Bernard Josef Stickler

Bernard Stickler was born in Neunkirchen, one of twelve children of master bookbinder Michael Stickler and his wife Theresia, née Schachner. The prominent Neunkirchen family is very religious. One of his brothers was the later famous cardinal Alfons Maria Stickler. Another brother was Michael Stickler, who later became head of the parliamentary library and archivist of the Austrian Cartel Association, as well as father of the long-standing senior official of the Austrian Cartel Association, Herbert Stickler.

After his school education, Bernard Stickler learned his father's trade and also became a master bookbinder.

He then joined the Austrian army and was invalided out in March 1934. When he returned home, he became an instructor for the Volunteer Protection Corps in the Neunkirchen district. [Note: The Voluntary Protection Corps was an armed formation created in Austria in mid-1933 to support the state executive (police, gendarmerie) in its tasks.] As its commander, he secured the district armed after the attempted coup by the National Socialists in July 1934.

In addition, Bernard Stickler is district secretary of the Vaterländische Front under the leadership of Johann Buchleitner. In the period leading up to 12 March 1938, the two organized groups of workers to break up Nazi meetings.

12 March 1938, the day on which Austria was occupied by Hitler's Germany and perished for seven years, shook the family to the core. On the evening of March 11, 1938, members of the SA and SS tried to arrest Bernard Stickler. After failing to apprehend him, they take his 57-year-old father hostage. The next morning, Bernard Stickler voluntarily turns himself in to the SA and SS to save his father.

After physical abuse and public humiliation, he received a call-up order to join the Wehrmacht in September 1938 and was temporarily released from prison on September 29, 1938 to take up a position in Vienna.

On arrival in Vienna, he was told that his regiment was currently close to the border with Czechoslovakia and that he was no longer needed.

As he did not want to return to prison, he traveled from Vienna to Vorarlberg and fled to Switzerland on October 14, 1938. There he registered with the Caritas refugee office and became a kitchen assistant in a refugee camp. In December 1938, the merchant Othmar Bernhard took him in at his home.

Finally, Bernard Stickler was able to emigrate to Palestine on October 25, 1939. Through the mediation, probably of his brother, Alfons Maria Stickler, he was able to work as a bookbinder at the Benedictine monastery Dormitio on Mount Sion in exchange for board and lodging.

When the monks, mostly German nationals, were interned at the end of 1941, Bernard Stickler stayed with the Egosi family, also Austrian emigrants.

There he experienced the liberation of Austria in May 1945. In 1947, he was finally able to return to his homeland through the UNRRA repatriation program.

He took over the bookbinding business of his father, who had died in 1946. He later married twice and had two daughters. He becomes involved in the ÖVP-Kameradschaft der politisch Verfolgten und Bekenner für Österreich. He retired as a master bookbinder in Neunkirchen and died there in 1990.