Minnie Maria Dronke (née Kronfeld, 17 July 1904 – 28 August 1987) was a New Zealand actor, drama producer and teacher. She was born Minnie Kronfeld in 1904 in Berlin, Germany, the daughter of Laura (Liebmann) and Salomon Kronfeld, a barrister. Born into a Jewish family, she converted to Catholicism in 1928 and took on the name Maria Magdalena. Her Jewish background placed her in great danger in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

and in December 1938, she went to live at a Catholic convent at Fenham, England. She was eventually reunited with her husband, judge Adolf John Rudolf Dronke, and children there, and the Archbishop of Wellington, Thomas O'Shea, arranged for them to come to New Zealand, where they arrived in August 1939. Her son was scholar

Peter Dronke Ernst Peter Michael Dronke FBA (30 May 1934 – 19 April 2020) was a scholar specialising in Medieval Latin literature. He was one of the 20th century's leading scholars of medieval Latin lyric, and his book ''The Medieval Lyric'' (1968) is con ...

. She is also related to

Josh Kronfeld Joshua Adrian Kronfeld (born 20 June 1971) is a TV presenter and a former rugby union footballer who represented All Blacks, New Zealand at international level and Otago Rugby Football Union, Otago, Otago Highlanders, the Highlanders and Leicest ...

, a member of the

All Blacks The New Zealand national rugby union team, commonly known as the All Blacks, is the representative men's national team in the sport of rugby union for the nation of New Zealand, which is considered the country's national sport. Famed for th ...

squad in the

1995 Rugby World Cup The 1995 Rugby World Cup (), was the third Rugby World Cup. It was hosted and won by South Africa, and was the first Rugby World Cup in which every match was held in one country. The World Cup was the first major sporting event to take place in ...

. In the 1980 New Year Honours, Dronke was appointed an

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

, for services to the performing arts. She died in

Lower Hutt Lower Hutt () is a list of cities in New Zealand, city in the Wellington Region of New Zealand. Administered by the Hutt City Council, it is one of the four cities that constitute the Wellington#Wellington metropolitan area, Wellington metropoli ...

on 28 August 1987.

References

1904 births 1987 deaths New Zealand educators New Zealand women educators Jewish educators Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to New Zealand New Zealand Officers of the Order of the British Empire People from Wellington City {{NewZealand-bio-stub