Frida Hahn

Rory M Larson rlarson at unlnotes.unl.edu
Tue Apr 29 14:03:20 UTC 2008


I'm confused.  What "holocaust" are we talking about here?  Were the Hahns 
Jewish or non-Jewish Germans?  If they were Germans from Russia who had 
come to America before Frida was even born, what authority would Third 
Reich Germany have had to call Frida "back" to Germany?  Why only her, and 
not the rest of her family?  If she was Jewish, why would they want to at 
a time they were trying to expel the Jews?  If she was non-Jewish, she 
might have moved there voluntarily, and perhaps died there in the 
following decade.  There were probably about three million or so German 
civilians that died during or after the war from Allied bombing or in the 
massive population expulsion of Germans from the eastern parts of their 
country by the Russians, Poles and Czechs.  Would on-line "holocaust" 
lists include these people?

Rory





"Rankin, Robert L" <rankin at ku.edu> 
Sent by: owner-siouan at lists.colorado.edu
04/28/2008 11:25 PM
Please respond to
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Subject
RE: Frida Hahn






Thanks for adding that information.  We were afraid something like that 
had happened.  The Hahns of Lincoln were Germans from Russia (like many of 
the Germans of western KS and other midwestern states), so she would have 
known the language since both parents and an older sister had been born 
abroad and her father was not yet a citizen.  I guess it might pay to 
check in Lincoln in any event.
 
The holocaust lists that are on-line give at least three Frida Hahns and a 
number of others with spelling variants.  The late '30s would have been a 
particularly bad time to go back to Germany. 
 
Thanks again for the info.
 
Bob

________________________________

From: owner-siouan at lists.colorado.edu on behalf of Tom Leonard
Sent: Mon 4/28/2008 5:15 PM
To: siouan at lists.colorado.edu
Subject: Re: Frida Hahn


Thought I'd add a bit regarding Freida Hahn.

My Ponca mother, Josetta Rush was friends with Freida. She had many 
stories about her. To my best understanding, as mom told it, Freida was 
German. She actually told a story about how they (Poncas) were all amazed 
that Freida could "i'e with those German ukhi'te at Miller's 101 Ranch" 
(German WWI POWs that never went back).

Some time in the late 30s Freida was called back to Germany and she went. 
Mom said that all the Ponca boys that went to Europe in WWII tried to find 
her, but to no avail. Mom and her sisters tried to locate her through the 
Red Cross, but they never found her. The fear has always been that she had 
been killed in the holocaust.

TML

Rankin, Robert L wrote: 

                 I did a little more checking on Frida Hahn, the student 
of Franz Boas who wrote the Ponca grammar found in the Gordon Marsh 
Collection of the APS.  There was a Frida Hahn listed in the 1920 US 
Census from Lincoln, Nebraska, daughter of one William Hahn who had 
emigrated from Russia.  At the time our Frida was exchanging 
correspondence with Franz Boas she would have been 23-27 years old -- just 
about right for a graduate student.  And she might have been naturally 
attracted to study Ponca since she was from Nebraska.  According to the 
Census figures, below, she apparently had a brother and possibly three 
sisters. 
 
                 Those of you living in the Lincoln area might want to 
make some phone calls to the Hahns in the Lincoln phone directory and see 
if any of the names below rings a bell.  There may be some children or 
grandchildren still around, and we could clear up the question "What ever 
happened to Frida Hahn?" once and for all.  They might appreciate the 
information we have about her too.
 
                 Her father and mother were both born in Russia
 
                 NAME                     STATUS   AGE     FATHER 
BIRTHPLACE
                 Hahn, Emma               Married  43  F   William (H9) 
Russia 
                 Hahn, Emma                Single  11  F   William (H9) 
Nebraska
                 Hahn, Frida               Single  13  F   William (H9) 
Nebraska
                 Hahn, George              Single  22  M   William (H9) 
Nebraska
                 Hahn, Hazel               Single  9m  F   William (H9) 
Nebraska
 
                 I also checked the listings of names of persons who died 
in the holocaust.  There were at least three Frida Hahns from various 
places in Silesia and Hungary, but they were all born in the 1880s.  Let 
us hope she was not one of them.
 
                 Bob
 


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