Title: Dr. Anna Sondheimer-Friedman Collection, 1933
Arrangement
1 box containing 18 saphhires
Administrative/Biographical History
Darrel Couturier’s family were forced to flee their home in Germany in 1935 due the rise of the Nazis. Darrel’s grandfather had a business in Frankfurt and realized the danger the family faced in Germany. before he died in 1933, he urged his wife (Darrel’s grandmother – Dr. Anna Sondheimer-Friedman), to get the family out of Germany. Over the next 2 years, Anna packed up the family’s possessions, including a large Jewish art collection. Much of this was confiscated by the Nazis never to be retrieved. However, Anna took sapphires from the family jewelry, and ingeniously sewed them into the family’s clothing in order to smuggle the gems out of Germany. The family left Germany in 1935, but as they were unable to obtain US visas right away, the emigrated to the Hague (via Switzerland), where they lived for 2 years. They ultimately emigrated to the US, ending up in New York. Anna held on to the sapphires until she passed away in the late 1970s, when they were passed on to Darrel’s mother, Marion B. Sondheimer-Couturier. When she passed away in June 2018, Darrel generously decided to donate the sapphires to the museum, in the name of these two women.
