A wealthy German business man wanted to help Jewish people escape Nazi Germany. Ernst Leitz II, a Christian, devised a genius plan that put himself and his family at risk and ended up saving the lives of many Jewish citizens.
He hired hundreds of Jewish people into the Leica Camera Company that he owned and inherited from his father. After employing them, he would send them on overseas 'assignments' so that they could get out of Germany before the Holocaust. He did this with the help of his daughter, Elsie Kuehn-Leitz. This effort became known as the Leica Freedom Train.
Elsie was caught at the border while helping Jewish women cross over into Switzerland. She was imprisoned by the Gestapo and endured terrible treatment while being questioned. She was eventually freed but fell under suspicion again when she tried to improve the living conditions of female Ukrainian slave laborers during the 1940s.
The Leitz family never wanted recognition for these heroic efforts and the story of the Leica Freedom Train only became known after the last member of the Leitz family had died.
