via facsimile: 011-43-1-53-415-252

Univ.Prof. Dr. Ernst Bacher
Bundesdenkmalamt
Schwiezerhof, Säulenstiege
Hofburg
A-1010 Wien

Re: Estate

Sehr geehrte Dr. Bacher:

 Thank you so much for your letter dated November 19, 1998 which was faxed to me on November 24, 1998. 

 First, thank you for allowing me to communicate in English. I agree that this will help speed up our communications. I have no difficulties reading your German.

 Second, as you will see from my letter to Bundesministerin Gehrer, we are happy to accept your advice and will gladly wait until your research is complete before you send us all of the documents you have found.  We hope that you will be able to complete your research in the near future, and it would be nice to know if you have an estimate of when that will be. If I do happen to be able to visit Vienna, I will certainly take the opportunity to review the documents myself.  In the meantime, we have nothing against allowing any researchers and journalists to view and have copies of documents you have collected related to the Bloch-Bauer estate, even before you have completed your research.

 I will send you via regular mail copies of all of the documents I have collected so far.  Some of the documents have only survived incompletely, but they will certainly assist your research.  We should discuss whether it would be advisable for us to review the documents you find before you declare your research to be "complete."  My clients and I might be able to assist you in interpreting certain documents, and may also be able to lead you to different sources of information that your researchers have not discovered.

 For example, I am informed by Emile Zuckerkandl of Palo Alto, California, that his cousin Minnie Müller-Hoffman (the daughter of Amalie Zuckerkandl) is still alive in Vienna.  She may no longer be capable of remembering how the portrait of her mother from the collection of Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer came to be in her collection after the war, but she may have documents that could explain this mystery. The partner of Dr. Gustav Rinesch, Dr. Wolfgang Mayer, Mölkerbastei 5, Wien I (tel: 553-5609) also may be able to assist you in questions related to Dr. Rinesch.  I do not know where the files of Dr. Erich Führer would be kept, if they still exist.

 If you do have the opportunity to call me while you are in Washington, D.C. I would very much appreciate that.  My telephone numbers are (213) 473-2045 and (310) 472-3122.

 Thank you, and your staff, very much for your cooperation.

     Very truly yours,

     E. Randol Schoenberg

Enclosures (via mail)

cc:  Bundesministerin Elisabeth Gehrer
bcc: Mrs. Maria Altmann
 Stephen D. Alexander, Esq.

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