Franz Goldberger

Professor Franz Goldberger hoped to immigrate to the United States, but before he could obtain an immigration visa, he needed to prove that he had financial support in the United States. He did not know any Americans, so he wrote to total strangers begging for help. One letter reached Helen Roseland, a postal employee in rural Iowa, who agreed to sponsor him. Ultimately, her efforts to bring Goldberger to safety were unsuccessful—he was deported to a concentration camp and murdered in the Holocaust.

Letter to a Stranger

After Nazi Germany annexed Austria in March 1938 (an event known as the Anschluss), Dr. Franz Goldberger, who was Jewish, began sending letters to strangers in America looking for help. He found their names and addresses in phone books and organizational directories. The Nazi regime had removed Goldberger from his job as a professor in Vienna, and he had no income. Goldberger wanted to immigrate to the United States but he needed to find an American who would promise to take financial responsibility for him by signing an affidavit to ensure he would not be a burden on the United States. Desperate to prove that he was a good candidate for immigration, Goldberger enclosed copies of his résumé with all his letters to American strangers.

Realizing that he might not find a teaching job in America, Goldberger learned other trades, including farming, domestic service, and hairdressing. At the bottom of his résumé, he explained why he needed help:

“Without exaggeration, I dare say I am nearly ruined . . . and as a Jew have no possibility whatever to earn my living in this country, in which I have lived since childhood.”

New York City high school teacher Benjamin Davis received this letter from Franz Goldberger, who said that he had found Davis’s name in a directory. Goldberger hoped Davis could provide him with a financial affidavit so that he could immigrate to the United States, January 13, 1940. *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

Goldberger included his résumé in his letter to Benjamin Davis, hoping to prove that he would not become a burden in the United States. *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

One of Goldberger’s letters reached Hazel Hostetter, a teacher in Des Moines, Iowa, in early 1940. Though she was not able to financially sponsor Goldberger herself, she found a friend who could. Helen Roseland, assistant postmaster of Eagle Grove, Iowa, enthusiastically agreed to provide an affidavit for Goldberger. Roseland was unmarried and had no personal savings, but her family owned 160 acres of land, and she hoped that would be enough to prove her financial stability.

Roseland turned to the Scattergood Hostel in West Branch, Iowa, for help. Scattergood, which helped newly arrived refugees settle in the United States, was affiliated with the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), a Quaker organization. Staff at Scattergood and at the AFSC’s main headquarters in Philadelphia advised Roseland on the immigration sponsorship process and helped her with the paperwork required to bring Goldberger to America. In addition to the affidavit, Helen submitted tax returns, a letter of credit, letters of recommendation, and a personal letter to the American consul in Vienna, expressing her interest in Franz Goldberger.

Helen Roseland (center) with her two sisters, ca. 1942. — Helen Roseland *(center)* with her two sisters, ca. 1942. *Courtesy of the family of Helen Roseland.*

Mildred Holmes, an aid worker with the American Friends Service Committee (the Quakers) advised Roseland about how to fill out the paperwork to sponsor Franz Goldberger, April 1, 1940. *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

Bureaucratic Hurdles

On April 11, 1940, the AFSC forwarded Roseland’s documents to the American consulate in Vienna, along with a cover letter to the State Department, emphasizing her generosity and genuine desire to assist refugees. The AFSC also wrote to Goldberger to inform him that his affidavit was on the way.

One month later, Goldberger responded to the AFSC. He was grateful, but needed a second certified copy of Roseland’s affidavit. Unfortunately, it did not arrive soon enough.

Goldberger was arrested in May 1940 and sent to a Nazi forced-labor camp near Vienna. He wrote to Helen Roseland immediately after being released in January 1941. By that time, more than six months after his previous letter, the requirements for US immigration had become more difficult. Goldberger needed Roseland to send an updated affidavit. He thanked her again for her “noble and unselfish act of humanity.”

Roseland immediately sent a new certified affidavit.

Franz Goldberger apologetically asked for a second notarized copy of Helen Roseland’s affidavit, May 6, 1940. *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

After surviving seven months in a work camp, Franz Goldberger wrote to Helen Roseland asking her to send updated immigration paperwork. Immigrating to the United States, he wrote, “is really my only hope for a new future.” *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

Helen Roseland wrote to the Quakers that she had pooled her money with a man in Brooklyn and a girl in Los Angeles to buy Franz Goldberger a ship ticket. None of the three donors had ever met Goldberger, April 3, 1941. *US Holocaust Memorial Museum.*

Out of Time

Anticipating that Goldberger would soon be able to leave Vienna, Roseland collected $425 (equivalent to $9,000 in 2022) for his ship ticket, borrowing money from the bank and soliciting donations from people in New York and California. She was able to purchase a ticket for Goldberger on a ship scheduled to sail from Spain on June 29, 1941.

Goldberger never boarded that ship. Helen Roseland never heard from him again. After July 1941, the US consulate closed in Vienna, and Goldberger was trapped in Nazi-occupied territory.

In May 1942, Goldberger was deported. Records show that he was murdered three months later at the Majdanek concentration camp on August 20, 1942.

Helen Roseland, Hazel Hostetter, and the staff at the Scattergood Hostel and the AFSC had corresponded for more than a year in their effort to bring Franz Goldberger to the United States. Even after it became clear that Goldberger had not used his ship ticket, Roseland still had hope that he would eventually arrive. She wrote to the AFSC in February 1942: “I am praying that he will live thru this ordeal and yet come here…I have heard that many of them [European Jews] are being sent to Poland and there they are dying in large numbers. It is all very sad.” She died without ever learning what happened to him.