Businessman, Folk Figure. Along with Miep Gies, Johannes Kleiman, and Elisabeth "Bep" Voskuijl (Elli Vossen), he helped hide Anne Frank; her family (father Otto, mother Edith, sister Margot); Fritz Pfeffer; and Hermann, Auguste, and Peter Van Pels from the Nazis in Amsterdam during World War II. In Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl," he was dubbed "Mr. Kraler." He was arrested and sent to a series of German labor camps in Holland where he survived by his wits and finally escaped in March 1945 when the prisoner march he was on was strafed by British Spitfires. Working his way back to his hometown of Hilversum on foot and by bicycle, he remained in hiding there until liberated by Canadian troops a few weeks later. He emigrated to Canada in 1955 (where several of his relatives already lived) and resided in Toronto, where he worked as an insurance salesman. He appeared as a guest challenger on the TV panel show "To Tell the Truth" in September 1958. He received the Yad Vashem Medal of the Righteous (1973) and the Canadian Anti-Defamation League awarded him $10,000 in 1977 in recognition of his assistance in hiding the Frank and van Pels families.
Businessman, Folk Figure. Along with Miep Gies, Johannes Kleiman, and Elisabeth "Bep" Voskuijl (Elli Vossen), he helped hide Anne Frank; her family (father Otto, mother Edith, sister Margot); Fritz Pfeffer; and Hermann, Auguste, and Peter Van Pels from the Nazis in Amsterdam during World War II. In Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl," he was dubbed "Mr. Kraler." He was arrested and sent to a series of German labor camps in Holland where he survived by his wits and finally escaped in March 1945 when the prisoner march he was on was strafed by British Spitfires. Working his way back to his hometown of Hilversum on foot and by bicycle, he remained in hiding there until liberated by Canadian troops a few weeks later. He emigrated to Canada in 1955 (where several of his relatives already lived) and resided in Toronto, where he worked as an insurance salesman. He appeared as a guest challenger on the TV panel show "To Tell the Truth" in September 1958. He received the Yad Vashem Medal of the Righteous (1973) and the Canadian Anti-Defamation League awarded him $10,000 in 1977 in recognition of his assistance in hiding the Frank and van Pels families.
Bio by: Bruce Carle
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