Ernst Lerch (November 19, 1914 - 1997) was one of the most important men of Operation Reinhard (German: Aktion Reinhard), responsible for "Jewish affairs", and the mass murder of the Jews in the General Government (Generalgouvernement).

On 19 November 1914, Lerch was born in Klagenfurt, (Austria). He briefly studied at the Hochschule für Welthandel in Vienna, Austria. From 1931 to 1934 Lerch learned the hotel trade by working as a waiter in various hotels in Switzerland, France, and Hungary.

On 1 December 1932, Lerch joined the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP) (Party Number 1,327,396). On 1 March 1934, he became member of the "Protective Squadron" (German: Schutzstaffel, SS) (SS Number 309,700).

From 1934 until the unification of Austria and Germany (Anschluss) in 1938, Lerch was employed in his father's Café Lerch. The café, located in Klagenfurt, became a meeting place for Nazis such as Odilo Globocnik and Ernst Kaltenbrunner, who frequented the café.

Ernest Bloch (July 24, 1880 – July 15, 1959) was a Swiss-born American composer.

Bloch was born in Geneva and began playing the violin at age 9. He began composing soon afterwards. He studied music at the conservatory in Brussels, where his teachers included the celebrated Belgian violinist Eugène Ysaÿe. He then travelled around Europe, moving to Germany (where he studied composition from 1900–1901 with Iwan Knorr at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt), on to Paris in 1903 and back to Geneva before settling in the United States in 1916, taking American citizenship in 1924. He held several teaching appointments in the U.S., with George Antheil, Frederick Jacobi, Bernard Rogers, and Roger Sessions among his pupils. In December 1920 he was appointed the first Musical Director of the newly formed Cleveland Institute of Music, a post he held until 1925. Following this he was director of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music until 1930.

In 1941, Bloch moved to the small coastal community of Agate Beach, Oregon and lived there the rest of his life. He died in 1959 in Portland, Oregon, of cancer at the age of 78. The Bloch Memorial has been moved from near his house in Agate Beach to a more prominent location at the Newport Performing Arts Center in Newport, Oregon.

Ernst Bloch (German pronunciation: [ˈɛʁnst ˈblɔx], July 8, 1885 – August 4, 1977) was a German Marxist philosopher.

Bloch was influenced by Hegel, Marx, and novelist Karl May. Counted also among his influences are apocalyptic and religious thinkers as diverse as gnostics like Valentinus (see "Spirit of Utopia") and Thomas Müntzer (see "Thomas Müntzer als Theologe der Revolution"). He established friendships with Georg Lukács, Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill, Walter Benjamin, and Theodor W. Adorno. Bloch's work focuses on the concept that in a humanistic world where oppression and exploitation have been eliminated there will always be a truly revolutionary force.

Bloch was born in Ludwigshafen, the son of a Jewish railway-employee. After studying philosophy, he married Else von Stritzky, daughter of a Baltic brewer in 1913, who died in 1921. His second marriage with Linda Oppenheimer lasted only a few years. His third wife was Karola Piotrowska, a Polish architect, whom he married in 1934 in Vienna. When the Nazis came to power, they had to flee, first into Switzerland, then to Austria, France, Czechoslovakia, and finally the USA. Bloch returned to the GDR in 1949 and obtained a chair in philosophy at Leipzig. When the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, he did not return to the GDR, but went to Tübingen in West Germany, where he received an honorary chair in Philosophy. He died in Tübingen.

Ernst Gossner is an Austrian film director, screenwriter and producer best known for writing and directing the 2007 film South of Pico.

Gossner grew up in Tirol and had his first stage appearance at the age of 15. After graduating from Business School in 1992, Gossner worked at various jobs before he turned to acting full time.

Within the next seven years Ernst appeared in many plays in Austria, Germany and Italy. He also wrote and directed several stage plays and made his short film debut FLUCHT. The film became an internet phenomenon and in 1999 Ernst was accepted to the Directing Program at the AFI Conservatory in Los Angeles. His AFI thesis film BAR TIME was one of only five AFI alumni films ever released on DVD by the American Film Institute.

After graduating from AFI Conservatory Ernst founded his Los Angeles based company Vent Productions. His first feature South of Pico (SOP), a character driven drama co-developed with his long-time collaborator Richard Marcus was shot in Los Angeles and premiered at the 2007 American Black Film Festival where it won all three awards it was nominated for. South of Pico went on to win seven international Awards in the U.S., Europe and China.