In 1842, 42-year-old Aron Heynemann, originally from Ballenstedt, was granted Halberstadt citizenship. This provided the family with legal security and increased freedom in how to run their lives both professionally and privately. The building in Dominikanerstrasse No. 23 in the Unterstadt (lower city) was purchased to house both the family and the leather business.In 1908, the Heynemann family, who by then were running a successful shoe wholesale business, built a prestigious residential building together with a warehouse and business offices in the Kaiserstrasse No. 8 in a new neighborhood bordering the city center to the south.The spacious rooms allowed for a lively and varied social life. Arthur Heynemann and his wife Margarete, née Kayser, were passionate about the theater; the actors Gustav Gründgens or Theo Lingen would stay with the Heynemanns’ during their engagements at the Halberstadt theater. These visits are commemorated in a guest book.In this cultured environment, their daughter Elisabeth, born in 1904, developed her love of books. She received training as a librarian, and then worked for the Halberdtadt City Library, the Gleimhaus and the Halle University Library. In Halle, Elisabeth Heynemann lost her job due to the Nazi’s Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service in 1933. Her termination letter explicitly states that the law was the only reason for her dismissal and that her work had been excellent.In 1936 Elisabeth Heynemann emigrated to Palestine and was one of the pioneers who founded the kibbutz Sde Nahum. She continued to miss her library all of her life. She married Egu Meyer.Elisabeth Heynemann stayed in contact to her friends and colleagues in Halberstadt and in Germany her whole life. Already shortly after the end of the war, she traveled to Italy and West Germany and met up with old friends.