Erna Patak

November 4, 1871–April 19, 1955

by Dieter J. Hecht
Last updated June 23, 2021

Erna Patak, 1953. From the Pritzker Family National Photography Collection, Abraham Schwadron collection, The National Library of Israel National Library of Israel.

In Brief

Born in Brno (Czech Republic), Erna (Ernestine) Patak was a social worker and one of the Zionist veterans in Vienna in the early twentieth century. In 1898 she was among the founders of the first Zionist women’s organization in Vienna and became the first president of WIZO Austria in the early 1920s. After the Anschluss in 1938, she refused to leave Austria because of her sick mother. In 1942, she was departed to Theresienstadt at the age of 71. She survived, and after liberation in 1945 she returned to Vienna and then moved to London in 1947. In 1949, she fulfilled a lifelong dream and immigrated to Israel, where she died in 1955.

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Bibliography

WIZO in Israel, No. 64, Tel Aviv: May 1955.

Mitteilungsblatt des Irgun Olej Merkaz Europa, Tel Aviv: May 13, 1955.

Sternberger, Ilse. Princes Without a Home. Modern Zionism and the Strange Fate of Theodor Herzl’s Children, 1900–1945. San Francisco: International Scholars Publications, 1994.

Wallas, Armin. Eugen Hoeflich. Tagebücher 1915 bis 1927. Vienna: 1999.

Adunka, Evelyn. Exil in der Heimat. Über die Österreicher in Israel. Innsbruck: Studien Verlag, 2002.

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