Rudolf Franz Josef Popper

Born:	10-05-1914
Faculty:	Medical School | Medical University Vienna
Category:	Expelled student

Rudolf Franz Josef POPPER, born on October 5^th, 1914 in Vienna (entitled residency ('heimatberechtigt') for Vienna/Austria, Citizenship: Austria), son of Dr. Richard Popper (born 1877, lawyer) and Gerda Popper, née Heymann (born 1889), lived in Vienna's 19^th district, Gregor Mendlstrasse 35, was last enrolled in spring term 1938 in the 5^th and last year of his studies at the Medical Faculty. He also already had a work contract as a demonstrator at the Histological-Embryological Institute (head: Prof. Patzelt). He was of Protestant denomination (AB), but was persecuted as a Jew during National Socialism under the Nuremberg Race Laws, and after the Anschluss was forced to abandon his studies and leave the University of Vienna for both racial and political reasons, and was also dismissed from his demonstrator position. His father, Dr. Richard Popper (born May 12^th, 1877 in Vienna, died January 6^th, 1948 in White Plains, NY/USA), had received his doctorate in law on May 25^th, 1900 and had been entered in the Viennese list of lawyers in March 1908 and operated a law firm at Vienna's 1^st district, Herrengasse 6 (together with Dr. Adolf Hamburger). He was forced to give up the practice on November 15^th, 1938, and left for Switzerland before the end of November, and then lived - partly in hiding - in France, most recently in Allevard les Bains. He was only able to emigrate to the USA via Marseille after the end of the war and arrived in New York, NY on September 7^th, 1946. Rudolf Popper's two brothers Felix Berthold Popper (b. July 6^th, 1918 in Vienna, d. May 20^th, 2011 Nashua, New Hampshire/USA) and Georg Gottlieb Popper (b. February 8^th, 1913 in Vienna, d. February 28^th, 1991 in New York, NY/USA) were able to flee Vienna in time and emigrate to the USA.

Rudolf Franz Josef Popper was arrested in the so-called "Reichskristallnacht" on November 8^th, 1938 and accused of illegal political actions (he had been a member of the then already illegalized Socialist Middle School Students since 1936 and was active in the Red Students Movement). Although he was acquitted in the first Vienna student trial, which took place almost two years later, in December 1940, the Gestapo took him into "security custody" immediately after the acquittal, and he was deported from Vienna's 7^th district, Schottenfeldgasse 46 to the Dachau concentration camp on February 22^nd, 1941, and on to the Buchenwald concentration camp on July 5^th, 1941. He died in Buchenwald concentration camp on April 4^th, 1942.
Lit.: Archive of the University of Vienna/enrollment forms ("Nationale") MED 1937-1938; OeStA/AdR/BMF/VA 2436; OeStA/AdR/BMF/AHF 13200 und AbgF 1186; TIDL 1976; information of his brother, Felix Popper, USA 07/2009 and from Dr. Barbara Sauer, Vienna 05/2021; www.genteam.at; www.geni.com 1; www.geni.com 2.

Herbert Posch