W. Michael Blumenthal

W. Michael Blumenthal ( Werner Michael Blumenthal, born January 3, 1926 in Oranienburg ) is an American professor, politician, manager and author of German origin. He was from 1977 to 1979, U.S. Treasury under U.S. President Jimmy Carter and is since 1997 director of the Jewish Museum Berlin.

Life

Blumenthal's father, Draper Ewald Blumenthal was awarded during World War I with the Iron Cross. During the pogroms of November 1938, he was interned for several months in the concentration camp Buchenwald.

First, Werner Michael Blumenthal attended the Jewish Kaliski Forest School in Berlin- Dahlem. His family fled with him in 1939 from Germany to Shanghai and then emigrated to the USA in 1947. He learned Chinese, English, French and Spanish. In 1952 he became an American citizen. He graduated in 1951 with a Bachelor of Science in International Business from the University of California, Berkeley. His Master of Arts in Economics and a Master of Public Affairs, he obtained in 1953 at Princeton University. In 1956 he earned his Ph.D. in economics. From 1953 to 1956 he worked as professor of economics. He then became vice president and finally Director of Crown Cork International Corporation. From 1961 to 1967 he was an employee of the U.S. State Department and at the same time economic adviser to the U.S. President Kennedy and Johnson. In 1967 he joined the board of the technology company Bendix Corporation, whose chairman he was. In 1973, Blumenthal was one of the founding members of the Trilateral Commission.

From 1977 to 1979 he served as Minister of Finance in the cabinet of U.S. President Jimmy Carter. In 1980 he became vice president in 1981 and CEO of Burroughs Corporation. He merged with Sperry 1986 computer firm Unisys, whose chairman he was also. After that from 1990 to 1996 Partner of Lazard Frères & Co. LLC and began writing his biography. In 1997 he was appointed as the founding director of the Jewish Museum in Berlin. Despite great difficulties, he managed to expand the museum to the largest Jewish museum in Europe.

In 1998 he published the family chronicle The invisible wall. The three hundred year-old story of a German - Jewish family. His ancestors include the jeweler Jost Liebmann, the writer Rahel Varnhagen von Ense, the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer and the literary critic Arthur Eloesser.

Blumenthal is a member of the advisory board of investment bank Evercore Partners, the American Jewish Committee in Berlin and the International Rescue Committee. He is a board member of the Foundation Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe and member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Princeton and Century Club.

For his service him seven honorary doctorates were conferred in the United States.

Awards

Publications

  • Codetermination in the German steel industry. A report of experience. Industrial Relations Section, Department of Economics and Sociology, Princeton University, Princeton 1956 The participation in the German steel industry. A field report. Gehlen, Bad Homburg / Berlin / Zurich 1960
  • The invisible wall. The three hundred year-old story of a German - Jewish family. Hanser, Munich / Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-446-19642-0; German Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-423-30788-9
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