Portland State Magazine Fall 2019

21 Laureen Nussbaum elevates Anne Frank’s literary prowess, and her own story of survival. L aureen Nussbaum wishes the world would remember Anne Frank for her potential as a budding author instead of only for her eye-opening chronicle of life as a Jewish child hiding from the Nazis during World War II. But she wouldn’t blame you if you hadn’t noticed Anne’s literary promise. Most American kids read an edited version of The Diary of Anne Frank . Only recently has the unfinished text of the book Anne Frank was working on been published. And that’s thanks in large part to the tireless work of Nussbaum, a Portland State alumna and emerita professor of German language and literature. Nussbaum, herself a Holocaust survivor by subterfuge, made it her life’s work to get Anne Frank’s epistolary nov- el— Liebe Kitty or Dear Kitty , named after the imaginary friend she wrote to—published. With its European release in May, this 91-year-old retired professor and activist hasn’t slowed down a bit. She just wrapped up her own memoir, out this fall, entitled Shedding Our Stars: The Story of Hans Calmeyer and How He Saved Thousands of Families Like Mine . In it she chronicles the impact Hans Calmeyer, a German government lawyer, made saving at least 3,700 Jews from disaster by determining them to be not “fully” Jewish or not Jewish at all, in the eyes of the law. BORN in Frankfurt, Germany, in August 1927, Nussbaum had a stable, predictable child- hood. “We were a middle-class family. We were comfortable,” she remembers. But then things began to change. As early as the spring of 1933, Nussbaum noticed a shift. Long rows of brown-shirted Nazis had begun marching through the streets of Frankfurt. Like many young kids, Nussbaum picked up what was going on around her like a sponge, not always realizing what was appropriate to share. “One day I was caught in the hall of our apartment, with my father’s cane slung over my shoulder, marching down the hall and singing one of the Nazi songs,” she remembers. Her parents did not appreciate her impromptu performance. “I was told to please stop and never do it again.” As time passed and the Nazi crackdown on Jews intensified, there were other changes to Nussbaum and her family’s daily life. Soon, Jewish families were fleeing Germany for other parts of Europe and beyond. By the fall of 1935, Nussbaum’s parents, the Kleins, decided to go to Amsterdam in the Netherlands, a neutral country during World War I, joining the Franks who had moved in late 1933. “There was this hope—maybe an illusion—that whatever would happen, the Netherlands would remain neutral again, like during World War I,” she remembers. “So, this would be a safe place.” But safety would prove to be a relative term. In May of 1940, the German military invaded the Netherlands. Soon the German anti-Jewish laws were enforced in the occu- pied country. By the fall of 1941, Jewish families were excluded from public cultural events. Those who valued culture took to organizing performances for themselves and others in their homes. It was through theatre and music performed in their homes that Nussbaum got to know the Frank family even more closely, and where she met her future hus- band, Rudi Nussbaum. “Rudi played the piano, and was good at sight-reading music,” she remembers. With Anne Frank and half a dozen other young teens a play was performed in December 1941. Anne had a leading role. Nuss- baum herself directed. “Anne was a lively girl and could learn her lines very quickly,” Nussbaum recalls. “But she definitely didn’t stand out. Her later fame did not cast a spell over these years.” Nussbaum admits that given her age she herself was much more interested in Anne’s older sister, Margot, who was just one year older than Nussbaum. NUSSBAUM remembers being a high-energy kid who helped her future husband’s father with deliveries from the corner drugstore that he ran in their immigrant neighborhood in Amsterdam. “When a customer called and needed something, I would be ready to run or bike over and take it to the to the customer,” Nussbaum remembers. “So, I became sort of an errand boy.” That’s also how Nussbaum got to know her future husband better. As the Nazi’s crackdown on Jews continued to intensify, as early as February 1941, roundups of young Jewish men had begun in the Netherlands. Rudi and his family decided he too must start to take precautions, moving out of his parents’