How Stamp Collecting Led To The Capture Of Adolf Eichmann

This information may already be common knowledge to many of you. However, I'd never seen this referenced anywhere before. Anyhow for those of you who haven't, you may find this quite intriguing.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...mp-catalogue

lpmiller, I happen to have been reading and viewing a great exhibit on Wiesenthal the past week. Here is a link for even more information and some nice reading and learning.

http://arago.si.edu/flash/?s1=6

Hit the link above then go to Curator's Choice and it will be a little ways down the list called Hunting for Wiesenthals.


thanks for the link.

Both are very fine articles. Thank you both for posting them

I was fortunate enough to meet Simon Wiesenthal, and in philatelic context.

My father was born in Hungary and 3 years after the end of WWII came to Israel. His mother stayed there. Since Hungary was a communist country to which Israelis were hardly allowed to enter we did not get a permission to go there until 1984. At that time the way to do it was to go to Austria and ask for a visa in Vienna.

And so we did.......

On the same street of the Hungarian embassy there was a little coffee shop which had a small sign saying stamp collectors meet there twice a week. As a teenager my ability to nag at that time was as close to perfect as can be.

My father had to let me go.

I spent some money on postal cards I found interesting and made a "deal" with a young guy for a "new issue" exchange (which worked fine for a year or two). While talking to him he referred me to an older gentleman with whom - he said - I can talk in Hebrew.

And that was Simon Wiesenthal. He was very nice and I wasn't completely sure (or fully aware) that I was talking to THE Simon Wiesenthal. We had a "small-talk" which I don't realy remember.

He showed me a nice Ottoman cover (sent from Jafa to Austria) he had bought at the meeting and off he went.

When my father came to pick me up he could hardly believe I met Mr. Wiesenthal. I guess for him, as a survivor of the war, it meant so much....

You can all imagine I still keep those postcards I bought at that little coffee shop - they are of little interest in any respect but they do remind me of that meeting.

Seahorse what a great story and memory for life. Those postcards would never leave the collection because of that personal connection. Thank you for sharing.

Seahorse, after reading your personal story, I'm certainly happy to have started this thread. What a once-in-a-life time experience!

L'hitraot,

Larry