Pupils at Goldschmidt School
Creator(s)
- Sam Bryan and International Film Foundation
- Julien H. Bryan (Camera Operator)
Biographical History
Julien Hequembourg Bryan (1899-1974) was an American documentarian and filmmaker. Bryan traveled widely taking 35mm film that he sold to motion picture companies. In the 1930s, he conducted extensive lecture tours, during which he showed film footage he shot in the former USSR. Between 1935 and 1938, he captured unique records of ordinary people and life in Nazi Germany and in Poland, including Jewish areas of Warsaw and Krakow and anti-Jewish signs in Germany. His footage appeared in March of Time theatrical newsreels. His photographs appeared in Life Magazine. He was in Warsaw in September 1939 when Germany invaded and remained throughout the German siege of the city, photographing and filming what would become America's first cinematic glimpse of the start of WWII. He recorded this experience in both the book Siege (New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1940) and the short film Siege (RKO Radio Pictures, 1940) nominated for an Academy Award in 1940. In 1946, Bryan photographed the efforts of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Agency in postwar Europe.
Scope and Content
Classroom shots of the Goldschmidt school in Berlin, which was created when Jews were no longer allowed to enroll in public schools. Interiors with students at desks writing and a female teacher. The pupils include Stella Goldschlag, who passed as Aryan during the war and reportedly betrayed Jews in hiding, and Trudi Goldschmidt (01:05:16 the blond girl with braids in profile view), the daughter of the school's founder, Dr. Leonore Goldschmidt. Outside the school during recess, students play and move around the yard before returning to the classroom. Good CUs of teenage boys and girls as they enter the school up the stairs, including Ellen Rosenthal. Inside, Margot Segall, the girl in a plaid dress, approaches the blackboard and conjugates the Hebrew verb "to ask". A male teacher helps her.
Note(s)
The "wavy positive scribe" or cross-hatching that constantly appears across the frame was added to the 35mm film print by a motion picture stock footage facility where Julien Bryan stored his original materials in the 1970s and 1980s. It was done to prevent people from copying the footage without permission. Unfortunately, the signature is deeply etched into the emulsion and cannot be repaired. Additional photographs are available in the USHMM Photo Archives. Bryan filmed in Germany in 1937 for the March of Time newsreel company. Some of his footage appears in the infamous March of Time release, "Inside Nazi Germany." See Raymond Fielding's book "The March of Time 1935-1951" for more information. Bryan retained some of his Nazi Germany footage and rights, and donated part to the Library of Congress (see USHMM Film IDs 210 and 211) and part to the USHMM. Ellen Rosenthal (1925-2019) and her family left Berlin for Chicago in 1939. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/196269915/ellen-grombacher
Subjects
- HEBREW
- GERMANY
- SCHOOLS
- GOLDSCHMIDT, LEONORE
- BRYAN, JULIEN
- TEACHERS
- JEWS
- CHILDREN (JEWISH)
- PLAYING
Places
- Berlin, Germany
Genre
- Film
- Outtakes.