Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Bennett, Eric, 1902-1964
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
Eric Bennett was born Erich Behnsch in Tarnowitz, Germany, on September 24, 1902. He worked as a hardware salesman until he was arrested, along with thousands of other Jews, on November 9, 1938, on Kristallnacht and sent to Buchenwald concentration camp in Weimar, Germany. Mr. Behnsch was deported in 1939 and went to Cuba, one of the few countries that would take Jewish refugees at the time.
In Havana he turned his hobby into a profession and worked as a children's portrait photographer. Behnsch was allowed to enter the United States in late 1941 and joined other members of his family in Detroit, Michigan. He changed his name to Eric Bennett and continued to work in Detroit as a professional photographer until his death in 1964.