21 - Fashioning Fortuna's Whim: German-Speaking Women Emigrant Historians in the United States

Summary

Summing up her life as a historian, Helene Wieruszowski once wrote that although subject to “the whims of Fortuna,” her life had been “rich in human experiences and filled to the brim with hardships and pleasures, promises and frustrations.” Wieruszowski's remarks capture much of the story of the sixteen women who were or became historians following their emigration from German-speaking Europe to the United States after 1933. All these women underwent the hardships of emigration as an adult or as a child. As historians, they experienced the pleasures of unanticipated intellectual discoveries, the promises of new or renewed careers, and the frustrations of being women in the male-dominated history profession. Yet, although they share the commonalties of being women, refugees, and historians, little else unites these women. They have had very different historical interests, varying degrees of success within American academia, and very different reactions to their situations as women and as refugees. Some have taught at large universities, others in small colleges, and still others have pursued their historical research largely independent of institutional affiliations. Some of these women emigrant historians have married, some divorced, and some remained single. Some of them became mothers; others remained childless.