[1] Emmi Effenberger was born in Ruppersdorf, one of a cluster of villages subsumed into Reichenberg (as it was then known) in north Bohemia, at that time an ethnically and linguistically German region in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
He later became a founder member of the Czechoslovak Communist Party ("Komunistická strana Československa" / KSČ), which some suggest must later have been helpful to his daughter in her own political career.
[2] After successfully concluding her schooling she moved on to a Teacher Training College and then embarked on a teaching career in nearby Neustadt.
[1] Following frontier changes mandated at the Congress of Versailles the Austro-Hungarian Empire ceased to exist and Bohemia found itself part of the newly formed state of Czechoslovakia, although at this stage the area of North Bohemia where Effenberger liver remained ethnically and linguistically German.
In 1928 she took a job with the Central Committee of the Czechoslovak Communist Youth League ("Kommunistischen Jugendverbandes der Tschechoslowakei").
The Nazi take-over across the border in Germany at the start of 1933 had its knock-on effect in the German-speaking parts of Czechoslovakia, and Emmi Dölling was briefly arrested.
When they returned Emmi became a member of the national executive of the Democratic Women's League ("Demokratischer Frauenbund Deutschlands" / DFD).