About: Arnold Bernstein

Arnold Bernstein (23 January 1888, in Breslau, Silesia, German Empire – March 1971 in Ocean Ridge, Florida, U.S.) was a German-American shipowner and pioneer of transatlantic car transport, which he revolutionised since he was transporting cars without boxing them up in wooden crates as was usual before and was thus able to reduce freight rates. When the 1929 Great Depression made the use of 'swimming garages' impractical, Bernstein then turned his cargo ships into passenger ships, with just one travel class, which he called tourist class, rather than the three that were usual. One of the first Jewish 'merchant princes', he was one of the victims of the Nazi appropriation policies.