I continued attending school and remained basically worry free until I received a notification to report for work at the Resort (cooperative ghetto factory, temporarily controlled by Khaim Rumkowsk, but the property of the Nazis). Actually, I received three separate notices by ghetto mail — to report for work in three separate locations. Evidently someone or several people submitted three separate applications for work in my behalf. One notice ordered me to report at Zbar’s Resort (an underwear and hosiery factory). Another notice was to report at the Shtroy Resort, where straw would be braided and stitched together into floor rugs, shoes and other items; the third notification was to report to the Zatler Resort (a leather goods factory). My mother decided that Zbar’s Resort, only one block away, was the closest to our home, and that the work might be easier there than in the other two Resorts. Suddenly, I had become a worker; that is, almost a worker.
Since I had the status of a minor, I did not work as many hours as the adults did. The daily pay for our work was a soup allotment, a single slice of salami and a few ghetto marks. Later, we — the youngsters with the status of learners — received in addition to the regular soup all of the workers received, an additional half measure of soup daily. We also received coffee every morning. The man distributing the coffee yelled at us and complained a lot, particularly when people were coughing — as I did. He asked us to stop coughing, as he had heard too much of it the previous day. We thought that he was crazy and kept quiet.
We were led to believe then that the principal advantage of going to work was the workers’ ID card with our photograph that appeared on it. It put us in the category of “productive ghetto elements,” and we were made to believe that we would be spared from the deportations that were continually going on.
Not everyone was fortunate enough to get a job. Masses of unemployed job seekers would line up daily in front of the employment office looking for work. Without work, one did not get soup at the Resort, and one did not have the Rumkes to buy his bread and other allowances on the ration coupons, and without employment one did not get a workers identity card.
During the earliest stage of my “working career” at Zbar’s Resort, I was instructed to turn over belts, collars and other parts of garments, and to straighten out the edges. Later, we learned to use the iron, the hole puncher, and the snap and hole making machines. We essentially had to do whatever the group foreman and the older group workers demanded of us. Some of them treated us very well; others would take advantage of us, poked fun at us and sent us on ridiculous errands. One learner, for example, was sent to another work group, to bring back the pattern of an armhole, another was sent to get an invisible needle from the floor manager. At first, we couldn’t understand why the adults were roaring with laughter on account of our naivete in trade expressions. Then, we too thought that these jokes were funny, and joined them in their fun.
The tailors, dressmakers and seamstresses, who had initially brought their own sewing machines from their homes (in order to get employment at the Resort), would sit in long double rows, and speed along all day long on their treadle machines. The learners at the Resort, (myself included) would sit at the head of the double rows of machines that were facing each other, and would attempt to oblige the experienced workers and instructors in every way possible. I was treated very well there by the instructors and workers, but the work was very tedious; the noise from the hundreds of speeding machines in the huge hall was unbearable; and the rewards for our labor was very minimal.
At lunchtime, I would try to be among the first to receive the food and immediately, after receiving my soup ration, I would run home with my meager portion of soup and single slice of salami. My mother would cut the salami into two thinner slices, dip them in flour and fry them, so the portions seemed to become bigger and “sufficient” for the two of us. She would add a large amount of water to the already watery soup that we would share, so the amount of soup seemed to have increased and our stomachs seemed to be filled — at least for a little while.
Later, my mother also got a steady job — at Altmaterialn, a warehouse, where she sorted old clothing that was brought in from surroundings towns and townships after the deportations or the liquidation of their ghettoes. All valuables that were found inside the clothing were the “property of the Third Reich,” and had to be turned over to the “authorities.” Then my mother began to receive her own worker’s food allowance, her own small wages, and a worker’s ID card.
The hardest part of going to work was rising early in the bitter cold Polish winter mornings and the fear of arriving late for work. In addition to getting washed and dressed in the morning, I had to help mother put on her orthopedic shoe and tie it safely all the way to her knee of her stiff leg. This required extra preparation time and I frequently arrived late for work. Before we entered the factory grounds, we had to go past a little entrance hut where we had to sign an attendance sheet and write in the time of arrival. Luckily, Yosl Friede, the person in charge of the admission hut, knew my brothers and looked aside when I arrived late for work and signed an earlier time of arrival. If I arrived after the cards had been collected by the office, he sent me to the office building, to report to a girl, Miss Opatowska, who was not much older than myself. She would then assist me by writing in an incorrect, acceptable time of arrival.
We had to go to work no matter what the weather was like and whatever our health condition was. We were afraid that otherwise we would be blacklisted.
©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
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Child In Captivity 