Out of the Archives: Birthday Card for a “Wanderer”
by Kevin Schlottmann, Levy Processing Archivist, Center for Jewish History 

This birthday card, found in the Leo Baeck Institute’s Margaret Rothenberger Family Collection (AR 25465), is part of a scrapbook documenting the Rothenberger family’s two years in France, 1933-1935, after they fled Germany and before they immigrated to the United States.  

It was created by Margaret Rothenberger for her youngest daughter, Ilse. The card, illustrating the family’s journey from Germany to the United States, via France, reads:

1. Exodus of the children of Israel from the land of 10,000,000 plagues

2. Until something better turns up

3. God’s own land

Dedicated to the youngest of the 4 wanderers between 2 worlds, on her 11th birthday, by the master painter Margaret, 7/12/35.