Axelrad family papers

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum 

Felix Axelrad (1903-1979) was born in Belgrade. He studied chemical engineering at the Vienna Technical Institute and the Berlin Technical University and worked in Berlin, Budapest, and Vienna. He married Hedwig (Hedi) Traub (1907-1999) from Vienna and had daughter Eva Axelrad (later Choper) in 1937. The family found temporary refuge in Istanbul along with Felix’s mother Leontine (1878-1969, from Zilinia, Czechoslovakia), his brother Desider (1899-1982), and his sister in law Rozina (1902-1968, from Tzmir, Turkey). Felix, Hedwig, and Eva sailed to New York from Istanbul via Greece in January 1940. The following year Desider and Rozina arrived in New York via Bombay and Leontine arrived in California via Basrah. Felix and his family settled in Highland Park in 1951 and had son Ronald (1952-1999). Felix founded the Fiber Chemical Co. of Matawan and practiced amateur photography. 

Axelrad family papers 

box 1 

The Axelrad family papers consist of immigration correspondence and forms and an Oranienburg photo album. The correspondence and forms primarily document Felix Axelrad's liquidation of his business in Vienna in the late 1930s, emigration from Vienna to Istanbul and then to the United States, his attempt to emigrate to Australia, and his efforts to help his friends Heinrich Grünberg (b. 1894 in Vienna) and Klara Török (b. 1907 in Budapest) immigrate to the United States from Istanbul. The photo album documents life in Oranienburg and Vienna and trips to Wannsee, Werbelinsee, and Berlin. It contains typed text pages and black and white photographs mounted on black cardboard. The original German text is accompanied by English translations and documents concerns about the rise of Nazism, Hitler’s appointment as Reichschancellor, the Reichstag fire, swastika banners, and the April 1, 1933 boycott of Jewish businesses. 

The Axelrad family papers are arranged as two series: Series 1: Correspondence and forms, 1931-1941, Series 2: Photo album, 1930-1933