Several new exhibits on the theme of sport entered the Museum with the current show-case exhibition on the Jewish sports movement in Germany “Faster, Higher, Stronger….” Among the most impressive is the Rowing Challenge Trophy, recently donated to the Museum by 88-year-old Fred Eisenberg. He won the over 50 cm-long trophy in the mid 1930s as a young sportsman at the Rowing Club, Berlin Oberspree, one of the numerous Jewish rowing clubs in Berlin.

The club awarded this challenge trophy annually to the rower with the most water kilometers. To determine the winner, the rowers kept a logbook in which – at the furthest point of their rowing trip – they got someone from a restaurant, gas station, or shop to confirm their location. Fred Eisenberg got to keep the prize after winning it three years running. He also gave his winner’s certificates, photographs, and a BRC Oberspree boat flag to the Jewish Museum.

Fred Eisenberg worked at the Berlin textile company Nussbaum and emigrated to relatives in London in 1939. In World War II, he served as a soldier in the British Army. After the war he worked at a clothing company in Scotland. He married in Glasgow in 1948 and later emigrated to the USA. He now lives in Atlanta.