in Gold”)

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About the Book

When Dina Gold was a little girl, her grandmother told her stories about the glamorous life she had led in pre-war Berlin and how she dreamed of one day reclaiming the grand building that had housed the family business.

Dina’s grandmother died in 1977, leaving behind no documents, not even an address, to help locate the property or prove its ownership. But when the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, Dina had not forgotten her grandmother’s tales and set out to find the truth.

In 1990, Dina marched into a German government ministry at Krausenstrasse 17/18, just two blocks from Checkpoint Charlie, and declared:

“I’ve come to claim my family’s building.”

And so began her legal struggle — to reclaim the building that had belonged to her family.

The six-story office block had been the headquarters of the H. Wolff fur company, one of the most successful Jewish fashion firms in Germany. Built by Dina’s great-grandfather in 1910, it was foreclosed on by the Victoria Insurance Company in 1937. Ownership was transferred to the Deutsche Reichsbahn, Hitler’s railways, that later transported millions of Jews to death camps.

Today the Victoria is part of ERGO, a leading German insurance company. Few are aware that the Victoria was once chaired by a lawyer with connections to the top of the Nazi party. The Victoria was also part of a consortium that insured SS-owned workshops using slave labor at Auschwitz and other concentration camps.

Dina has delved deep into archives across the world and made shocking discoveries. What she found has repercussions even in today’s Germany.

In a major victory, Dina persuaded the German government to put up a plaque in July 2016 acknowledging in both German and English the history of “The Wolff Building.”

But the story is STILL not over.

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Author Archive

So Important! Podcast Interview

Monte Mallin – host of the podcast series So Important! – has interviewed me.  In his billing for our talk, Mr Mallin writes: This is a story of determination, commitment, and conviction, and never giving up when the cause is just. Dina’s story is an inspiration for all of us, and here it is in her own words.  Listen to our discussion here.  

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B’nai B’rith magazine

A feature article I wrote entitled Jewish German Fashion Industry Flourished, Then Perished Under Nazi Rule is the cover story for the Winter 2019 edition of the B’nai B’rith magazine.  It is about how, beginning in the mid 1830s, Jewish German fashion designers and entrepreneurs made Berlin into  a thriving hub of sophistication and glamour.

The concept of ready-to-wear clothing was invented by Jewish Berliners and by the middle of the 19th century some 100 Jewish fashion firms existed around Hausvogteiplatz in central Berlin’s Mitte district.  By the 1890s a full 85% of all women’s fashion manufacturing companies had Jewish owners and “Berlin chic” enjoyed an international reputation.

By 1933, there were 2,700 Berlin-based Jewish fashion businesses – making the fashion trade, besides Paris, the largest exporter in Europe.

Uwe Westphal,  author of  “Fashion Metropolis Berlin: 1836-1939: The Story of the Rise and Destruction of the Jewish Fashion Industry”(to which I contributed a chapter), has studied the history of this once flourishing industry and what happened to it as soon as the Nazis came to power.

The central role of Jews in the German fashion industry, and how the Nazis utterly destroyed that legacy, is told in Mr. Westphal’s book.  That history has been forgotten for far too long.  

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Keynote speaker at Hadassah

The Hadassah Dorot Bat Gurion Chapter held its 2019 fundraising luncheon at the magnificent Mirasol Country Club in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. There were 130 Hadassah members who came to hear me talk in the swish dining hall – spot the chandeliers!!

These are certainly “Women who Do” – as the poster attached to the podium made clear. The event was to raise money for a pediatric unit at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem – a worthy cause for sure.

         

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Order the Revised and Updated Paperback

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Translated into Mandarin and on sale in China Titled 失窃的遗产

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Stolen Legacy is published by the American Bar Association and distributed by Ingram.

Paperback: 328 pages   |   Language: English
ISBN: 978-1634254274
Includes book club discussion questions.

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