Who She Was: My Search for My Mother’s Life, by Samuel Freedman 2005

"A son’s story, a Jewish story, an American story." from a review in Kirkus Reviews

The journalist Samuel Freedman (b. 1955) lost his mother to breast cancer when she was 50 during his sophomore year of college. He felt he never knew her very well, preoccupied as he was, first with his life as a teenager, then as a college student in Wisconsin, quite a distance from his home in New Jersey. He decided to do the research and write this memoir in an attempt to better understand her, by conducting extensive interviews with friends and family and by investigating other sources like letters, diaries, photos, and newspapers.

Through his research he recreates the Bronx of his mother’s youth, early adulthood, and young married life. He explores her home life, her Morris High School experiences, her work life and her social life. His skills as a journalist help him to place her life in historical context. He fleshes out the Jewish immigrant experience in the Bronx with the attendant tension between the immigrant parents and their American children. And he explores the social and economic impact of the Depression, World War II, and the post-war preoccupation with Communists in America. He also discusses what the cultural expectations were for a woman in his mother’s time and how those often unspoken restrictions played out in her life.

One of the most significant threads Freedman explores is the antagonistic relationship that existed between his mother and her mother which stemmed mostly from his grandmother’s insistence on the importance of living a traditional Jewish life. The author’s mother, a very bright student, spent much of her energy in rebellion. It is not surprising that the author, having delved as deeply as he could into their relationship and the circumstances surrounding it, develops a more nuanced understanding of both his mother and his grandmother.

But finally the author realizes that, despite having done a yeoman's job of recreating the past and having learned a great deal about his mother, he can never really know her completely. The fuller picture can never bring her to life, it can never completely fill the emotional gap created by her early death and his early loss.

To read an excerpt from this memoir, click here.
To read an article about the history of Jews in the Bronx, click here.

People
Author's mother's father's family
Sarah Hatkin
    Samuel Hatkin – son of Sarah
    Sol Hatkin – son of Sarah; married Rachel (Rose) Markiewicz
        Eleanor Hatkin – daughter of Sol and Rose; married Leonard Benjamin Schulman; second marriage to David Freedman
               Samuel Freedman - son of Eleanor and David; married Cynthia Sheps
                        Aaron and Sarah Freedman - children of Samuel and Cynthia
        Fannie Hatkin – daughter of Sol and Rose; married Danny Schlomkowitz (Stevens)
              Joel Schlomkowitz (Stevens) – son of Danny and Fannie
    Seymour Hatkin – son of Sol and Rose; married Evelyn
    Jacob Hatkin – son of Sarah; married Rachel Gartenberg, cousin of Rachel Markiewicz
    David Hatkin – son of Sarah

Mildred Schlomkowitz – sister to Danny (see above)
Jack and Hilda Schulman
     Leonard Schulman - son of Jack and Hilda (see above)
    Alan Schulman – son of Jack and Hilda
Leonard Hatkin – cousin of Eleanor; exact relationship unclear; married Thelma
Harry Schneer – cousin of Sol Hatkin; relationship unclear
Elaine Sheps - mother of Cynthia (see above)


Author's mother's mother's family
Yehuda Ariyeh Markiewicz – father of Rachel Markiewicz
 Rachel (Rose) Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh; married Sol Hatkin (see above)
 Ester Dina Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh; married Alter David Kaczkowicz
      Judis Kaczkowicz – daughter of Esther Dina and Alter David; married Jaime Prusky
      Julius Kaczkowicz– son of Ester Dina and Alter David; married Rebeca Kaganas
 Menuchi Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh
 Avram Markiewicz – son of Yehuda Ariyeh
 Shifra Markiewicz – daughter of Yehuda Ariyeh

Shai Gartenberg – uncle of Rose Markiewicz – exact relationship not clear
Minnie and Morris Osder – Minnie is a cousin of Rose Markiewicz – exact relationship unclear
Rebeca and Guillermo Bronstein - relatives in Uruguay - exact relationship unclear
Dina Berlinblau - relative in Uruguay - exact relationship unclear
Pinhas Kaczkowicz – cousin of David Kaczkowicz (married to Ester Dina Markiewicz – see above)

Author's father's family
Samuel and Rose Freedman
    Ziggy Freedman – son of Samuel and Rose
    Clara Freedman – daughter of Samuel and Rose
    David Freedman – son of Samuel and Rose; married Eleanor Hatkin Schulman (see above)

Friends and Acquaintances
Regina and Monikou  Adler – sisters
Clare Abramowitz – married Hy Dickman
Leon Becker
Vicky Behar – married Dave Fried
Artie Bernfeld
Ralph Betstadt – married Lillian Golden
Miriam Beyman
Shirley Binenstock
Bruno (Bernie) Brenner – brother of Ignaz
Ignaz (Irving) Brenner – brother of Bruno; married Fannie Povodator
Florence Brodsky
Harry Ceitlin
Maxwell Cohen
Sid Cozin
Bern Dibner
Bernie Dunetz – married Anita Rosenhoch
 Sandy Dunetz – child of Bernie and Anita
Stanley Feldman – brother-in-law of Herman Keltz
Jerry Ferber
Bea Flesichman
Artie Fluger
Stanley Frank
Rudy Friedlander
Lou and Murray Glass – brothers; cousins of Vicky Behar
Al Glazer
Sol and Sidney Goldfarb – brothers
Mel Goodman
Howard Gropper
Dick Gumerov
Florence Herzog
Marion Herzog – daughter of Florence; married Saul Maidens
Max Kagan
Herman David Keltz
Mildred Keltz – sister of Herman
Rose Klekman
Hy Kraft
Abe Kronenfeld
Ruth Liebowitz
Morris Laitman
Joe Lempert
Leon Mandelbaum
Ted Millon
Bernie Murowitz
Harriss Pacter
Bernard Pacter – son of Harriss
Noach Pacter – brother to Harriss; married to Fannie
Sam Pacter – son of Noach and Fannie
  Ruth Pacter – daughter of Noach and Fannie; married Al Taylor
Estelle Pacter – daughter of Noach and Fannie
Simmy Plansky
Buddy Rashbaum
Neil Rosenberg
Bill Rosenhoch – sister of Anita; married Naomi Gruder
Pauline Rubenstein
Selma Rubenstein – daughter of Pauline
Hilda Saltzman Wachtenheim
George Slayton – cousin of Claire Abromowitz
Bernie Solomon
Jack Steinglass
Flo Zipkin

Places
Kolno, Poland
Bialystok, Poland
Morrisania, The Bronx, New York
Morris High School, The Bronx, New York
Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York
Montevideo, Uruguay
Stelton, New Jersey
Highland Park, New Jersey

Red Brick, Black Mountain, White Clay: Reflections on Art, Family and Survival by Chrisopher Benfey, 2012

"The later pages of the book’s first section trace the Jewish thread of family history; the meditative aspect of Benfey’s journey sends off 'if only' reverberations, suggestions of identity compromised and spiritual treasure lost."  from a review by Philip K. Jason posted on the blog of the Jewish Book Council

This memoir has a global reach. The author, a professor of English literature, a writer and a critic, is the son of a father who was a German Jewish refugee who was born in Berlin and a Quaker mother born in America.

The author’s father, O. Theodor Benfey, the son of a prominent judge, married Lotte Fleischmann, a daughter in the Ullstein family, the founders of a large European publishing house. Both sides of the author’s assimilated German Jewish family converted to Lutheranism.  They felt that they were German to the core, but they soon learned that Hitler felt otherwise. In 1933 the Nazis seized the Ullstein family’s publishing company. Fearing for their ten-year-old son's future, in 1936 Otto Theodor’s parents sent him to England to live with family friends.

Several years later O. Theodor Benfey's parents also fled to England and then to the U.S. where Lotte’s sister Anni, a textile artist married to the artist Josef Albers, had already fled. They had left after the Nazis closed the Bauhaus in Berlin where Anni and Josef Albers had worked.

Tracing his father’s family involved actual and virtual travel to Germany, England, and Mexico. Although this memoir spends more time on his mother’s Quaker roots than his father’s German-Jewish roots, the chapters dedicated to his father  and his family are quite interesting. Especially engrossing is the investigation into the Jewish origins of the Benfey name.

To read an article about anti-Jewish legislation in pre-war Germany, click here.

Family
Author’s father’s paternal family
Eduard Benfey – married to Lotte Fleischmann
    Renate Benfey Wilkins – daughter of Eduard and Lotte
    Otto Theodor Benfey – son of Eduard and Lotte; married to Rachel Thomas
         Stephen Benfey – son of Otto Theodor and Rachel
         Christoper Benfey – son of Otto Theodor and Rachel; married to Mickey Rathbun; author
               Tommy and Nicholas Benfey – sons of Christopher
         Philip Benfey – son of Otto Theodor and Rachel
         Karen Benfey Boyd – daughter of Otto Theodor and Rachel
    Arnold Benfey  - brother of Eduard
    Ernst Benfey  - brother of Eduard

Feistel Dotteres (Philipp Theodorus) - early Benfey ancestor
    Isaak Philipp Benfey  - son of Feistel
         Simline Benfey – daughter of Isaak
         Theodor Benfey – son of Isaak; author’s father’s great-granduncle
                 Meta Benfey – daughter of Theodor
         Philip Benfey – son of Isaak
Bruno Benfey – relative; connection unclear

Author’s father’s maternal family
Siegfried Fleischmann – married Toni Ullstein
     Anni Fleischmann – married Josef Albers
     Lotte Fleischmann – daughter of Siegfried and Toni; married Eduard Benfey (see above)
Hanz, Louis, Franz, Rudolf, and Hermann Ullstein – brothers of Toni (see above)

Acquaintances
Walter Benjamin
Heinrich Heine
Gerald and Babs Mendl
    Wolfgang Mendl – son of Gerald and Babs
Karen Karnes – married David Weinrib – Jo Anne (his second wife)

Places
Richmond, Indiana
Greensboro, North Carolina
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Berlin, Germany
Watford, England
Black Mountain College, North Carolina
Richmond, Indiana

Europa, Europa by Solomon Perel, published in English in 1997

 "Perel's continuing struggle with identity was indirectly reflected in the various titles of his memoirs, which have been published in French, German and ... Hebrew." from an article written by Daniel Williams in the Los Angeles Times 3/30/92

Solomon Perel, born in Germany in 1925 to a Russian-Jewish family who settled in Pleine, Germany after the Russian revolution, has a powerful story to tell about his experience masquerading as a young German, hiding in their very midst. In 1935 when he was ten, his family fled to Lodz in Poland, expecting that they would be safer there than in Hitler’s Germany. The author, a very good student, learned Polish quickly and settled into life in Poland only to be uprooted again when Hitler invaded Poland in September of 1939.

His parents, fearing for the safety of their children, urged Solomon to cross the border into the Soviet Union with his brother Isaac. The two brothers soon become separated and here begins a tale that reveals the deep determination of the author to survive. He tells his tale in order to describe the incredible stress he endured and to dramatize his responses to events that threatened his survival. He is not trying to portray himself as heroic. He is trying to plumb the depths of his psyche and explain as best he can to himself and to his readers how he could assume a German identity complete with a name and a background he invented and maintain it until the war was over. He became two separate people – Solly inside, and Jupp on the outside.

His fears were many. For example, he did not have papers identifying him as German (he told the Germans they were destroyed in a bombing), he had to keep his background story straight every time he told it, he was afraid he’d be identified as being a Jew if someone saw that he was circumcised, and he had to learn not to react “inappropriately” when being subjected to Nazi propaganda  which was a constant condition of his life.

But he was smart and he was lucky. The fact that he was alone and spoke German made it possible to pose as a non-Jewish orphaned German. He put his ability to speak Russian to good use by acting as a translator for the Germans as they interviewed wounded Russian soldiers. Because his intelligence impressed the Nazis, tthey sent him to Germany where he was enrolled in an elite Hitler Youth school where he was fed, clothed and safe. And his feigned enthusiasm also helped in his interactions with various Germans and Nazi officials.

When the war was over and he was on his own again, having inhabited the psyche for three years of a young German being groomed for an elite position in the Nazi power structure, it was difficult for him to feel free and to tell anyone that he was a Jew. When he finally felt liberated enough to live outwardly as a Jew, having seen and heard about the suffering of concentration camp survivors, it was then difficult for him to claim to be a survivor.

To see the trailer for the award-winning movie made based on Perel's memoir, click here.
To read an interview with the author in the New York Times, click here.

People
Eliahu bar Halperin – grandfather of author;
    Rebecca – daughter of Eliahu; married Azriel Perel
         Isaac Perel –son of Rebecca and Azriel;  married Mira Rabinowitz
              Naomi Perel – daughter of Isaac and Mira
        David Perel – son of Rebecca and Azriel; married Pola Rosner
              Azriel Perel – son of David and Pola
        Bertha Perel – son of Rebecca and Azriel
        Solomon Perel – son of Rebecca and Azriel; author
   Clara Wachsmann  - daughter of Eliahu

Friends and Acquaintances
Jerzyk  Rappoport
Jakob Lublinski
Hans Marburger
Binem Koppelmann
Manfred Frenkel
Lotte Friedenthal
Eliahu Beth Josef

Places
Peine, Germany
Lodz, Poland
Smorgon, Lithuania?
Stutthof  Concentration Camp, Poland
Munich, Germany
Tel Aviv, Israel

Crossing the Borders of Time: A true story of war, exile, and love reclaimed by Leslie Maitland

"A former New York Times journalist, Maitland has seized on her family’s far-flung tale of fleeing the Nazis in Europe and energetically made it her own."  from a review in Kirkus Reviews 2/15/12

Leslie Maitland has written a memoir that focuses on her immigrant mother and her family, refugees from Frieberg, Germany. Her thoroughly researched narration of their dangerous and difficult journey to America is both engrossing and edifying. It also demonstrates that although her family’s situation was unique in its detail, similar iterations of their experience were being enacted throughout Europe as Jews tried to escape from Hitler’s death machine.

The oldest of two children, Maitland repeatedly heard pieces of her mother’s story that entranced her. The research she embarked on to corroborate her mother’s version of what happened and to flesh out the details took her on several trips to Germany and France as well as to Cuba where she interviewed officials and survivors and met with archivists to help her search through records.

The author’s maternal grandparents, Sigmar and Lisel Gunzburger, had no interest in leaving Germany when Hitler came to power. Her grandfather, from a well-established family who had lived in Germany for many generations, co-owned with one of his brothers a successful business in Frieberg. Although many Jews had already fled, they, like others, felt that they could weather a temporary storm, but by the time her grandfather realized that he and his family were in real danger, it was extremely difficult accessing bank accounts, finding a country that would take them in, and securing visas and exit permits.

Maitland’s mother’s family was fortunate for a number of reasons: her grandfather had a friend who was a Christian brother, Joseph Fimbel, who helped them immeasurably. And he had wealthy and well-connected relatives in America and France who loaned him money and managed to help him get passage to Cuba. But their route was long and circuitous. They left Germany in 1938 and settled in Mulhouse, France. Maitland includes a map that shows how they wended their way through France with extended stays in Mulhouse, Gray and Lyon. When all paperwork was in order they left for Marseille where the American Joint Distribution Committee had arranged for Portuguese ships to transport Jewish refugees to Cuba. More machinations eventually got them to the United States where they arrived in 1944.

The story Maitland tells of their life in America (she was born in 1949), is a version of a classic immigrant tale. Her family settled in the German Jewish refugee community in Inwood in New York where they felt comfortable amongst fellow immigrants who clung to their language and customs. Maitland's grandfather read the German-Jewish newspaper, the Aufbau, and wrote constantly to Germany about the bank accounts and property he had left behind. Soon Maitland’s mother and her two siblings were married and each had an apartment in the same building as their parents. This extreme closeness lasted until the author’s American-born father decided that it was time to move on and up: they bought a suburban house in New Jersey where to some extent both the author, then eight years old, and her mother felt exiled.

The rest of the story focuses for the most part on her mother’s first love, a young Roman Catholic she had met when they lived in Mulhouse, France. Although they had made a commitment to each other and vowed to reunite somehow, somewhere after the war, the relationship was fraught with complications. Because he was Catholic her parents and other relatives sabotaged the relationship which included intercepting letters. So they lost track of each other and each assumed the other had lost interest. Although less compelling than the sections narrating the family’s life in Germany and their flight, the couples’ initially thwarted romance raises the enduring question: “What if?” But it also makes the significant point that war leaves its mark in many ways. So many people dead, survivors traumatized, so many families and relationships ruptured, displaced, reconfigured.

This memoir includes maps, photos, a bibliography, and a family tree with birth and death dates and places of origin. The author notes that she has changed some names to protect privacy but it is highly unlikely any names on the family tree have been changed by her, so I present the names below assuming they are correct.

To read an article about the difficulties refugees had in landing in Cuba, click here.
To read an article about the difficulties refugees had obtaining visas to come to the United States, click here.

Family
Author's mother's family
Simon Gunzburger – married Jeanette Bloch
     David Gunzburger – son of Simon and Jeanette
     Norbert Gunzburger – son of Simon and Jeanette
     Karoline Gunzburger – daughter of Simon and Jeanette; married Edward Winter
          Gretl Winter – daughter of Karoline and Edward; married Marcel Weil
          Herbert Winter – son of Karoline and Edward; married Estelle Sokoloff
     Max Gunzburger – son of Simon and Jeanette
     Sara Gunzburger – daughter of Simon and Jeanette; married Maurice Feldstein
     Hermann Gunzberger (Gunn) – son of Simon and Jeanette
     Marie Gunzburger – daughter of Simon and Jeanette; married Paul Cahen (Mulhouse)
          Emilie Mulhouse – daughter of Marie and Paul; married Maurice Goldschmidt
          Elie Jean Mulhouse – daughter of Emilie and Maurice
          Jeanine Mulhouse – daughter of Emilie and Maurice
          Jacques Mulhouse – son of Emilie and Maurice
     Edmond Mulhouse – son of Marie and Paul; married Elizabeth Hauser
          Francoise and Janine Cahen – twin daughters of Edmond and Elizabeth
         Michel Cahen Mulhouse – son of Edmond and Elizabeth
          Paul-Andre Cahen Mulhouse – son of Edmond and Elizabeth
          Robert Cahen Mulhouse – son of Edmond and Elizabeth
          Isabelle Cahen – daughter of Edmond and Elizabeth
   Heinrich Gunzburger – son of Simon and Jeanette; married Toni
   Sigmar (Samuel) Gunzburger – son of Simon and Jeanette; married to Lisel (Alice) Heinsheimer
         Norbert Gunzburger – son of Sigmar and Lisel; married Dorothea Ostheim
               Stanley Gunzburger – son of Norbert and Dorothea
         Hanna (Janine) Gunzburger – son on Sigmar and Lisel; married Leonard Maitland
               Leslie Maitland - daughter of Sigmar and Lisel; married Daniel Werner; author
                    Zachary Werner  – son of Leslie and Daniel
                    Ariel Werner – daughter of Leslie and Daniel
              Gary Maitland – son of Sigmar and Lisel
        Gertrude Gunzburger – daughter of Sigmar and Lisel; married Heinz Rawitscher (Harry Rawlings)
              Lynne Rawlings Maravin – daughter of Gertrude and Harry
             Michael Rawling – son of Gertrude and Harry
Max Wolf – cousin, relationship not clear

Author’s mother’s mother's family
Maier Heinsheimer – married Johanna Kahn
         Lina Heinsheimer – daughter of Maier and Johanna; married Sigmund Weil
               Carol Weil – daughter of Lina and Sigmund
         Jennie Heinsheimer – daughter of Maier and Johanna; married Joseph Guggenheim
         Rosie Heinsheimer – daughter of Maier and Johanna; married Natan Marx
               Hannchen Marx – daughter Rosie and Natan; married Julius Hamburger
         Lisel (Alice) Heinsheimer – daughter of Maier and Johanna; married Sigmar Gunzburger (see above)
         Sigfried Heinsheimer – son of Maier and Johanna; married Liesel
         Ruth Heinsheimer – daughter of Sigfried and Liesel

Cousins relationship not clear: Huguette Cahen, Francois Blum, Lynn Ullman, Suzanne Steinberg.

Author’s father’s family:
 Beresh (Bernard) and Fannie Friedman (changed name to Maitland)
       Mona Maitland – daughter of Bernard and Fannie
        Leonard Maitland – son of Bernard and Fannie; married Janine Gunzburger (see above)
Danielle Fakhr and Helene Putermilch - cousins of author's father - relationship not clear

Friends and Acquaintances
Meta Ellenbogen
Therese and Alfred Loewy
Isabelle Picard
Pauline Picard (sister of Isabelle)
Moise Levy
     Rene Baruch Levy - son on Moise
Roger Dreyfus

Places

Mulhouse, France
Freiberg, Germany
Ihringen, Germany
Eppingen, Germany
Breisach, Germany
Gray, France
Buffalo, NY
Cleveland, Ohio
Inwood, New York
Englewood Heights, New Jersey

The Secret of Priest’s Grotto: A Holocaust Survival Story by Peter Lane Taylor and Christos Nicola 2007

"[T]his is a unique and absorbing addition to the library of Holocaust testimonials written for younger readers." from a review in Kirkus Reviews, 4/1/2007.

This large format book, with material interesting to adults as well  as older children, is a compilation of narrative and photos written by two “cavers.”  In exploring extensive underground caves in the vicinity of Korolowka, Ukraine, part of what are called the Gypsum Giant cave system, they heard from local Ukrainians that Jewish families had survived in the section of a caves called Popowa Yama during World War II. At a length of 77 miles, it is the ninth longest cave in the world.

 

It took a number of years and a number of trips into the caves, searching for and interviewing Ukrainians who could tell them more, and searching for and interviewing the Jewish survivors, many now living in Montreal, to get a fuller picture of the life lived by 38 Jews. They were mostly members of a large extended family who lived underground for the better part of a year. The writers of this volume also relied on the privately printed memoir of the matriarch, Esther Stermer, who, in 1960, wrote "We Fight To Survive" about their experience.

 

It is common knowledge, of course, that many Jews went into hiding during the war – in attics, in barns, in holes in the ground. But this instance of hiding was quite remarkable. Thirty-eight people lived as best they could in an underground cave as a community, carving out living space, assigning chores, sustaining each other through the deprivation: darkness, cold and limited food, as best they could. We learn about the heroic efforts of some of the men who went out under cover of darkness to buy supplies from a few trusted Ukranians and to “appropriate” food from the fields. One son of Esther Stermer carried a 150 pound millstone back to the cave on his back so that they could grind wheat into flour.

 

This book uses short excerpts from the memoir as well as many photos of the family from their early lives until today as well as maps of the area and of the section of the caves where they hid. It also has photos of the contemporary cavers exploring the caves and photos of the objects that they found in the caves that had been left behind by the hiding family members, including the millstone.

 

 An afterword explains that Peter Lane Taylor published an article about exploring these caves and his interviews with the surviors in the June 2004 issue of National Geographic Adventure which generated a lot of interest in the press. In August of 2006 Nicola escorted some of the survivors and descendants of some of the survivors back to the cave and is spearheading an effort to preserve the caves for their historic value. A documentary entitled  “No Place on Earth” which contains interviews with survivors as well as re-enactments was released in April of 2013.

To see a segment on the Today show generated by the interest in the original article published in the National Geographic Adventure magazine, click here.
To see a trailer for the film "No Place on Earth" click here.
 

People

 Zeida and Esther Stermer

             Nissel

             Chana Stermer – married Joseph Richter

             Henia Stermer – married to Fishel Dodyk

                         Shunkale Hochman – daughter of Henia and Fishel

                         Pepkale Stermer – daughter of Henia and Fishel

 Shulim – married Czarna

                                    Erin Grunstein – granddaughter of Shlomo  

             Shlomo – married Bella

                         Lila – daughter of Shlomo and Bella             

             Etka Stermer – married Abe Katz

 

 Choncia Dodyk

             Mendel Dodyk – son of Choncia; married to Yetta

                         Regina Dodyk – daughter of Mendel and Yetta

             Fradel Dodyk – daughter of Choncia

             Yossel Dodyk – son of Choncia; married to Pepcia

                         Nunia Dodyk – son of Yossel and Pepcia (adopted after parents’ death and became Norman Kittner

             Meimel Reibel – daughter of Choncia

                         Mania Reibel – daughter of Meimel

 Dortcia (Dorothy) Karpf – daughter of Mania

  Mundek (Marvin) and Luzer (Louis) Reibel; sons of Meimel

             Etcia Goldberg – daughter of Choncia

                         Mania (Mariya) Gritsiv – daughter of Etcia

  Dunia (Daniel) and Marek Goldberg – sons of Etcia

    

 Ulo and Frida Barad – siblings; nephew and niece of Yetta Dodyk (see above)

 

Mayer and Hersch Kavelek – cousins of Fishel Dodyk (see above); exact relationship unclear

 

Siomo and Karl (Ziundi) Kurz – nephews of Esther Sturmer; exact relationship unclear

 

Leiche Wexler – sister of Esther Stermer; married to Munie Wexler

            Sol Wexler - son of Leiche and Munie 
                 Ed Vogel - son-in-law of Sol
            Lonchia Wexler – daughter of Leiche and Munie

 

Shimon Kittner

Leib Kittner – brother of Shimon

            Shunia Kittner – son of Leib
Usher Metzger

 

Shancie Kimelman – sister of Esther Stermer

 

Places

Ukraine

Popowa Yama (Priest’s Grotto) , Ukraine

Verteba Caves, Ukraine

Korolowka, Ukraine

Bilche-Zolote, Ukraine
Myshcoff, Poland

Montreal, Canada

 

Wedding Song: Memoirs of an Iranian Jewish Woman by Farideh Goldin 2003

"Memoirs like ... 'Wedding Song' by Goldin teach us as much about the history of Iran as they do about the authors by addressing larger themes of war, coming of age, veiling, immigration and alienation." from a review by Erika Meitner in the Jewish Daily Forward 12/29/09

Ferideh Goldin immigrated to the United States from Iran in 1976 when she was 23 years old, eventually married an American, and gave birth to three daughters. She says in the Prologue that she has written this memoir for her daughters to explain to them what growing up in Iran had been like.

The daughter of a mother from Hamedan and a father from Shiraz, Ferideh Goldin tells the story of growing up in a family where age-old customs prevailed. The theme of her memoir is marriage and family, and although the story focusses mainly on the marriage of her parents, it moves backward several generations and forward to her own marriage as well as to thoughts about what the future holds for her daughters.

What the author emphasizes is that women in Iran were chattel, married off when they were quite young, at which point each settled near or in the home of her husband’s family. Daughters from poor families were a particular liability. Each was another mouth to feed and marrying them off lessened the burden in a typically large family.  When the author’s mother was given over to her father, she was passed off as being fifteen, the legal age when girls could be married in Iran. She was actually only thirteen. Her father was 23. Two years after their marriage in 1951, at the age of fifteen she gave birth to her first daughter, Farideh.

The marriage came about because of hardships on both sides. The mothers of both the bride and groom were widows with large families. The bridegroom, obligated to help support his mother and younger siblings, took a bride whose role it would be to help her mother-in-law keep the household running. Young, far from her mother in another city, the bride never fit in, was labeled a peasant and made to feel inferior. She was depressed and angry.

The author describes many heartbreaking scenes that reveal that her father’s loyalty was to his family, not to his wife. When the author wanted to go to high school and college, her father acceded to her insistence on an education, but throughout her years in school her family looked around for an appropriate husband for her. She held her ground, refusing all suitors, eventually leaving for America over her father’s objections.

This family drama is played out against the background of the growing turmoil in Iran with the rise of Muslim fundamentalism. The rich detail the author provides about her Jewish family and their day-to-day customs reveals how much their lives were like their Muslim neighbors before Muslim extremism held sway. But when many Iranian Jews fled to the United States or Israel, her family chose to stay in Iran, finally fleeing when the Shah was overthrown. The author makes a point that throughout his life her father at increasingly great emotional cost maintained the cultural tradition of keeping the extended family together, and that his personal tragedy was that all this came to an end when members of his family scattered as they fled a hostile government in their homeland.

To read a review of a book about the history of Iranian Jews written as the catalogue to accompany an exhibit illustrating that history, click here.

In the last section of this memoir Ferideh Goldin explains that in writing this memoir she did not want to publicly criticize members of her family so she has changed names. I think it is reasonable to conclude that she uses the original names of the members of the earlier generations, especially those pictured with their names attached to the photos reproduced in this memoir. And from the page of acknowledgements it seems clear that she uses the real names of her immediate family. It is most likely that she has changed the names of members of her father’s family, many of whom the author portrays as being particularly uncharitable to her mother. In any case, she provides no last names except for women in very early photos on her mother’s side. I have included below only those names I am reasonably certain are the actual family names, but for the most part they are only first names.

People
Author’s mother’s family
Adina Sabba
    Dina Salem – daughter of Adina
        Touran – daughter of Dina
             Rouhi – daughter of Touran; married Esghel
                  Farideh – daughter of Rouhi and Esghel; married Norman Goldin; author
                      Lena, Yael, and Rachel Goldin- daughters of Farideh and Norman
                 Nahid Gerstein – daughter of Rouhi and Esghel
                 Freydoun – son of Rouhi and Esghel
                 Farzad – son of Rouhi and Esghel
                 Niloufar – daughter of Rouhi and Esghel
           Avi – son of Touran
           Shekoofeh – daughter of Touran
           Fereshteh – daughter of Touran
           Beejan – son of Touran
     Aziza – half sister of Rouhi
           Mohtaram – daughter of Aziza
                Parveez, Eshagh, Jamsheed, Maheen, and Farzaneh- children of Mohtaram

Hamineh Saed – mother-in-law of Dina Salem

Author’s father’s family
Bibi
    Tauvous – daughter of Bibi
         Esghel – son of Tauvous; married Rouhi (see above)

Places
Hamedan, Iran
Shiraz, Iran
Tehran, Iran
Israel

Virginia, United States
 

Fifteen Journeys: Warsaw to London by Jasia Reichardt 2012

..."[T]he format of the book ... reads as something of a collage. The letters and the illustrations ... and then the countdown of the 15 different journeys ... becomes this interesting mosaic." from an interview with Jasia Reichardt conducted by Jessa Crispin and reprinted in Kirkus Reviews 6/26/12

This moving holocaust memoir was written by a writer in the art world who came from a family of artists and musicians living in Warsaw. Born in 1933, Jasia Reichardt was quite young during much of the time leading up to the war and during the war’s early years. This, she writes, accounts for the fact that she did not really have a total picture of what was happening because her family shielded her as much as possible.

Her inheritance, 15 letters and 31 postcards sent by her mother and grandmother from Warsaw to her mother’s sister Franciszka Themerson, form the basis of the first half of the memoir. Reichardt finally read them fifty years after they were written, the contents too painful for her to confront. Franciszka and her husband Stefan Themerson had been in Paris when the war broke out and Franciszka fled to London where she worked with the Polish government in exile and worked to sustain her family back in Poland. None of Franciszka’s correspondence to her mother or sister in Warsaw has survived.

The first letter in the packet is from February, 1940. The last postcard is from June of 1942. Reichardt points out that mail was censored and that some of what her mother and grandmother wrote was in “code” which she “translates” for us. Letters were often sent through contacts in Portugal and Romania. The author's mother and grandmother fret about the fact that they were not sure Franciszka was getting all of their letters, nor they hers. Reichardt also points out that in reading the letters you can follow the deterioration of the family situation. In the early communication her family members were still living in well-appointed apartments amongst possessions like grand pianos. Eventually they were moved, along with all of the Jews in Warsaw, to the ghetto and were crammed into close quarters where nerves were frayed and disagreements broke out. In early communications the author’s mother and grandmother thank Franciszka for the packages of food she continually sends and they beg her to not spend so much of her own funds on food for them. They are fine. But as time passes, you can see that they are much more dependent on the packages and they convey this without trying to worry Franciszka. But the author makes clear that because of Franciszka’s connections to the Polish government in exile, she knew exactly what was going on.

The second half of the memoir is about Reichardt’s journeys once she is smuggled out of the ghetto with her grandmother in an ambulance, an act she later realizes must have cost her family a lot of money in bribes. History records that the first deportations from the Warsaw ghetto – the Grossaktion – started in July of 1942, so she assumes she was smuggled out in June. She and her grandmother are taken to the ghetto in Otwock where she gets instruction in the Catholic religion. She flees the ghetto with specific instructions about where to find a contact, and she receives papers that give her a new identity. Over the next months and years her journey takes her to a number of hiding places including to the homes of sympathetic Poles and to an orphanage where the nuns look after her. After the war she was reunited with her aunt Franciszka and her husband Stephan Themerson, artists, experimental film makers and founders of the alternative Gaberbocchus Press in London.

Included in the memoir are family photos, reproductions of art work by her grandfather, mother and aunt, and reproductions of documents. Also included is an annotated list of the people connected to her story, noting who survived the war and who did not, and a “Calendarium” which sets out the important dates of World War II, mostly as they relate to Poland and Warsaw.

To watch a short video of Jasia Reichardt talking about her life, click here.
To see photos from the Warsaw ghetto, click here.

People
Author's mother's family
Jakub Weinles – married Lucja Kaufman
 Maryla Weinles – daughter of Jakub and Lucja; married Seweryn (Sewek) Chaykin
   Janina Chaykin (took the name Maria Janina Ceglowska) – married Tony Richards; (became Jasia Richards, then Jasia Reichardt)
   Franciszka Weinles – daughter of Jakub and Lucja; married Stefan Themerson

Author’s father’s family
Herman Chaykin (Chajkin) - married Cecylia (Cesia) Zajac
  Stach Chaykin – son of Herman and Cecylia; married to Dasza (Daria) Lifszyk
     Wisia (Ludwicka) Chaykin – daughter of Stach
  Michal Chaykin – son of Herman and  Cecylia
  Pawel Chaykin – son of Herman and  Cecylia
  Seweryn (Sewek) Chaykin – son of Herman and Cecylia; married to Maryla (see above)

Antoni Libin – son of sister of Cecylia Zajac Chaykin; brother of Zdzislaw
Zdzislaw Libin (Libera) – son of sister of Cecylia Zajac Chaykin; brother of Antoni; married to Helena
   Antoni Libin – son of Zdzislaw and Helena
Wladek Kaufman – sister of Lucja Weinles and Leon Kamir
Leon Kamir – sister of Wladek and Lucja Weinles
Ludwika (Ludka) – cousin of Franciszka and Stefan; married Henryk (Heniek) Heller [Sobieralski – surname acquired during the war]
    Wanda (Wandzia) Sobieralski – daughter of Ludwika and Haniek; married to Genek Wilczynski
     Jas Sobieralski – son of Ludwika and Haniek
Anka Poznanska – cousin, relationship not specified

Stefan Themerson’s family
Mieczyslaw Thermerson
  Stefan Themerson – son of Mieczyslaw
  Irena (Irka/Irenka) Themerson – daughter of Mieczyslaw; married to Stefan Miller
Hania Kawa – cousin of the Themersons; exact relationship not specified

Places
Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Ghetto, Warsaw, Poland
Falenica, Poland
Otwock, Poland
Zofiowka Psychiatric Hospital, Otwock, Poland
Treblinka Extemination Camp, Poland
London, England

Shanghai Ghetto - a documentary written and directed by Dana Janklowitz Mann and Amir Mann

"... [T]he documentary 'Shanghai Ghetto' tells the fascinating story of a group of Jewish survivors who narrowly escaped the full horror of the Holocaust but are still very much its victims and will always bear its scars." from  a review by William Arnold in the Seattle Post Intelligencer 5/15/2003

As the Nazis increased their discrimination against their Jewish population in the 1930’s, many Jewish residents looked for ways out of Germany. Before war was declared Germany was happy to have their Jewish population leave, but it wasn’t easy for the Jews to do so. They needed sponsors and visas to immigrate to other countries. Furthermore, countries had restrictive quotas, and even if they found a country that would take them in, they needed cash to pay for the paperwork and their transportation.

One route that was available for those who had no other way out and had money for travel and were willing to take the risk was to travel to Shanghai, China where, due to a specific set of circumstances, visas were not necessary. So as many as 20,000 Jewish refugees sold their assets for what they could get and embarked on a journey that in most cases took them overland to Italy and from there by ship to Shanghai.

This film tells this story through interviews with a handful of the refugees who, as children, had spent their early years in Shanghai. It includes archival footage of the Jewish community of Shanghai during the war as well as a few scenes of some of them returning to Shanghai as adults.

The interviewees tell versions of the same story: They and their families were shocked at the conditions they found in Shanghai. Most were sent to live in the poorest area, Hongchew, where accommodations were primitive. They did not have flush toilets, for example, a fact of life that the formerly well-off German refugees found hard to imagine. They had to find jobs, but many could not earn enough to support their families and they relied on the largesse of a large established Baghdadi Jewish community who had settled much earlier in Shanghai and on charity from the American Joint Distribution Committee. Conditions were especially difficult during the war in the 1940’s because of dwindling food supplies.

From the moment they got there, they formed a community and did their best to adjust. Like immigrants who settled elsewhere, they brought their culture with them, setting up small businesses to cater to their needs. They created newspapers in German and Yiddish, and schools for their children and entertainment for the adults, but when the war was over they wanted to leave. They again went through the process of looking for places to settle and scattered across the world, many emigrating to Israel or the United States.

During the interviews the refugees also remarked with their voices full of emotion, that as difficult as it was to live in Shanghai, most of them survived, unlike most of the members of their families and friends who never made it out of Germany and other countries in Europe.

To watch a trailer for the movie click here.
To read a travel article about visiting the former Jewish ghetto in Shanghai and the refugee museum that has been established, click here.
To read a post on this blog of a memoir, Strange Haven, by Sigmund Tobias who is interviewed in this documentary, click here.
To read a post on this blog of a young adult novel that tells the story of the author's Russian family's stay in Shanghai before and during the war, click here.

People
Those interviewed in the film: Alfred Kohn, Harold Janklowicz, Betty Grebenschikoff, Sigmund Tobias, Evelyn Pike Rubin; and Laura Margolis - employee of the American Joint Distribution Committee
Three interviews are included on the DVD as extras: Gary Matzdorf, Henry Meisel, Susie Lipsey

Places
Berlin, Germany
Germany
Shanghai

Ekaterinoslav: One Family’s Passage to America, A memoir in verse by Jane Yolen 2012

"Jane Yolen’s new work combines her talents as a poet with her skill as a storyteller." from a review by Laurel Corona posted on the Jewish Book Council blog

The writer Jane Yolen has written an engaging volume of 35 poems that explore the lives of her grandparents and their eight children who left their home in Ekaterinoslav in Ukraine to come to America. The poems deal with the personal and the socio-political: her family and its life in the old country and the new. She divides the poems into three time frames - “Ekaterinoslav: 1873-1913, Passage: 1910-1914, and Greenhorns: 1914 -1939.

In a two-page “Note from the Poet” that precedes the poetry, Yolen sketches in what she knows about her grandparents, their trip to America and the family’s early life in Connecticut. But now that she is a grandmother there are no family members left who can fill in the many gaps in their family story, and she expresses regret that her father had never seemed interested or willing to talk about the past.

So she does some of the work that genealogists do – she contacts cousins for scraps of information and looks at documents which sometimes become the basis for poems. For example, the facts on a ship’s manifest about family members inspire a poem she calls “Manifests.” And she includes a number of family photos that are the source of poems, taken both in Ekaterinoslav and in America.

Yolen writes that she comes from a family of storytellers. She knows that family stories passed down are made up of truths, half-truths and total fabrications – intentional or otherwise. In her poetry she uses what she knows and what she supposes  in order to recover her family’s past both as a way to acknowledge their lives and as a way to help her to better understand the personalities and accomplishments of the many family she did not know at all or did not know well. And through her poetry she tries to apprehend how their lives shaped hers. She has used her inheritance, her gift for story telling, to create this wonderful "memoir in verse.”

To read about the history of the Jewish community in Ekaterinoslav, click here.

People
Samson Yolen – married to Mina Hyatt
   Louis Yolen – son of Samson and Mina
      Ruth – daughter of Louis
   Eva Yolen – daughter of Samson and Mina; twin sister of Sylvia; married Abe Dranoff
   Sylvia Yolen – daughter of Samson and Mina; twin sister of Eva; married Hyman Plotkin
   Vera Yolen Krassner – daughter of Samson and Mina
      Marsha Krassner, daughter of Vera
  Samuel Yolen – son of Samson and Mina; married Rose Pinkus
  Rose Yolen Davidow – daughter of Samson and Mina
  Velvel (Wulf, William) Yolen – son of Samson and Mina
      Jane Yolen – daughter of Velvel; author
  Harry Yolen – son of Samson and Mina

Relatives tagged in photos, exact relationships unclear: Micki Plotkin, Minnie Plotkin, Alvin Krassner, Claire Dranoff, Dorothy Yolen Mark, Eli Dranoff

Places
Ekaterinoslav, Ukraine
New Haven, Connecticut
Waterbury, Connecticut

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