Heinz Steinitz
Heinz Steinitz was born in Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland) on April 26, 1909, to Walter Steinitz (1882-1963), a cardiologist and zoologist, and Marta Schindler Steinitz (1885-1926). He grew up in Breslau and was greatly inspired by his father to study science and to be an active Zionist. He studied medicine from 1927-1933 in the universities of Breslau, Freiburg and Berlin. Although he passed the Medical Board examination in 1933, and would have started work in a hospital in Berlin and in the Jewish hospital in Breslau, he was prohibited from practicing by the Nazi regime which came to power that same year. Together with his wife Ruth Aber Steinitz (1907-1995), a medical student as well, he left Germany in 1933 and immigrated to Palestine.
Wilhelm Steinitz
In February 1897, the "New York Times" prematurely reported his death in a New York mental asylum. Some authors claim that he contracted syphilis, which may have been a cause of the mental breakdowns he suffered in his last years. In the months prior to his death, he spent some time in institutions as a result of his failing mental health. His chess activities had not yielded any great financial rewards, and he died a pauper in the Manhattan State Hospital (Wards Island) on August 12, 1900, of a heart attack. Steinitz is buried in the Cemetery of the Evergreens in Brooklyn, New York. His second wife and their two young children were still alive at his death.