Arthur W. Fanta Papers

Dr. Arthur W. Fanta was born in Broumov, Bohemia (Czech Republic), on August 1, 1893. He received his doctorates of law and philosophy from the University of Prague and the University of Vienna. After serving in the Austrian Army during the First World War, Fanta practiced international and industrial law in Karlsbad, Czechoslovakia. He also served as the Legal Advisor to the Social Democratic Party in Czechoslovakia. Because of this affiliation and his political activities against the Nazi Party, Fanta was forced to flee to England in 1939. He remained in England during the war and was employed for two years by the British Ministry of War as a Lecturer for the British Army.

In 1945, Fanta became a U.S. War Department employee, acting as one of the prosecutors and trial attorneys in the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials. He was involved in the prosecution of Hans Lammers, chief of the Reich Chancellery, and the interrogation of Gauleiter Ernst Bohle, leader of Nazi activity outside of Germany. While working on the trials, Fanta met the American Ruth Roscoe. They married in 1948 and moved to the United States later that year. While living in the United States, Fanta taught at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, the University of Hartford, and the University of Pennsylvania. He was also a research associate and statistician with the State Department of Labor. Fanta died on July 9, 1963 at the age of 69.