In a small alley in Nerbyen, Trondheim you’ll find a nameplate. The nameplate belonged to David Isaksen who lived in Brattøra 12b, and since before the Second World War, the nameplate has belonged to this building. David got the house at the end of the 1920s, after Aron Mendelsohn moved the family company to Kjøpmannsgata. On the first floor David had his store «David Isaksen», where he sold men’s clothing. In 1930 he married Lillian Adele, and they got two children together – Kurt and Irene. The small family lived on the second floor when the war broke out.

David was one of six men that got arrested early in the year of 1942. They were arrested because they allegedly had spread illegal news. Five of them were executed in the Falstad Forest, close to the prisoner camp Falstad, 7th of March 1942. One of them was David. Lillian Adele and their children fled to Sweden and stayed there until the war ended. Their home was confiscated and was used as headquarters for Rinnanbanden (Sonderabteilung Lola) for about a year during the war. After the war the Isaksen family got their home back, and in 1969 David’s son, Kurt and his partner Jan Erik took over the house. They started the well-known record store «Playtime». Brattørgata 12b stayed in the family until 2000, when Kurt sold the house and the entire inventory, before he moved to Nepal.

The nameplate of David Isaksen has survived all these years, but for a long time it was painted over and almost invisible. Due to rehabilitation work on the building, the nameplate was taken down, polished, and hung back up. Now it hangs for everyone to see, and represents an important memory and reminder of the Norwegian-Jewish life in Nerbyen.