Ferdinand Eberstadt (mayor)


Ferdinand Falk Eberstadt was the first Jewish mayor in Germany. He served as mayor of Worms from 1849 to 1852.
He was born to a prominent Jewish family in Worms on 14 January 1808. His parents were Amschel Löb Eberstadt und Esther Gernsheim. In 1839, he and his brothers succeeded to their father's textile merchant company, and he became a successful businessman.
When Eberstadt resigned from the office of mayor in 1852, he and his family moved to Mannheim. He died on 9 February 1888 in Mannheim, where he and his wife are buried in the Jewish cemetery.

Family and legacy

In 1837 Eberstadt married Sara Zelie Seligmann from Kreuznach and they had ten children, one of whom, Maximilian, died as a young man and is buried in Willesden Jewish Cemetery, London, in a grave designed by the famous artist Edward Burne-Jones, who was a friend of Max's twin sister, Elizabeth. Elizabeth married the distinguished solicitor Sir George Lewis, 1st Baronet.
Eberstadt's son :de:Rudolf Eberstadt|Rudolph became professor of architecture in Berlin.
Eberstadt's daughter Emma married Bernard Kahn. Their son Otto Hermann Kahn spent most of his adult life in the United States, where he became an investment banker, collector, philanthropist, and patron of the arts.