Round metal Star of David made in Theresienstadt concentration camp

According to her son Michael: “My mother was small in size, less than 5 feet tall, but a giant in spirit – each foot represented an almost infinite amount of perseverance and determination to overcome terrible trials and tribulations.”
Margarete Popper was born on August 3, 1899, in Leitmeritz, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary (now Litomerice, Czech Republic.) She married Karel Grünbaum (Gruenbaum), who was born in Ceska Kamenice, Bohemia, on December 26, 1897. They had two children, Marietta, born July 24, 1926, and Michael, born August 23, 1930. The family lived a very comfortable life in Prague, where Karel, like his father Eduard and brother, was a prosperous attorney, active in several Jewish communal organizations. In fall 1938, the western powers agreed in the Munich Pact to Nazi Germany's annexation of the Czech Sudetenland border region. On March 15, 1939, Germany violated the pact and seized Bohemia and Moravia. Karel was in England at the time, but he soon returned home. Not long after returning, he lost his position and their property was confiscated, because they were Jewish. The family was forced to wear yellow stars, move to the ghetto, and Michael was expelled from school. In September 1939, Reinhard Heydrich became Reich Protector. Persecution of Jews increased and deportation plans were formed. In October 1941, Karel was arrested by the Gestapo and detained in Pankrac prison in Prague. On November 24, 1941, Theresienstadt ghetto-labor camp opened about 60 miles north of Prague. Karel, 44, was transferred to the Small Fortress at Theresienstadt with the designation RU (Return Undesirable.) He was murdered there on December 18, 1941.
Transports of Jews to Theresienstadt soon became frequent in Prague. On November 20, 1942, Margarete, Michael, 12, and Marietta, 14, were sent to the ghetto-labor camp. Males and females were housed separately. Michael was placed with a group of boys known as the Nesarim (Eagles) in the children’s home L-417, under the leadership of Franta Maier. Margarete was assigned to work in the art studio manufacturing toys, artificial flowers, and stage sets for various Terezin productions. Michael worked in the garden and bakery and sang in the children’s choir for Terezin musical productions. Marietta worked in the camp laundry. At some point, Margarete received an encoded postcard from her sister-in-law, who was imprisoned in Auschwitz concnetration camp, warning them that Theresienstadt inmates were being deported to Auschwitz. In autumn 1944, the family received an order for deportation to Auschwitz. Margarete was able to help her boss, the Dutch artist, Joseph Spier, the head of the workshop, who had a son Michael’s age, convince a camp guard that her work - creating teddy bears and others toys for Germans for the Christmas season - was important enough to keep her, and her children, in Terezin. Since the guard also wanted toys for his family, he took the Gruenbaum’s off the transport list and they were never deported. They were liberated from Theresienstadt on May 8, 1945, by the Soviet Army.
Marietta went to England in 1946; the next year, she won a B’nai Brith scholarship to go to the United States to attend the University of Wisconsin, where she met her husband, Milton Emont. Margaret and Michael initially remained in Prague. But after the Communist take-over in 1948, they left for Paris by train and then flew to Cuba to await permission to enter the United States. After living there for 2 years, they were granted US visas and arrived in New York City on July 4, 1950. Margaret got a clerical job and rented a small apartment. She was determined to never be a burden to her children, and according to Michael, she succeeded, just as she intended. Michael earned a degree in civil engineering from MIT in 1953. He spent the next 2 years in the US Army during the Korean War. After his return, he got a position with the Illinois Highway Department. He met and married Thelma Yutan, in Chicago in 1956, and they had three sons. Marietta and her husband settled in Granville, Ohio, where they both taught at Denison University, and had 2 sons and 5 grandchildren. Margaret lived in Brookline, Massachusetts, where she died in 1975.

In a letter written to friends abroad in May 1945, shortly after being liberated from the Theresienstadt concentration camp, Margaret wrote:
I am writing to you as I remember you, and yet we have the feeling that we will never be able to find a bridge to those who have lived on the outside and who, fortunately, will never be able to grasp what horror, fear and deep sorrow we experienced through the years just passed….We hardly have the hope of finding anyone [of our relatives] alive. We ourselves were saved by a miracle….We do not yet know how the future will shape up for us….We do not know where we are going to live. Nothing! But somewhere in the world there is still a sun, the ocean, books, small, clean apartments, and perhaps again the rebuilding of a new life. (quoted in Gruenbaum, Thelma: Nesarim: Child Survivors of Terezín. Portland: Vallentine Mitchell, 2004.)