Hessy Levinsons Taft

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Hessy Levinsons Taft
Hessy Levinsons as featured in Nazi propaganda materials
Born (1934-05-17) 17 May 1934 (age 89)
Berlin, Germany
EducationBarnard College (BA)
Columbia University (PhD)
OccupationChemistry professor
Known forJewish child whose photo was featured in Nazi Germany as the "Perfect Aryan Baby"
SpouseEarl Taft

Hessy Levinsons Taft (born Hessy Levinsons; (1934-05-17)17 May 1934),[1] a Jewish German, was featured as an infant in Nazi propaganda after her photo won a contest to find "the most beautiful Aryan baby" in 1935. Taft's image was subsequently distributed widely by the Nazi party in a variety of materials, such as magazines and postcards, to promote Aryanism.

Photograph[edit]

Taft's Ashkenazi Jewish parents, Jacob Levinsons and Pauline Levinsons (née Levine),[2] were originally from Latvia and were unaware of their photographer's decision to enter the photograph into the contest until learning that the photo of their daughter had been selected by Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels as the winner.

Fearing that the Nazis would discover that their family was Jewish, Taft's mother informed the photographer that they were Jewish. The photographer told her mother, Pauline, that he knew they were Jewish and deliberately entered Taft's photograph into the contest because he "wanted to make the Nazis ridiculous".[3] In July 2014 Taft told the German-language newspaper Bild that "I can laugh about it now, but if the Nazis had known who I really was, I wouldn't be alive."[4]

Later life[edit]

In 1938, Jacob Levinsons was briefly arrested by the SS. In the same year, the family immigrated to France and settled in Paris, then later moved to Cuba and from there to the United States in 1949.[4]

Hessy Levinsons studied chemistry at Julia Richman High School in New York, and majored in chemistry at Barnard College,[5] graduating in 1955.[6][7] As a graduate student in chemistry at Columbia University she met her husband, mathematics instructor Earl Taft. She and her husband joined the faculty at Rutgers University, but she left academia to raise a family, later working on the AP Chemistry exam for the Educational Testing Service.[5] After 30 years at the Educational Testing Service, she returned to New York as a chemistry professor at St. John's University[3][5] in 2000. Her research in this later period of life focused on water sustainability. She retired in 2016.[8]

See also[edit]

  • Werner Goldberg – soldier with partial Jewish ancestry also used in Nazi propaganda

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Oral history interview with Hessy Levinsons Taft". United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. 15 February 1990. Archived from the original on 31 August 2015. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  2. ^ McCoy, Terrence (7 July 2014). "The 'perfect Aryan' child used in Nazi propaganda was actually Jewish". The Washington Post. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  3. ^ a b Huggler, Justin (1 July 2014). "Nazi 'perfect Aryan' poster child was Jewish". The Telegraph. Berlin. Archived from the original on 31 August 2015. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  4. ^ a b Sidon, Adi (1 July 2014). "Ich war Hitlers Propaganda-Baby" [I Was Hitler's Propaganda Baby]. Bild (in German). Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  5. ^ a b c Wolf, Lauren K. (8 September 2014). "Hessy Taft: Jewish survivor and longtime ACS member describes how she was once a Nazi poster child". Chemical & Engineering News. Vol. 92, no. 36. American Chemical Society. p. 30.
  6. ^ "Alumnae Biographical Files" (PDF). Barnard College Archives. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 16 July 2019.
  7. ^ "Class of 1955". our.barnard.edu. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
  8. ^ Author biography from Alexandratos, Spiro D.; Barak, Naty; Bauer, Diana; Davidson, F. Todd; Gibney, Brian R.; Hubbard, Susan S.; Taft, Hessy L.; Westerhof, Paul (January 2019). "Sustaining Water Resources: Environmental and Economic Impact". ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering. 7 (3). American Chemical Society: 2879–2888. doi:10.1021/acssuschemeng.8b05859. S2CID 104330272.
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