Metadata: Estate of Hans Brehm
Collection
- Country:
- Switzerland
- Holding institution:
- Archives of Contemporary History at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archiv für Zeitgeschichte der ETH Zürich
- Postal address:
- Hirschengraben 62, CH-8092 Zurich
- Phone number:
- +41 44 632 40 03
- Web address:
- https://www.afz.ethz.ch/
- Email:
- afz@history.gess.ethz.ch
- Reference number:
- NL Hans Brehm
- Title:
- Estate of Hans Brehm
- Title (official language):
- Einzelbestand Hans Brehm
- Creator/accumulator:
- Brehm, Hans
- Date(s):
- 1916/2005
- Language:
- German
- French
- English
- Extent:
- 0.6 shelf metres
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- The collection documents (official and personal), correspondence, poems, and other written records.
- Archival history:
- The collection was transferred to the AfZ in 2016 by Beatrice Margot Brehm Jenni.
- Administrative/biographical history:
-
Hans Hermann Brehm was born in Mannheim on 30 October 1916 and died on 23 October 2015 in Zurich. He was the son of Adolf Ludwig, a reformed Christian who was deputy of the City of Mannheim, and Alice Margarethe, née Stern, who originated from a Jewish family, but was baptised and brought up Protestant. Brehm had a younger brother, Max Walter, born in 1918. In 1936, after attending the humanistic grammar school in Mannheim, Brehm moved to Switzerland and studied mechanical engineering at the ETH Zurich. He repeatedly visited his family in Mannheim, whereby the outbreak of war almost thwarted his return to Switzerland in 1939. His father had already died in 1937. In 1942, his grandmother Hedwig Emma Stern was murdered in Theresienstadt. His mother was murdered in Auschwitz in 1945. His brother Max Walter survived in a “half-breed camp“ in Lower Lusatia, from which he managed to flee back to Mannheim at Easter 1945.
In 1940, Hans Brehm began his doctorate at ETH Zurich with the title “Die Bewegung der von Karten gesteuerten Webstuhlteile” (The movement of weaving loom parts controlled by cards). From autumn 1943 to spring 1944 he held assignments in a work camp for emigrants in Bad Schauenburg near Liestal (BL), interrupted by holidays to continue his doctoral thesis. In 1944, Brehm obtained a work permit for Switzerland and in 1946 he married Renée Rappmund. Their daughter Jeanne Alice was born soon after. From 1947 to 1971, Brehm was a manager at the Plüss-Staufer company in Oftringen. In 1953, he became a citizen of Switzerland and founded the Dr. Brehm AG engineering firm the following year. He married his second wife, Margot Anna Stricker, in 1955. In 1960, his second daughter, Beatrice Margot, was born. Brehm sold his company in 1979 and worked as a freelancer and board member in various companies.
- Subject terms:
- Personal records
- Access, restrictions:
- Partially restricted. Subject to application.
- Finding aids:
- An online finding aid is available.
- Links to finding aids:
- http://onlinearchives.ethz.ch/
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Museum Hohenems
- Author of the description:
- Severin Holzknecht; Jewish Museum of Hohenems; 2019