The Leo Baeck Institute London was pleased to co-host a book talk at The Wiener Holocaust Library on 5 October 2026, featuring Inheritance: Love, Loss, and the Legacy of the Holocaust.
Co-authors Charlie Scheidt and Kat Rohrer discussed the book with Dr Kinga S. Bloch, former Deputy Director of LBI London, who moderated the event. The discussion was followed by a reception and book signing.
Inheritance traces the histories of two German-Jewish families whose lives were disrupted by the Holocaust and the Second World War. Scattered across two continents, the families were later re-formed in the United States. The book began with the letters and documents Scheidt discovered after his mother’s death, which opened a path into the history of his German-Jewish family and the consequences of persecution and displacement.
The conversation also explored the book’s unusual collaboration. Scheidt’s family had fled Nazi-occupied Europe, while Rohrer’s grandfather had joined the Nazi army. Their partnership offered a way to examine complex family histories and the connections between personal memory, responsibility and inherited experience.
Charlie Scheidt was born in New York to parents who had escaped Nazi-occupied Europe. He later led Roland Foods, the company founded by his parents, before turning his attention to supporting universities and organisations working on refugee rights.
Kat Rohrer is an award-winning filmmaker from Vienna. Her work includes the feature documentary Back to the Fatherland and the narrative film What a Feeling. She is currently developing a film inspired by Inheritance.
Alice Riegler, Development Manager at LBI London, said:
This evening showed how personal documents can open wider questions about memory, responsibility and belonging. We are grateful to Charlie Scheidt and Kat Rohrer for sharing this work, and to Kinga Bloch for guiding such a thoughtful discussion. It was a privilege for LBI London to support an event that brought family history and contemporary questions about displacement into conversation.
The event was co-sponsored by the Wiener Holocaust Library, the Austrian Cultural Forum, LBI London and Rutgers University Press.
