Timeline

  • Schocken's birth house in Margonin

    1877

    Born in Margonin, province of Posen, German Empire (now part of Poland)

  • 1891

    Takes an apprentice position in the village of Samotshin.

  • 1895

    Takes a job at a wholesaler in the town of Gnesen.

  • 1898

    Moves to Berlin, to work in a wholesale business.

  • 1900

    Works as a traveling salesman for a textile firm in Leipzig

  • 1901

    Moves to Zwickau, to join his brother Simon in managing a department store for the company Ury Brothers

  • 1904

    joins Simon to launch their own store in Zwickau.

  • 1907

    Buys the Ury store and sets up a common distribution center to serve both stores.
  • Lilli Schocken

    1910

    Marries Lilli (Zerline) Ehrmann, a twenty-year-old woman from Frankfurt.
  • Theodore Herzl

    1911

    Joins the Zionist movement.

  • 1914

    Completes the opening of additional stores in the working-class towns of Meissen, Frankenberg, and Planitz. The Schocken chain operates nine stores.

  • 1915

    Meets the Hebrew novelist S.I. Agnon.

  • 1917

    Supports Martin Buber’s literary magazine Der Jude.

  • 1921

    First trip to Palestine, Invited by Arthur Ruppin.
  • Erich Mendelsohn (1887- 1953) Photographer: Unknown

    1922

    Meets the architect Erich Mendelsohn.

  • 1925

    Second trip to Palestine; Invited to the opening ceremony of the Hebrew University In Jerusalem.

  • 1928

    Buys 3,000 Hebrew poetic works discovered in the attic of the deserted Ben Ezra Synagogue in old Cairo.

  • 1930

    Completes the expansion of the Schocken chain with additional department stores in Nuremberg (1926), Stuttgart (1928), and Chemnitz (1930).

  • 1931

    Founds the book publishing company Schocken Verlag in Berlin.

  • 1931

    Opens a department store in Berlin. The Schocken chain is the fourth largest in Germany.
  • The Hebrew University

    1934

    Leaves Germany and relocates in Jerusalem; elected to chairman of the Hebrew University’s executive committee.

  • 1936

    Buys Haaretz, a small newspaper in Tel Aviv; Inaugurates the Schocken Library in Jerusalem.

  • 1938

    Forced by the Nazi regime to sell the department stores for a fraction of their value.

  • 1939

    Launches the Schocken Publishing House in Tel Aviv.

  • 1940

    Relocates in the USA.

  • 1945

    Founds Schocken Books in New York.

  • 1949

    Regains control over some of his confiscated department stores in West Germany.

  • 1953

    Sells the department stores in West Germany.

  • 1957

    Receives the Nuremberg Machzor as a part of a reparations package for losses incurred during the Nazi period.

  • 1959

    Dies during a vacation in Switzerland.