Dr. Amalie Oppenheim (geb. Pollak)

Amalie Pollak was born in Holleschau in Moravia [today: Holesov in the Czech Republic] as the legitimate daughter of the Jewish religious teacher Markus Mordechai Meir Pollak and his wife Marie Minna Machla, née Freistadt. She had a total of 13 siblings, two of whom died at birth and two others in early childhood. The family soon moved to Vienna, where Amalie Pollak attended a girls' grammar school after elementary school. Her father died when she was 17 years old.

Amalie Pollak, who always achieved excellent grades at school, did not originally want to study. However, women have been allowed to study at the University of Vienna since 1897. At a meeting, however, she was encouraged to enrol due to her excellent grades. She finally enrolled in physics and mathematics at the University of Vienna in 1899 and on March 9, 1905 became the 39th woman to receive a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Vienna.

In 1906, Amalie Pollak married David Ernst Oppenheim, whom she knew from university. He also graduated from the University of Vienna in 1905 and, after his probationary year, was sent to the grammar school in Nikolsburg [today: Mikulov in the Czech Republic]. Their daughter Kora Renta Oppenheim was born there. In 1909, David Ernst Oppenheim took up a position as a grammar school teacher at the Akademisches Gymnasium in Vienna's 1st district, whereupon the family returned to Vienna.

David Ernst Oppenheim was drafted into the First World War in 1914 and, after the defeat of Austria-Hungary, the break-up of the Dual Monarchy and the expulsion of the House of Habsburg, returned home in 1918, scarred by the war. In 1919, her second daughter Doris Oppenheim was born.

On March 12, 1938, Amalie Oppenheim witnessed the demise of free and independent Austria with the invasion of the German Wehrmacht. With the occupation of Austria, German legislation was adopted and with it the 'Nuremberg Race Laws', according to which she and her family were considered 'full Jews'. On the day her homeland was occupied, her husband David Ernst Oppenheim was no longer allowed to enter the school where he had taught for almost 30 years. He was officially dismissed on May 13, 1938.

While their two daughters, the now married Kora Renata Singer and Doris Oppenheim, emigrated to Australia, Amalie and David Ernst Oppenheim refused to emigrate, despite persuasion from various acquaintances and friends. As David Ernst Oppenheim is very deserving of the war, he does not believe that he will be persecuted any further. This misjudgement cost the Oppenheim couple dearly.

First, eight Jews were forcibly housed in their apartment alongside David Ernst and Amalie Oppenheim. In 1942, they had to leave their apartment and move to a transit apartment for Jews a few streets away at Förstergasse 7 in Vienna's 2nd district.

On August 20, 1942, they were deported on transport number 8 to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. David Ernst Oppenheim, a diabetic, died there on February 18, 1943 as a result of chronic diarrhea and the lack of insulin. Amelie Oppenheim experienced liberation by the Red Army in the Theresienstadt concentration camp on May 8, 1945, but had to spend another winter in Vienna, where she was supported by her American relatives, who sent her food and warm clothes.