A formative figure of the Trier bourgeoisie
Sigmund Loeb came from the Hunsrück. In 1893 he settled in Trier as a wholesale wine merchant — and was soon to become one of the formative figures of the German wine trade. In 1901 he joined the leadership of the wine merchants' association. From 1903 to 1930 he was president of the Moselle Wine Merchants' Association (Moselweinhändlerverband). For almost three decades he thus belonged to the top of the industry.
Civic engagement
Sigmund Loeb was a city councillor in Trier from 1906 to 1930 and a member of the Chamber of Industry and Commerce of Trier from 1921 to 1933. He was among the leading representatives of the Jewish community of Trier and a co-founder of the Philharmonic Society of Trier. Together with Dr Breucker he worked successfully on the merger of two wine merchants' associations and led the new Wine Merchants' Association for Moselle, Saar and Ruwer jointly through the difficult years of the Weimar economic crisis. In 1912 he was co-founder of the Association of Wine Commissioners on the Moselle and chairman of the Trier-based “Purist” wine merchants' association.
The family home at Johannisstrasse 10 was regarded as a cultural centre of the Jewish community. Sigmund Loeb embodied the union of Jewish bourgeois life, commercial success and public engagement.
Persecution and survival
After the National Socialists seized power in 1933 the Loeb family was step by step pushed out of economic and social life. In 1938 Sigmund and Nelly Loeb fled to the Netherlands. After the German occupation they were temporarily interned in the Westerbork transit camp. Both survived — presumably because Nelly Loeb was a US citizen and was therefore afforded special protection.
Legacy
Sigmund Loeb died in May 1950 at the advanced age of 91. His son Otto Wolfgang Loeb dedicated his 1972 book Moselle to him. In 1958 the city of Trier named a street in Trier-Nord after him. The Trier City Archive has published a photographic collection on the family; a municipal podcast in 2021 was devoted to their story.