Otto Frank
- For the physiologist of the same name, see Otto Frank (physiologist).
Otto Heinrich Frank (May 12, 1889–August 19, 1980) was the father of Anne Frank.
Born into a banking family in Frankfurt-am-Main, he was stationed at the Western Front during World War I, and promoted to lieutenant in 1918. He married Edith Holländer on 12 May 1925 in Frankfurt-am-Main and their first daughter, Margot was born on 16 February 1926, followed by Anne on 12 June 1929.
As the tide of Nazism rose in Germany and anti-Jewish decrees encouraged attacks on Jewish individuals and families he decided to evacuate his family to the safer western territories of Europe, and in the summer of 1933 he moved his family to Aachen where his wife's mother resided in preparation for a subsequent and final move to Amsterdam in the Netherlands.
In response to a call-up notice sent to his daughter Margot in July 1942 he took his family into hiding in the upper rear rooms of the Opekta premises on the Prinsengracht. They were joined two weeks later by Hermann van Pels and his wife and son, and in November by Fritz Pfeffer. Their concealment was aided by Otto Frank's colleagues Johannes Kleiman, whom he had known since 1923, Miep Gies, Victor Kugler, and Bep Voskjuil. They were concealed for two years until they were betrayed by an anonymous informant in August 1944. Otto Frank, his family, the four people he hid with, and Kugler and Kleiman were arrested by SS Officer Karl Silberbauer and, after being imprisoned in Amsterdam, the Jewish prisoners were sent to the Dutch transit camp of Westerbork and finally to Auschwitz. Here Otto was separated from his wife and daughters. He was sent to the men's barracks and found himself in the sick barracks when he was liberated by Soviet troops on January 27 1945. He travelled back to the Netherlands over the next six months and set about tracing his arrested family and friends. By the end of 1945 he knew he was the sole survivor of the family, and of those who had hidden in the house on the Prinsengracht.
After Anne Frank's death was confirmed in the summer of 1945, her diaries and papers were given to Otto Frank by Miep Gies who had rescued them from the ransacked hiding place. He left them unread for some time but eventually began transcribing them and in 1947 the first Dutch edition of the diary was published under the title 'Het Achterhuis'
Otto married a former neighbour and fellow Auschwitz survivor, Elfriede Geiringer-Markovits (1905-1998), in Amsterdam on November 10 1953, moved to Basel, Switzerland and devoted the last years of his life to promoting Anne Frank's message of tolerance and compassion.
Further reading
- Diary of a Young Girl, Anne Frank ISBN 0-553-29698-1
- Anne Frank Remembered, Miep Gies and Alison Leslie Gold ISBN 0-671-66234-1
- The Hidden Life of Otto Frank, Carol Ann Lee ISBN 0-670-91331-6
- Roses from the Earth: the biography of Anne Frank, Carol Ann Lee ISBN 0-670-88140-6
- Love, Otto, Cara Wilson ISBN 0-8362-7032-0
- Eva's Story, Eva Schloss ISBN 0-9523716-9-3