In order to help his workers, Otto Weidt relied on support from people he could trust. He managed to build up several circles of helpers, whom he coordinated and who were closely interconnected—without all of them being aware of one another. They supported Otto Weidt and the persecuted Jews with food, clothing, papers, and accommodation, or gave warnings of upcoming raids or deportations.
Otto Weidt’s business partner Gustav Kremmert supported persecuted Jews with food, took people at risk into his home, and planned the Horn family’s hiding place in the workshop.
Hedwig Porschütz, a friend of Otto Weidt’s, bought food on the black market. She hid four Jewish women in her home in 1943.
The head of the Jewish Community’s supplies management, Hans Rosenthal, warned Otto Weidt and his staff of the large-scale raid known as “Operation Factory” in February 1943. When the Licht family were living in a hiding place arranged by Otto Weidt, the Jewish doctor Gustav Held treated the severely ill Georg Licht. His non-Jewish wife Inge Held obtained medications for people in hiding from the neighboring pharmaceuticals company Kuby & Co.
Theodor Görner, who ran a printing press at Rosenthaler Straße 26, organized forged identity papers and employed Jews living in hiding. The advertising agent Karl Deibel housed other persecuted Jews in the former workshop in the basement at Großbeerenstraße 92.