Pinkus family

The Pinkus family were textile manufacturers. The factory in Neustadt, Upper Silesia (now Prudnik, Poland), was one of the largest producers of fine linens in the world. Joseph Pinkus became a partner in the firm S. Fränkel when he married Auguste Fränkel, the daughter of the owner. Their son Max Pinkus (1857-1934) was director until 1926. Their daughter Hedwig married Paul Ehrlich, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1908.

Max Pinkus was a noted patron of the arts and literature and of commercial, political, and civic life in Neustadt and Upper Silesia generally. He was noted for amassing a large library of books by Silesian authors, both known and obscure, as well as several document collections pertaining to Silesian history. He wrote manuscripts on these topics and on the textile trade in Silesia. His library was eventually dispersed to different repositories within Silesia after its confiscation by the Nazis in the late 1930s. Attesting to the importance of Max Pinkus to cultural affairs in Silesia are his relationships with Gerhart Hauptmann, Hermann Stehr, and many other notable figures. Stehr dedicated the story Der Geigenmacher to Pinkus; Hauptmann was present at Max Pinkus's funeral in 1934 and reportedly modeled the protagonists of Vor Sonnenuntergang and Die Finsternisse after Pinkus.

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