Spotlight: Gaby Derenberg

Spotlight on Gaby Derenberg 

The next two spotlights are on two of the people who worked with the, at this point, newly minted refugee section of the AFSC. Both wrote to Opa. This first spotlight is on Gaby Derenberg, who was one of the secretaries. The second is on Hertha Kraus, who really ran the refugee section. 

Gaby was a recent refugee herself having left Germany, passed through England and came to the U.S. in 1937. She worked briefly with the AFSC Refugee Section before she started school in 1939. This is why we don’t see any more of her name after spring of 1939. In trying to find information about Gaby, Ron Coleman, the librarian at the Holocaust Museum, informed us they had some oral history and interviews online and he had remembered one with Gaby Derenberg (now Schiff). So the link to two of these interviews are below. 

The first is shorter, but is a video and was taken in 1998. She briefly talks about the time working for the Refugee Section around the 40 minute mark. 

The second is much longer and in four parts. This is an audio interview from 2000 and gives you an extensive background of her life and all she accomplished. The time working for the Refugee Section can be found around 19 minutes into Part 1. 

Enjoy learning about another one of many who helped, in whatever large or small way, to get Opa to America!!

40 minutes

http://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn511950

19 minutes into Part 1

http://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn506744