The Hamburg municipality is planning to honor 17th-century Jewish businesswoman and diarist Glückel von Hameln (1646 – 1724), whose account of life provides scholars with an intimate picture of German Jewish communal life in the late 17th and early 18th century Jewish ghetto. Written in Yiddish, her diaries were originally intended for her descendants. The first part is actually a living will urging them to live ethical lives. It was only much later that historians discovered the diaries and began to appreciate her account of life at that time.
And speaking of an ethical life, the same Hamburg municipality will also honor with a street named after her a woman named Domenica Niehoff, who died in 2009, a prostitute who became famous in the 1980s by campaigning for sex workers’ rights. She also worked to help women struggling with drug addiction.
Altogether, Hamburg will name 10 streets in its Altona district after famous women, including German comic actress Helga Feddersen (1930 – 1990).