Ella Kay

Ella Kay (16 December 1895 – 3 February 1988) was a Berlin city politician (SPD) with a particular interest in workers' welfare and youth matters. During the Hitler years she became a resistance activist: she focused on looking after victims of government persecution. Despite being subject to surveillance and frequent visits from the security services, she avoided arrest.^[1][2]

After 1945 she found herself in the Soviet occupation zone where, during 1946, she was elected mayor of the district of Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg. She was removed from office in December 1947 by the military administrators. After 1948 the differences implicit in the administrative division of Berlin into four separately controlled military occupation zones began to find increasingly intrusive resonances in administrative and physical differences, especially as between the eastern part of the city, controlled by the Soviets, and the three other sectors of the city, which by this time were coming to be known collectively as West Berlin. In or before 1949 Ella Kay relocated to West Berlin, where, between 1955 and 1962, she served as Senator for Youth and Sport.^[1][2]