Maria Lienhart

The Viennese Maria Lienhart came from a well situated middle-class family. She attended the “Arbeitsschule” (Work School) of the “Frauenerwerbsverein” (Viennese women’s association for occupations) and after her mother’s death was housekeeper for her father and her single brother Friedrich. Maria Lienhart documents the development of the bodyweight of her family members for several decades, unwittingly creating a valuable source for the effects of the drastic, war-related shortages of food on the population. Thus by the end of the war she had lost more than ten kilos in her own average weight and that of her father Karl.