Born: Irma Kamerling
Berlin, Germany
April 2, 1907
Died:
January 3, 2015
Irma Frankel was the daughter of furniture-store owners and her father served in the German army during World War I (1914-1918). He was sent to Siberia as prisoner of war and she recalled that when he returned in 1920 he was sick and mentally disabled. After the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, Frankel's father managed to get his sons out of the concentration camps. Frankel persuaded her parents to leave under the pretext of vacation in Switzerland, then London. Once they were in London, they obtained visas to come to the United States. Irma's sister, Hilda, went to Palestine. Her mother and her brothers arrived in New York in 1936. After living in New York for four years, they came to Houston in November 1939. They opened a store downtown, then in the Galleria, called Southern Fabrics. Frankel's father survived in London, but died before coming to America.
Parents:
Joseph Kamerling, d. London, ca. 1939
Sarah Herschowitz Kamerling, survived
Siblings:
George Kamerling, survived
Siegfried Kamerling, d. 1925 in Germany
Hilda Pinczower, survived
Max Kamerling, survived