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An intimate history of the Holocaust, drawn from the final days of a Jewish family in Munich
Postcards to Hitler tells the story of a Jewish family in Munich living as close neighbors to the demagogue who becomes the Nazi Führer—Adolf Hitler. In a story passionately told by one of their descendants, the narrative begins as Benno Neuburger, a modest German land investor from Munich, and Anna Einstein, daughter of a cattle dealer, meet at a seder in Laupheim and soon marry. The year is 1907, a relatively prosperous, optimistic time for German Jews, and there is little hint that this good fortune might soon unravel. Of all the Jews in Europe, Germans like the Neuburgers feel most secure.
When, on a warm July day in 1914, an assassination strikes an “obscure” Balkan corner of the continent, the news passes through Munich’s beer-gardens like a cold wind. Far from a fleeting chill, what follows is the time of prolonged bloodshed known as World War I, followed by a period of German humiliation, resurgent revolution, and a brief left-led democratic interlude in Munich. What might have been a site of socialist experimentation instead becomes the epicenter of German fascism, and as Benno and Anna and their extended families cling with vain hope to a peaceful resolution, their beloved haven degenerates into a state of racialized madness. A bloody pogrom is chased by a second world war, followed by evictions, “resettlements” and far worse, sounding an inescapable knell despite desperate and defiant acts of resistance.
Postcards to Hitler is a deeply researched history drawn from personal interviews and archival documents including Benno’s and Anna’s final letters—written amid a slow-moving parade of horror until the frail boundaries between themselves and the Holocaust ultimately vanish.
— Eva Tyrell, Public Historian, Kulturreferat der Landeshauptstadt München
"With Postcards to Hitler, Bruce Neuburger gifts us an homage to his Jewish family in southern Germany based on a trove of original documents. Deeply embedded in the historical context, the colorful semi-fictitious account spans from 1871 and the emancipation of the Jews in Germany to the near end of the Third Reich. However, this is not the regular tragic narrative of a Jewish family destroyed by Nazis persecution, albeit it is too, it is a story that rather culminates in how his grandfather courageously resists Hitler."
— Wolf Gruner, author of "Resisters: How Ordinary Jews fought Persecution in Hitler’s Germany"
"Bruce Neuburger has told the very personal story of his grandfather Benno, who was executed for resisting Hitler’s persecution. Neuburger’s powerful writing recreates the atmosphere of the times as his family fights for existence. This is a book that calls us to stand up against injustice and that gives us hope in disturbing times."
— Maximilian Strnad, historian, member of the City of Munich Institute for Urban History and Remembrance Culture, author of "The Fortune of Survival - Intermarried German Jews in the late stage of the Shoah," and other historical works on Munich's Jews.
"A significant contribution to the library of Holocaust literature. Drawing upon the research, writing, and documentation of hundreds of historians and archivists and the testimonies of survivors and family members lost to the Holocaust, Postcard to Hitler imaginatively dramatizes those terrible times."
— Dr. Michael Shinagel, author, "Holocaust Survivor to Harvard Dean: Memoirs of a Refugee’s Progress"