Susan Beer collection
Extent and Medium
folders
2
Creator(s)
- Susan Beer
Biographical History
Susan Beer (née Eisdorfer) was born on 14 May 1924 in Budapest, Hungary to Max and Rose Eisdorfer. She grew up in Topolčany, Czechoslovakia (Topolčany, Slovakia). In 1939 her father arranged for her to be smuggled into Hungary to live with relatives. Her parents later joined her. Susan was arrested in 1943 and sent to a prison in Budapest. She and her parents were deported to Auschwitz in 1944. In January 1945 the camp was evacuated and Susan and her mother were sent to Ravensbrück and then Mecklenburg. After liberation, Susan and her mother were reunited with her father in Budapest. The family moved to Bratislava (Slovakia) and then immigrated to the United States in 1948.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
In Oct. 1993, Susan Beer gave the USHMMA her documents and photographs. She gave the USHMMA the memoir in Aug. 1994.
Scope and Content
The collection documents the experiences of Susan Beer and her parents, Dr. Max and Rose Eisdorfer, after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia. The collection includes family photographs; records relating to confiscated property and punitive monetary measures against her parents; identity cards; and a memoir, "To Auschwitz and back: an odyssey," describing her illegal emigration to Hungary and her deportation back to Czechoslovakia; conditions inside the Budapest ghetto; Hannah Senesh; Susan's imprisonment in Auschwitz; a death march; her liberation and reunion with her parents; and the family's immigration to the United States.
System of Arrangement
Arrangement is thematic
People
- Eisdorfer, Rose.
- Senesh, Hannah, 1921-1944.
- Eisdorfer, Max.
Corporate Bodies
Subjects
- Jewish property.
- Hungary--Emigration and immigration.
- Jewish ghettos--Hungary--Budapest.
- United States--Emigration and immigration.
- Czechoslovakia--History--1938-1945.
- Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Personal narratives.
- Canada--Emigration and immigration.
- Confiscations.
Genre
- Document
- Identification cards.
- Photographs.