Gertrud Helene Kunz Jr., circus director in Germany Born 1913 dead 2009-06-06 in Brazil . 1941: Trude Stosch-Sarrasani (1913 – 2009) took over the circus, after her husband died in Southamerica. Trude, the wife of Hans Stosch-Sarrasani Jr., was a lovely and angelic young woman, found herself in charge of the circus aged only 28 years, during the Nazi regime. Her approach to running it was notoriously different from her male predecessors: she never commanded or ordered; on the contrary, she always delicately suggested. Minister Goebbels recommended the use of her young and beautiful figure in the circus posters as an icon of the Arian era. In 1944, however, she was sent to prison accused of anti-Germanic behavior. Two weeks later, Trude was released to continue performing, while Germany was immersed in the open war. Her partner, the Hungarian acrobat Gabor Némedy, was kept prisoner as a way of persuasion. In 1945, during the show, she was caught in the bombing of Dresden, from which she fortunately emerged alive. The Sarrasani theater was destroyed on 13 February 1945 during the Bombing of Dresden in World War II. After the war, she started over as an equestrian artist working for other circus. Trude Stosch-Sarrasani emigrated to Argentina. In 1948, an Argentine producer invited her to reestablish Sarrasani in Buenos Aires with the presence of President Juan Perón and his wife, Evita, and began a very close relationship with them, when she reestablished the circus in Buenos Aires as the "Circo Nacional Argentino". Trude ran the circus until the mid seventies, albeit as a smaller enterprise. The popularity of cinema and TV, together with new cultural codes for animal care and use, led the circus to adapt to modern times. Trude Stosch-Sarrasani spent her last days in San Clemente del Tuyú (a seaside resort town south of Buenos Aires) with Kiki, a little dog picked up from the street. Ms. Stosch-Sarrasani died there on June 6, 2009, at the age of 96.
