Emanuel Boekman was a son of Maurits Boekman and Heintje Peereboom. He became a typographer straight after primary school. He was chairman of the Association for Young Typographers. Shortly afterwards, Emanuel Boekman became a member of the management committee of the Social Democratic Workers Party (SDAP). In 1921, he became a member of Amsterdam town council for the SDAP. In 1931, he followed up Eduard Polak (the brother of Henri Polak) as elderman for Education and Art in Amsterdam. He occupied the post until 1933 and later again in the period 1935-1939.
Boekman was a member of the 'Poale Zion' and he was regular staff member of Het Joodsche Weekblad 'De Vrijdagavond'. He published many articles of a social, economic, demographic and statistical nature. In 1936 he published the ground-breaking work Demografie van de joden in Nederland.He was very involved with the social needs of the Jewish proletariat in Amsterdam, particularly the status of the Jewish street vendors.
In 1939, Boekman obtained his doctoral degree with the thesis 'Government and art in the Netherlands'. This book was and is very important for culture policy in The Netherlands.
On the 6th June 1918 Emanuel Boekman married to Jansje Nerden in Amsterdam. After the German invasion, Emanuel Boekman and his wife took their own lives. They were buried on the Jewish cemetery in Diemen.
See also his biography in Biografisch Woordenboek van het Socialisme en de Arbeidersbeweging in Nederland [in Dutch] and:
M.H. Gans, Memorboek. Platenatlas van het leven der joden in Nederland van de middeleeuwen tot 1940 (6e bijgewerkte druk; Baarn 1988) 759;
T.Jansen and J.Rogier,Kunstbeleid in Amsterdam(Nijmegen 1983) 140
R. Pots, Cultuur, koningen en democraten; Overheid en cultuur in Nederland (3e bijgewerkte druk; Nijmegen 2006), 221-222
R. Fuks-Mansfeld (red.), Joden in Nederland in de twintigste eeuw. Een biografisch woordenboek (Utrecht 2007) 32-33.
Biography