Jakob Straußer stayed in Bad Kissingen for only few years. He was born in Euerbach on May 3, 1869 but lived there for only a short time. Soon after his birth, the family moved into the Franconian spa town. Isidor’s father was the Euerbach master butcher Simon Straußer. He had three sons with his second wife Agatha Sara, née Löwengard: Jakob, who was born in Euerbach in 1869, and Moses and Isidor, who were born in Bad Kissingen in 1871 and 1873.

The family already moved to Schweinfurt in 1874 which was to become the center of the family’s life. Jakob’s father bought an estate in Lange Zehntstrasse 1 and opened a butchery. Soon he turned to gastronomy and got the permit to run an Israelite restaurant with a hostel attached. The Straußer couple ran the restaurant for 30 years, after Simon Straußer’s death in 1899, his widow Ricka (Rebekka), née Hofmann (his third wife) continued running it on her own.

According to the tradition of his father’s family, Jakob Strauß apprenticed as a master butcher. In February 1899, he married Sofie Selig from Mosbach in Schweinfurt and lived with her in Lange Zehntstrasse 1. In August 1902, the childless couple moved to Kapstadt (called “Capland” in the registration card). There is no information on the following years. It is not known when and why Jakob Straußer obviously returned to Germany after a short time. The fate of his first wife Sofie is also unclear.

Since 1910, Jakob Straußer lived in Frankfort/ Main and in March 1922, he married the non-Jewish, Catholic Therese Tetz from Aachen-Heils. Whether Jakob Straußer converted to Catholicism and married in a church, can’t be proved by the files of the Frankfort Parish of Allerheiligen. In the wedding register of the Allerheiligen Parish, there is no wedding of Jakob Straußer and Therese Tetz in 1922/23 to be found. But there are some hints at a file card by the parish office issued to Jakob Straußer from August 1938. In the registry books of the town from 1926 to 1939, Jakob Straußer is listed as a merchant first in Kaiserhofstrasse 12/I and for the last time in Kaulbachstrasse 46/I. In February 1943, Jakob Straußer was arrested and imprisoned in Frankfort for some weeks. The background is not known. In June 1943, the 74-year-old was deported to Auschwitz/ Oświęcim Extermination Camp and murdered there few weeks later on August 26 (restitution request of his wife, 1950). His widow, who had to live on a scanty widow’s pension and support from the welfare office in the time after the war, died in September 1950, shortly after she had applied for restitution.