Non-jew Hails Jews’ Share in Berlin’s Rise

The existence of German Jews in Berlin for hundreds of years has had a large share in making it the world city and trade centre that it is today, says the Central Verein Zeitung, alluding to the newly published work, “Berlin: City of Destiny”, by Karl Scheffler (who is not a Jew). Herr Scheffler calls Berlin the “historical product of the mingling of races,” and sees it as an outpost of internationalism, to which all peoples must contribute racial entities. The old distinguished families of Berlin were mainly Jewish, and the chief patriotic contributions to the city’s welfare were those made by Jews.

The development of Berlin’s business and her growth as a city has been largely due to Jewish enterprise and Jewish connections all over the world. A long row of Jewish names reveal how many of the race helped in the leadership of the city, from Abraham Mendelssohn, son of the great philosopher to Ludwig Loewe, Oskar Taffel and Herman M. Bamberg, whose names till recently were uttered with pride by every Berliner.

The hundreds of ways in which patriotic citizens of Jewish faith have helped the city cannot be enumerated, any more than a total can be put to the enormous sums they have contributed for Berlin schools and charities, what they have done for hospitals, for asylums, for museums, in private assistance, declares Herr Scheffler. All these things will remain, in spite of present conditions, as monuments of the true patriotic German Jews’ share in the making of modern Berlin.