Category Archives: Pre-World War II

The Polish Shirley Temple and her sister the poet

25 Wednesday May 2016

Posted by in Memory, Names, Poland, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Pre-World War II, World War II

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Elizabeth Bellak and my mother met in Poland, when Elizabeth was just a child and mama a teenager. Years later, they reconnected in New York and have been best friends and confidants ever since. Elizabeth, her husband George, and their children Andrew and Alexandra visited us on Long Island more often than our biological relatives did. In fact, I’ve grown up calling her my aunt.

Elizabeth is as outgoing as my mother is shy. She loves to socialize, to tell stories, even to sing and dance. She dresses elegantly in heels and designer clothes, her hair and make up always perfect. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her in pants.

But she and my mother share a deep fondness for each other. They also share a hidden Jewish heritage that they kept silent about until recently. Elizabeth was actually Ariana Spiegel, born in eastern Poland in what is now Ukraine. Her talent was recognized at a young age, when she appeared in films like Gehenna, and was called “the Polish Shirley Temple.”

Ariana as the Gypsy girl in Gehenna, 1938.
Review of Ariana Spigiel’s performance in Gehenna. She is called the “Polish Shirley Temple.” In Kurier Filmowy 1938, vol. 12, nr.27.
Ariana Spigiel

Her older sister Renia was equally talented, though as a writer and poet. Renia kept a diary for the last few years of her short life which has just been published along with her poetry (in Polish, though there are plans for it to be published in English as well).

I can’t wait to read it.

 

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Swimming in the Synagogue?

20 Sunday Mar 2016

Posted by in Commemoration, Jewish Culture, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Post-World War II, Poznan, Pre-World War II, Synagogues, World War II

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How, realistically, can Jewish heritage be preserved in Poland? Some projects are easy to get behind, like the lapidarium in Wronki. Others fall into more problematic ethical territory. The fact remains that there are many more sites in need of preservation than there are funds for such projects. And yet, I would argue that because of the magnitude of the destruction of Jewish life in Poland, every fragment has enhanced value.

The survival of a building as grand as the New Synagogue in Poznań is thus of particular worth. As with most remaining synagogues in Poland, the New Synagogue was not destroyed because it was repurposed. The Nazis converted the building into a swimming pool; after World War II, it remained a municipal pool until 2011. Although there has been ongoing public debate about more appropriate uses of the space, which at some point was passed back into the hands of the Jewish Community, the main reason the pool was finally closed was because of its deteriorating condition.

The New Synagogue was built in 1907 on Stawna Street between Wroniecka and Żydowska (Jewish) Street, just a few blocks from the central market square of the old city. Intended for Poznań’s wealthier Jewish citizens, the imposing structure had a seating capacity of 1200 and a large copper-covered cupola. Its size and grandeur is all the more striking, considering the Jewish population of the city was under 6000 when the synagogue was built, and further dwindled to perhaps 3000 right before World War II (statistics from Virtual Sztetl).

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Poznań’s New Synagogue in 1907 when it was first opened and in 2011, around the time the swimming pool closed (photos from: http://www.januszmarciniak.pl/synagogue)

As these photos show, the German occupiers also removed the cupola and other ornate features, leaving a far less elaborate structure. For several years, starting in 2004, artists like Janusz Marciniak were involved in installations and commemorative events that used the pool as a focal point. Some of these include Marciniak’s  Atlantis (2004),  Alphabet (2005), and 9/09/1939 (2006).

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Poznań’s New Synagogue in 1907 when it was first opened and in 2011, around the time the swimming pool closed (photos from: http://www.januszmarciniak.pl/synagogue)

The Jewish Community, together with others interested in preserving the New Synagogue, proposed restoring the building to its prewar shape and condition, and housing a Center for Dialog and Tolerance. Unfortunately, the plan failed to gain the institutional support and financial backing necessary for it to be realized.

But now there is a new plan in the works, to turn the synagogue into a hotel. In and of itself, that is not the worst outcome; investors will preserve and upgrade the structure, which will include a mini-museum with information about the building’s origins and the history of Poznań’s Jews. So while a museum, or memorial, or center for dialog and tolerance would be preferable, at least the synagogue won’t be torn down, as some city leaders suggested as recently as 2006.

Artist’s rendering of the proposed hotel project. The prewar copper-clad dome is reimagined in glass. Photo from article in Gazeta Wyborcza
Elements of the pool being disassembled. Photo by Łukasz Cynalewski

But putting another pool in the synagogue is, as my husband put it, kind of tone deaf. It’s insensitive to the cruel history of the place.

A recent article in Gazeta Wyborcza about the planned hotel begins with the following fable:

(my translation) “Summer 2020. Early morning at the hotel on Wroniecki Street at the corner of Stawna Street. In a luxury room in the former Jewish synagogue Alessandro Gianini, a tourist from Rome, wakes up. He flew into Poznan the night before and stayed in the modern hotel with intriguing architecture. In the guidebook, he read that the glass copula of the building recreates the old outline of an imposing synagogue. Now he wants to look around the city.

“But before Alessandro sets out for the Old Market Square, he goes down to the second floor for a swim in the hotel pool. The swim helps to relax and awaken him. He changes, and full of life goes down to the ground floor to the restaurant. After a light breakfast and a cappuccino, he heads to the exit. In the hall, however, he sees an open door to a small space. A sign in English hangs on it: “Museum of the Jews of Wielkopolski.”

“Intrigued, Gianini looks inside. He sees large boards–reproductions of sepia-colored photographs. On the first of these–a long swimming pool under a high vaulted ceiling. On the wall of the pool–a fascist eagle.

“Surprised, the Italian looks at the caption below the photo: “In 1940 Nazi occupiers profaned the synagogue, removing the Star of David from it and building a pool inside of it.

“Alessandro suddenly feels ashamed. Because of his morning swim in the place where 80 years earlier Nazis showed complete contempt for the feelings and religion of Jews, and then sentenced them to a horrible death. He is ashamed and embarrassed. And more than anything surprised that history could be repeated in this cruelly perverse way…”

(the original Polish is in the article)

I don’t know anything more about these plans, except for rumors I heard while I was in Poznań last year, and the contents of this article. Perhaps if they do include a pool, it will be located in some new addition to the structure, in a less offensive place than the main sanctuary. I certainly hope so.

Memory in Fragments: the talk at UA

31 Thursday Dec 2015

Posted by in Brześć Kujawski, Buk, Cemeteries, Family, Heritage work, Israel, Jewish Culture, Lutowiska, Memory, Poland, Polish Culture, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Polish-Jewish relations, Post-World War II, Poznan, Pre-World War II, Research Methodology, Skierniewice, Synagogues, World War II, Wronki, Włocławek

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The lecture I gave at UA September 3, 2015 about my research during my Fulbright Fellowship is now available on vimeo. I’ve never seen myself lecture before. It’s a little unsettling. Still, here it is, flaws and all (for instance I know that Poland entered the European Union in 2004, even though I misspoke here).

I talk a little about the Fulbright Program–the kinds of grants available and some tips for applying.

It’s also a good introduction to my ideas about reassembling Jewish life: the strands that I’m following, what has been lost, what can be recovered, and how memory projects at sites throughout Poland intertwine with my own search for my family history. I hear echoes of some of the scholars I’ve read–Iwona Irwin Zarecka and Marianne Hirsch, as well as my sometime collaborator Malgosia Wosińska. There is no way to bring back what has been lost, but fragments of the past can be reassembled to form a new kind of life that allows for connection with what used to be and what yet might be.

Guide to the United States for the Jewish Immigrant

19 Saturday Dec 2015

Posted by in Archives, Jewish immigrants, Pre-World War II

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Here’s something a friend uncovered: Guide to the United States for the Jewish Immigrant, published in 1916.

Besides providing helpful information about transportation options in the US, the benefits of farming as a profession, and how to become a citizen, it includes legal advice; bigamy, spitting in public, and beating or shaking a rug are illegal. The second of these, spitting, is also disgusting.

It advises, “The Jew, like any other foreigner, is appreciated when he lives the American social life. Until then he counts for nothing.” Though it also urges, “Be proud of your race, your birth and your family, a Jew is all the better an American for being a good Jew.”

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Title page of Guide to the United States for the Jewish Immigrant (1916)

Available at archive.org.

Tracking Down Jewish Radymno

13 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in Cemeteries, Jewish Culture, Memory, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Polish-Jewish relations, Post-World War II, Pre-World War II, Radymno, Synagogues, World War II

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Although I knew the former synagogue still stands in Radymno, had to look several times before I actually found it. I’ve visited for years, and yet my friends never even told me the town had a prewar Jewish population. But until June, I never thought to ask them about it, either.

When I finally did ask, my friend couldn’t tell me much. She repeated a common refrain, especially in southeastern Poland: Jews used to say “nasze kamienicy, wasze ulicy” [“our buildings, your streets”]. It’s not clear that any Jews ever actually said this, but nevertheless, this is often what is remembered about them—Poles may have been the majority but Jews were richer. It’s a telling way of marking the distinction between Poles and Jews. Rather than all residents being regarded as Poles of various religions, Jews remained separate. Moreover Jews are remembered as being complicit in asserting their difference, and indeed their superiority. My friend didn’t mean it this way, but I’ve commonly heard this expression deployed as a justification for why Poles didn’t like Jews. Not only were Jews the property owners, they rubbed it in.

Jewish property ownership poses different challenges today. Some current residents fear prewar owners will return to claim what was theirs. My friend told me about two men who came to Radymno a few years ago and looked at some buildings that had once belonged to Jews. She also described a building in the center of town that is falling apart, but nothing can be done about it. It can’t be torn down because it is a historic structure, but no one will invest in its renovation for fear they will lose possession of it if the owner comes back. She also mentioned another property, a plot of land surrounded by fields whose last owners were Jews. The town hasn’t pursued a clarification of ownership because it isn’t worth enough to hire a lawyer and try and collect the few zloties of tax owed on it each year. So it just stands fallow. I suggested the owner is probably dead. She said of course, it’s been so many years. I clarified there probably aren’t even any descendants, and she responded “of course, because of what happened to Jews.” She didn’t elaborate, nor did she use the words Holocaust, murder, or genocide.

My friend’s mother-in-law had heard her mother’s stories about Jews. She grew up right next door to where they live now. Still, when we asked her about it, she responded she doesn’t know much. She was too young, and her mother didn’t tell her much. She remembers her mother complaining about the sound of the calves at the slaughterhouse across the fields. Kosher law demanded that they be killed with a single knife stroke, and with an empty stomach. Her mother could hear the calves crying in hunger as they awaited slaughter. There still is a slaughterhouse in the same spot, but it has been rebuilt and expanded. At first, my friend’s mother said it used to be owned by Jews, but then she said she wasn’t sure. Jews definitely used it, even if they weren’t the owners.

Her father opened a grocery store in Jarosław, a nearby town. All his neighbors were Jewish shopkeepers. He had to give up the business after a year and a half because they lowered their prices to the point that he could not compete.

Her mother also told her how all the Jews were collected by the Germans and taken to the cemetery where they were shot. She mourned the loss of two young pretty Jewesses, whom she knew because they did seamstress work together.

My friend’s mother-in-law said some Jews and Poles się przyjaźnili [were friendly with each other]. They lived side by side.

She also recalled where the Jewish cemetery was, not far from the water treatment plant.

My friend drove me down a dirt road past the plant, but there was no cemetery. When the road narrowed to two wheel tracks in tall grass, we turned around. My friend pointed to a stand of trees in the distance, saying she thought the cemetery was there. She tried to find someone at the water treatment plant but no one responded. From there, she stopped at a store, but chanced on a man who lives in a nearby city.  The young men working at the car wash knew nothing about the cemetery, either. She finally found an older woman who pointed to a different, less traveled dirt road. We drove up it, but it didn’t get us to that stand of trees. My friend kept looking for a road leading in that direction. I can’t help wondering if maybe at some point in the past she hd been told the cemetery was there.

We drove past the slaughterhouse her mother-in-law had mentioned. It’s a big operation, rebuilt and expanded since the war. The building closer to the road, essentially a box shape, is probably the oldest.

From there, we took a back road up the hill into town and I finally got to see the former synagogue. It is now a beverage wholesaler. My friend’s uncle lives next door. I took some photos while she went to ask him if he knew where the cemetery might be.

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The Radymno synagogue now houses a beverage wholesaler.

The front of the synagogue is an imposing two-story square façade that has been renovated, leaving no clear elements of synagogue architecture. From the back, though, the bricked-in semicircular tops of the former synagogue windows are visible. Through windows, you can also see staircases on either side that used to go to the “babiniec,” the upstairs balcony for women. My friend’s uncle used this term when he described it to us, so clearly he knows a bit about the building’s former life as a synagogue. He said nothing has been added to the building. It still has the same footprint, and it stands at its original height. I asked him how he knows, and he simply responded, “after all, I live next door.”

The synagogue from the back
Brick arches used to be the tops of the synagogue windows.

My friend’s uncle also knew how to get to the cemetery. He said he last went there over 30 years ago. As a high school student and a young man, he and his friends used to go there sometimes to have fun (in other words to drink). He remembers some tombstones were still standing, though many others had been brought to the river where people would wash their clothes on them. The writing was still visible on them, but later, the stones fell apart. Today there is nothing left.

Looking back toward Radymno from the cornfield beside the Jewish cemetery
The overgrown site of the Radymno Jewish cemetery.

He took us past the slaughterhouse and up a different dirt road. It petered out in a cornfield, right beside the stand of overgrowth and trees that Jasia had kept pointing toward. Still, we still couldn’t reach it because of a deep gully that separated it from the cornfield. Besides, the overgrowth would not have been penetrable without proper footwear, pants, and probably a machete. I suggested returning in the winter might be best.

At least I know the site to return to.

Grassroots heritage work in Bieszczady

21 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by in Cemeteries, Dukla, Heritage work, Lesko, Nazi Camps, Polish-Jewish relations, Pre-World War II, Sanok, Synagogues, World War II, Zasław

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There is a pattern in the frequency (or rareness) of my posts. When I’m focused on other writing projects, I also write more for the blog. When I’m traveling, interviewing, and attending events, I write less. This month I’ve been traveling.

It seemed important to bring my new research focus to my old fieldsite, and see what is happening in relation to Jewish culture and history in the Bieszczady Mountain region.

The Lesko synagogue. Destroyed in World War II, it was rebuilt in the 1960s.

The Lesko synagogue. Destroyed in World War II, it was rebuilt in the 1960s.

I’ve written elsewhere about how striking it is that, despite the fact that before World War II more Jews lived in Lesko than Poles, only very rarely have contemporary residents volunteered any information about the former Jewish residents. Even though I walked by the former synagogue (bigger than the Catholic Church) and the massive Jewish cemetery countless times, it really only sunk in to me last November that Lesko was a sztetl. One of my friends in Lesko described it really clearly. She said that somehow she always knew that the Jewish history of the town was something that you don’t talk about. It was a taboo topic. This has only recently started to change. Only in the past few years has she noticed that people talk about Jewish culture and history openly. She thinks this is a good thing. Realizing how little she knows about the subject, she has started to educate herself about prewar Jewish life and the Holocaust in Bieszczady.

Interior of the Lesko Synagogue. Now owned by the town, it functions as a gallery of regional art.

Interior of the Lesko Synagogue. Now owned by the town, it functions as a gallery of regional art.

Generally, I have found that when I ask, most people have a story or two to tell about Jews in Bieszczady, either something they have read or a some fragmentary memory their grandmother told them. Though also when I told one friend about my interest in Jewish culture and history, she responded, “There were Jews in Bieszczady?” Even though she went to high school in Lesko, she only vaguely remembered the Jewish cemetery and had no recollection of the synagogue. Whether she really didn’t know or just continues to think this is a topic that polite people don’t talk about, I’m not sure.

Nevertheless, some important grass roots work is being done: by Arkadiusz (Arek) Komski in Sanok, Ewa Bryła and her brother Piotr in Zagórz, and Jacek Koszczan in Dukla. Arek is working on a dissertation about the Jews of Sanok. We met at the Słotki Domek Cafe in Lesko after he finished work, and then the next day he showed me the places associated with Jewish life in Sanok.

One of the former synagogues in Sanok

One of the former synagogues in Sanok

Commemorative marker, Sanok

Commemorative marker, Sanok

His interest in the topic originated with a curiosity about history, and particularly the history of his hometown. He has published articles about the Nazi work camp in neighboring Zasław and about the locks that were found at the Jewish cemetery. Last year, he realized a project to place a commemorative marker across the street from the former site of the great synagogue.

Arek also let me know that he was awaiting the arrival of a group of students from Dartmouth College, led by Rabbi Edward Boraz, who were going to clean up and inventory the tombstones in the Jewish cemetery in Lesko (see Project Preservation). He has helped them already, first when they came to the cemetery in Sanok, then to Ustrzyki Dolne, Korczyna, and last year to Lutowiska.

Through Arek, I met Ewa, who helped found the Stowarzyszenie Dziedzictwo Mniejszości Karpackich (Association for the Heritage of Carpathian Minorities). Arek joked that for Ewa, working on heritage preservation is a full time hobby. Her interest emerged out of her own Bojko/Ukrainian roots; her parents and grandparents spoke Ukrainian among themselves, though they only spoke Polish with her and her brother. To date, the association has helped clean up as many as thirty Uniate (Ukrainian) and Jewish cemeteries in the region.

Information about the prison camp and murder of Bieszczady Jews in Zasław, near Zagórz

Information about the prison camp and murder of Bieszczady Jews in Zasław, near Zagórz

Another of the association’s projects is a heritage trail and information sign at the site of the Nazi work camp in Zasław. This is where most Jews from Lesko and neighboring communities were taken and forced to work at a neighboring factory. Approximately 10,000 prisoners were shot on the site, while perhaps 5,000 were sent to extermination camps at Belżec and Sobibor.

Monument at the site of mass murders in Zasław, near Zagórz

Monument at the site of mass murders in Zasław, near Zagórz

I stopped by Dukla on my way back to Krakow, and despite the rain Jacek and Ania, who works at the local tourist office, showed me around. Jacek had already started collecting Judaica around the time of his retirement from the border patrol. An infectiously upbeat and energetic man, he needed something to occupy himself and so decided to get to work protecting and publicizing the sites associated with Dukla’s prewar Jewish population. He told me that the town was as much as 80% Jewish. We walked by the former Jewish school, where boys learned various trades. It is across the street from the old government building; Jacek says that the associate mayor used to be selected from among the Jewish population. Similarly, most of the stone buildings around the market square (rynek) were owned by Jews. Jacek told me the fate of the last rabbi who hid under his rynek home, but then was caught and killed by the Nazis when he tried to escape to Krosno.

Writing still visible on the wall of the ruined synagogue in Dukla

Writing still visible on the wall of the ruined synagogue in Dukla

Ruin of the 18th century synagogue in Dukla

Ruin of the 18th century synagogue in Dukla

 

Former synagogue, now a grocery store in Dukla

Former synagogue, now a grocery store in Dukla

Two synagogues stood side by side. The one dating from the 18th century was burned by the Nazis with Jewish residents inside. The neighboring mykwa was also destroyed. Jacek would like to see the remains of this synagogue conserved. All it would take is reinforcing the window arches and putting in a platform on the inside for viewers to walk on; right now a chain link fence surrounds the site. The other synagogue, dating from the late 19th century, is now a grocery store. Dukla also has two Jewish cemeteries, the older one with burials up to World War I, and the newer one beside it used during the interwar period. Jacek mows them himself.

Jacek also coordinated the construction of a monument near the entrance of the old cemetery recognizing the 70th anniversary of the murder of Dukla’s Jewish population. Funders include the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage (FODŻ) and descendants of former Jewish residents. While there have been many contributors to these various projects, Jacek is clearly the energy behind them, insuring that they are realized, and doing much of the physical labor himself.

Jacek reading a tombstone in the new Jewish cemetery, Dukla

Jacek reading a tombstone in the new Jewish cemetery, Dukla

Remembering the murder of Dukla's Jews

Remembering the murder of Dukla’s Jews

In each of these cases, someone (or several people) from the local community has taken the initiative to insure that Jewish culture and history is brought back into the public landscape. They are not Jewish themselves, but something compels them to remember, and to teach others about the former residents of their towns.

The Piwko Saga, Vital Records Version

10 Tuesday Mar 2015

Posted by in Archives, Brześć Kujawski, Family, Names, Piwko, Pre-World War II, Skierniewice, Sobota, Włocławek, Żychlin

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I’ve found records connecting my great grandparents’ lives to five different towns in central Poland.

Hiel Mayer Piwko's birth certificate, 1854

Hiel Mayer Piwko’s birth certificate, 1854

A birth certificate in the Łódź archive states that Josek Piwko, a thirty-year-old tanner appeared with two witnesses to report that his wife Cywia nee Raych, age 26, gave birth to a son Hil Majer on October 26/ November 7, 1854[1] at eight in the evening in the city of Skierniewice.

Żychlin book of residents, Walfisz family first half. Hinda, third from the top, was crossed out when she married and moved to Skierniewice.

Żychlin book of residents, Walfisz family first half. Hinda, third from the top, was crossed out when she married and moved to Skierniewice.

In the Kutno archive, the book of Żychlin residents includes Hinda Walfisz, born August 14, 1854 (making her two months older than her future husband). Others in the household include her parents and two younger sisters. Her father Nusen was born June 14, 1817 in Wyszogród. His profession is listed as belfer, (According to JewishGen this means an assistant melamed in cheder [religious teacher]). His parents were Jamoch and Hinda nee Pigel. Her mother Pesa was born February 5, 1831 in Żychlin to Dawid Losman and Tema nee Majerek. The two other girls were Tema, born March 28, 1858 and Łaja, born May 2, 1861.

Żychlin Book of Residents, Walfisz family second half.

Żychlin Book of Residents, Walfisz family second half.

Hinda’s name is crossed out and a note is added on June 22, 1873 that she moved to Skierniwice to live with her husband Hil Majer Piwko. Hinda’s sister Tema eventually married Hil Majer’s younger brother Jankel Wolf, from whom the Zurich Piwkos descended.

The next document, found in the Łowicz archive, is the marriage certificate of Hil and Hinda’s oldest daughter, Liba Cywja, and Jankel Winawer in 1891. She was 18 and he was 20. His family was from Warsaw, while her family was living in Sobota, a village outside of Łowicz and not far from Żychlin. So at some point, Hil and Hinda moved from Skierniewice to Sobota. I wonder why? I’m told it was common to move from smaller to larger settlements, so why move from a town to a village?

Liba Piwko and Jankel Winawer's marriage record, 1891

Liba Piwko and Jankel Winawer’s marriage record, 1891

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By 1901, when a son, Abram Janas (born in 1877) married Blima Kolska, the Piwko family was listed as living in Brześć Kujawski. Abram and Blima were married in Blima’s hometown of Kłodawa. I found this marriage certificate online; the Poznań archive has digitized these records.

Abram Piwko and Blima Kolska married in Kłodawa in 1901

Abram Piwko and Blima Kolska married in Kłodawa in 1901

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In the Włocławek archive, I found the Piwkos in the book of residents of Brześć Kujawski. This is my Holy Grail—the thing I’ve been looking for—a document that includes my grandmother. My guide for the day, Tomasz Kawski, a historian who has written about Jews of the area, said, “It’s a miracle [cuda]” I found it. I agree.

Piwkos in the Brześć Kujawski Book of Residents

Piwkos in the Brześć Kujawski Book of Residents

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The document lists Hil Majer, son of Icek and Cywja nee Rajch, born October 26/ November 7, 1854 in Skierniewice, married, townsman, Jewish faith, trader (handlarz), and Hinda Piwko nee Wolfisz, daughter of Nusen and Pesa nee Losman, born August 2/14, 1854 in Żychlin, married, townswoman, Jewish faith, [supported] by her husband. In addition, five daughters are listed: Liba Cywja (b. January 27/February 2, 1874), Ryfka (b. December 20, 1884/ January1, 1885), Hana (b. October 11/23, 1886), Małka (b. December 10, 1895), and Haja (b. January 21/ February 2, 1894). Haja is Halina, my babcia. So I finally know her Jewish name.

The document confirms several details that have been passed down in the family; it also raises new questions:

  • All the sisters are listed as having been born in Żychlin. Perhaps Hinda returned to her native home to give birth? Or maybe it was just customary to list girls as being born in their mother’s hometown?
  • There is a note from July 16, 1906 that Ryfka (called Regina on Pat and Pini’s family trees) married Pinkus Kolski and moved to Piątek. The dates don’t correspond exactly to information from other sources which say Pinkus and Ryfka had a son Natan already in 1905. It might just be that the note was added a while after the wedding. Still, why then wasn’t it also noted that Ryfka died giving birth?
  • According to another note on the page, Małka died in Włocławek on June 7/20, 1912. This fits the story Mom told me about Babcia’s younger sister who committed suicide at age 17. No one knew why, but they suspected it was related to unhappiness in love. My mom was fascinated with her story. Maybe it is because she was named after her (the Christianized family tree lists Małka as Maria Renata). Maybe it is because of my mom’s interest in psychology. She wondered what would have compelled Małka to take her own life. Was her love unrequited? Did her father forbid it? Mom told me that Małka was beautiful, with dark hair and a dark complexion unlike the other girls in the family who were fair. In 2011, when I found Babcia’s family photos in the envelope labeled “Do Not Open,” and showed them to Mama, one of the few ones she recognized was Małka’s (though of course mom called her Maria).
  • Hana is my auntie Nunia. The document confirms her birth name and birth year, but the birthdate is different—her US records list her birthday as July 21. Similarly, my grandmother’s birthday is different on her US records—July 16. They also changed her birth years, claiming to be four years younger than they actually were, but this was a known secret in the family.

It is not clear from this document when the family moved to Brześć Kujawski. A note by the first three names states they were registered as residents of Skierniewice; it’s dated April 3, 1903. So where were they living at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries? In Skierniewice, Sobota, or Brześć Kujawski? Or could they have been in Włocławek already? Hil Majer is on the Włocławek voters list in 1907, and his obituary says he died there in 1929. Aunt Pat lists Hinda’s place of death as Włocławek in 1933. All these places are within one hundred miles of each other, more or less in a line headed northwest from Warsaw.

And why aren’t some of the other siblings listed? Jakób, the oldest boy may well have been living on his own already. But what about Sarah who supposedly married Saul Winawer in Brześć Kujawski in 1899? Or Efraim (who changed his name to Philip in the US) who was two years younger than Sarah? Why is there no mention of Rachel? She was born around 1890, between Hana and Haja who are listed. Rachel married Pinchas Kolski after the death of her sister Ryfka, so she should still have been living at home when this record was made. Conversely, why is Liba listed as single and living with her parents? Wasn’t she with her husband, Jankel (Jakub) Winawer, whom she married in 1891 in Sobota?

Of course, I wonder about the records I can’t find. The vital records for Jews of Żychlin and Brześć Kujawski no longer exist. My new Holy Grail would be to find Babcia’s marriage certificates and the birth certificates of my mom and her brothers. Vital records are made public only after 100 years, so some of these might be available through the Civil Registration Office (Urząd Stanu Cywilnego). But do they even exist? Were they destroyed by war, or somehow expunged when Babcia broke ties with her old (Jewish) life and took on her new Christian identity?

[1] According to JewishGen, when two dates appear on vital records, the first refers to the Julian calendar used by the Russians while the second refers to the Gregorian calendar, used in most of Europe.

Three Minutes in Poland

17 Saturday Jan 2015

Posted by in Jewish Culture, Memory, Pre-World War II, Research Methodology

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Glenn Kurtz’s book Three Minutes in Poland: Discovering a Lost World in a 1938 Family Film (2014) recounts a project similar to my own, of piecing together fragments. Kurtz’s journey began with a film recorded during his grandparent’s visit to his grandfather’s native town in Poland. Seeing the places and faces on film inspired him to learn all he could about the town and its prewar inhabitants—what life was like in Nasielsk, how it was disrupted by World War II, the fate of those who perished, and what became of those who survived. It’s a fascinating story of discovery, tacking between information revealed in archival records and the stories recounted by survivors and their families. He makes use of the same archival resources I’ve been using—JewishGen, Ancestry.com, Yad Vashem, Warsaw Database, ship manifests of passengers, archival photographs. And extraordinarily, out of these fragments, he was able to find some of the people in the three-minute film, or find people who remembered them and could tell some of their story.

These stories bring the fragments, and the town, back alive. Still partial, still shadowy, but alive. I see this particularly in the words of Morry Chandler (Moszek Tuchendler), whom Kurtz found in Florida with his wife, children, and grandchildren. He appears momentarily in Kurtz’s grandfather’s film jumping out and smiling in front of the camera. For Morry, looking at himself and his town on film, and recalling the people he lived with in Nasielsk reminded him he ever had a childhood, and that he was happy:

It’s looking back and saying, Yes, there was a world. Other than what we have lived all these years, knowing what happened. It was a real world there. I mean people were going about their business. Kids were running, and doing all the things that kids do. And here I look at myself, and I see it was a happy face.

The book models two guidelines for my fieldwork: first, how to weave together fragments into a coherent story, integrating as well the gaps and inconsistencies that remain. Information is labeled along a scale of likelihood; the probable, the possible, and the still unknown outnumber what can be unambiguously confirmed. The book also provides a model for working with personal accounts. It corroborates Greenspan’s argument for ongoing contact with survivors, which provides the space for new stories to be recounted, for the revision or elaboration of past accounts, and for interviewers to ask questions that lead to new explanations and deeper insight into survivors’ experiences. (See Henry Greenspan’s “The Unsaid, the Incommunicable, the Unbearable, and the Irretrievable,” Oral History Review 2014, Vol 41, No. 2, pp. 229–243).

Kurtz writes, “Memories, like artifacts, are tightly wound bundles of information. Pull one thread, try to identify one figure, and the whole bundle unfurls.”