2003
Dedication of the Blue House
With a “Jewish Week” the renovated house was dedicated in June and officially named the “Blue House.” The street in front of the house was closed and transformed into a temporary lecture hall. The program took guests on an excursion to the former concentration camp of Struthof in Alsace.
One of the highlights was a concert in the former synagogue of Reguisheim. The Chagall Quartet with Marat Dickermann played compositions by Jewish musicians imprisoned in Theresienstadt.
The Förderverein presented its publication “Zone 30, Rückkehr aus dem Exil” (Zone 30, Return from Exile).
Using research on the Blue House, Andreas Meckel urged the town of Breisach to cancel the honorary status of Nazi war criminal Josef Schillinger’s grave in the cemetery of Breisach-Oberrimsingen. The gravestone was removed. Schillinger, a dreaded SS guard in the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp, was fatally injured on October 23, 1943 in the changing room of the crematorium II by Franciszka Mann, a Polish-Jewish dancer.
Recherchen des Blauen Hauses nutzend, forderte Andreas Meckel die Stadt Breisach dazu auf, den Ehrenstatus des Grabes von Josef Schillinger auf dem Friedhof Breisach-Oberrimsingen zu beenden. Der Grabstein wurde entfernt. Josef Schillinger war ein gefürchteter SS-Wärter im Konzentrationslager Auschwitz-Birkenau, der am 23. Oktober 1943 von Franciszka Mann, einer polnisch-jüdischen Tänzerin, im Auskleideraum des Krematoriums II tödlich verletzt wurde.
