Anna Leichtentritt

Anna (actually Johanna) Leichtentritt was born in Posen on 20 December 1884, the first child of the merchant Adolf Leichtentritt (died 25 March 1838 in Berlin) and his wife Jenny, née Silberstein (died 1929 in Berlin). Anna's sister Else, born in Posen on 18 May 1886, died in Berlin in 1926. Lucy, born in Posen on 30 June 1892, survived the Shoah and died in Berlin in December 1973.

Anna Leichtentritt went to school in Posen, and after graduating from high school attended Stern's Conservatory in Berlin. Back in Posen, she taught in her profession as a musical pedagogue. In 1919, together with her parents and her sister Else, she moved to Charlottenburg/Berlin where she lived at Clausewitzstraße 7. Here she gave piano lessons to private students and was a renowned concert pianist.

From 1938 on, she was no longer allowed to practice her profession. In order to survive, she earned her living by giving cooking classes and by renting out rooms. In the same year, she was forced out of her parents' apartment and had to move into a small apartment at Uhlandstr. 49. Anna Leichtentritt was deported to Riga on 27 November 1941 and murdered in Riga-Rumbula on 30 November 1941.

One of the restituted books was added to the stock of the Berlin City Library (Berliner Stadtbibliothek, BStB) as a "gift" just after the end of the war in 1945. The "Cultural Office" is listed as the supplier. Another volume was purchased by the BStB in March 1945 from the as yet unidentified supplier Gerda Götze. The remaining books were stored among unsorted stock of the BStB. Their path into our library cannot be reconstructed.