Theodore (Ted) Schocken

Theodore "Ted" Schocken was born on 8 October 1914 in Zwickau, the son of Zerline "Lilli" (née Ehrmann) and Salman Schocken, a businessman and founder of the department stores' group of the same name.

In 1924, the family moved into a villa designed by architect Hermann Muthesius in the west of Berlin-Zehlendorf at Lessingstrasse 29, which was renamed Limastrasse in 1936.

At the age of 16, Ted left grammar school and continued his education with a private tutor and at a commercial college. From 1931, he worked in the Schocken family's department stores. While his parents and siblings left Germany in 1933/34, Theodore stayed behind. At the age of just 20, he became deputy manager of all Schocken department stores together with his cousin Georg Spiro.

In 1939, Ted first flees to Palestine and emigrates to the United States in the same year. In 1941, he married Dora Landauer, whom he had met years earlier in Germany. After becoming an American citizen, Ted enlisted in the US Army. There he is trained as an intelligence officer and serves in North Africa and Europe.

After the end of the war, Ted and Dora moved to New York, where they had three daughters: Miriam (born 1945), Naomi (born 1946) and Eva (born 1949). In New York, Ted runs the publishing house Schocken Books together with his father Salman until 1959.

Ted Schocken dies on 20 March 1975 in White Plains, New York, USA.