Ghetto Elite and Government

In the midst of all the misery in the ghetto lived a well-to-do ghetto elite. This elite establishment was headed by Mordechai Khaim Rumkowski — the Altester der Juden in Litzmannstadt ghetto, also referred to by the inhabitants, with sarcasm as the “King”, “the Prezes”, “der alter” (the old man) and “Chaimek” (the Polish diminutive for Khaim). Of the many poems and songs written, recited and sung about him — most carried negative connotations.

Since 1931, Mordechai Khaim Rumkowski — an ardent Zionist from White Russia, had been an elected member to the Jewish Kehile, on the right wing Zionist slate. At one time he had been the leader of their faction. Among the city dwellers who knew of him, he had been known as the professional “shnorer” (beggar), because of his position as a campaigner for funds for the orphanages. He was a moody, cranky, authoritarian man and was basically disliked by most people who knew him. There had been little respect for him even among the members of his right-wing party.

Despite his lack of education and failure in businesses, he had seemingly succeeded in his community work because of his good organizing skills and his devotion to the Zionist ideology. In 1939, he took over the management of the orphanage in Helenowek. Despite his self-proclaimed label as “the father of orphans”, an “orphan-lover and orphan-protector”, there was testimony by the children from the orphanages — some with whom I later became very familiar — and some newspaper reports that he was a maniac, a sexually deviant, child molester and abuser.

Rumkowski had a lot of “chutzpah” (brazen nerve or audacity), and truly believed in some of Hitler’s philosophies and ultimate victory. He believed that by cooperating with the Nazis, a golden opportunity existed for the Zionist dream of establishing a Jewish state, albeit under the Nazis, and the opportunity to achieve personal glory as the undisputed ruler of such state. The Jewish educational system under him was organized in such a manner as to form such a state.

Rumkowski worked closely with the German ghetto administration. At some point, he dismissed the remainder of the old Jewish community council and appointed his own relatives and friends to the new Judenrat (better known in Lodz as Beirat), which was to become an instrument to him (to establish control over the Lodz Jews) and a tool for the Nazi Germans. Despite the fact that he was actually a German puppet, he acted in a manner befitting an actual ruler — a king or dictator. A man in his middle sixties, he was often seen riding around in a “royal coach” (horse and buggy). He was always surrounded by a large security team — consisting of young men who had been known as boxers, wrestlers and members of the criminal underworld. They all belonged now to the privileged class. They were well fed, well clothed, and relatively well housed. His portrait had to be hung in all the ghetto offices. All the ghetto stamps and ghetto money, was engraved with his portrait and signature. All the posters and ghetto newspapers (usually in Yiddish and German) displayed his signature. He himself made all the final decisions regarding hiring and firing of the ghetto bureaucrats.

Khaim Rumkowski delivered fiery speeches in support of unconditional compliance with the German decrees and requests. His famous motto was: “work, obedience and order.” He often argued that “only work for the German war machine in exchange for food will save our center of productivity from calamity.” He frequently stated that if the Nazis requested a contingent of Jews and deportations were organized, “the “unproductive parasites” — smugglers, unemployed and welfare recipients — would be the first on the lists of deportees.” Many claimed that “the old crazy man’s main interest was saving his own skin and the autocratic rule by Chaim Rumhowski.

At first he claimed that his goal was to save the majority of the ghetto residents, but later his aim was reduced to saving “a percentage” or at least a small segment of the Jewish population. He used to say that those whom he will save, would be prepared to build a Zionist state in the holy land.

“The king” enjoyed having power over the nearly 250,000 Jewish inhabitants of the Litzmannstadt ghetto (natives of the city, and people from other towns and counties who were brought to the Lodz ghetto). He also tried, unsuccessfully, to expand his hegemony over other nearby cities and rural areas.

There were at least two versions of how Khaim Rumkowski got to become the Elder of the Jews.

According to one rumor, when the German authorities requested to know who was the “Elder” of the Jewish Community Council, he mistook the German word Altester (Elder) for the Yiddish word “eltster” (oldest) and called out: “Ikh bin der eltster!”

“Good, you will be responsible for the behavior, organization and cooperation of the Jews,” responded the German Chief. Thus he became the “Altester der Juden in Litzmannstadt.”

Another version that circulated in the ghetto was that when the Germans occupied the city, a high-ranking officer appeared at the Jewish Community Council and requested a list of the board members. Since most of the important leaders had already left the city (those who remained in Lodz had either been arrested, shot or were in hiding and were being hunted by the occupying authorities), and the remaining influential Jewish people did not come forward. The Germans insisted on getting together a “representative” body of Jews. Eventually, a lesser-known member of the council appeared at the German police station with Rurnkowski, whom he introduced as an authority. The Chief of the Police claimed that he was going to investigate the matter and requested that they come again on a given date and time.

In the meantime Khaim Rumkowski paid a solo visit to the Police Chief, without the knowledge of the other person. He told the Chief that he was the only true remaining leader of the Jews in the city, and explained that he was able and willing to be responsible for the behavior of the Jewish population in the city. He assured the German Chief that he would fully cooperate and satisfy all requests by the German authorities. The Police Chief immediately assigned him as the “Altester der Juden in Litzmannstadt.” When the other council member came to remind Rumkowski about their appointment with the police chief, Rumkowski announced that he was already declared as the Jewish Elder.

Rumkowski immediately began organizing the Jewish ‘self-governing’ apparatus. He organized a new Council, the Beirat, with his close political associates and relatives appointed to serve on it. He organized food cooperatives, ghetto (Jewish) police, a fire brigade, and, shortly thereafter, a Sonderkommando (Special Police). He appointed the members of the Beirat as directors of the various ‘governing’ units — the Departments of Food, Cooperatives, Justice, Health, Police, Sanitation and others. He allowed them special privileges, including special food allotments. Although the members of the Beirat also had the power over the ghetto dwellers, they actually served as Rumkowski’s personal rubber stamp, whereas he was the virtual undisputed, autocratic ruler of the ghetto.

When he began to organize the Food Cooperatives (in or about December 1939), and later the various Distribution centers and factories, he frequently made use of his favorite refrain: “Five years from now, the ghetto will tick like a clock!” Most of the people spat three times on the ground (an old Jewish superstitious custom to keep it from happening) and thought that the old man was deranged to speak of five years of war, hunger and horror.

He later married Miss Weinberger, a spinster who was half his own age (she was in the early thirties). Miss Weinberger was the Secretary to the Director of the Health Department in the Ghetto. There was much talk about Rumkowski thriving since he married the girl. With the exception of the few people who also managed to gain power after the German occupation, and lead comparatively comfortable lives, the ghetto inhabitants hated Rumkowski. They said that the Lilvak (White Russian, Latvian or Lithuanian Jew) was a crazy man, who would do anything to save his own skin and to rule over others.

No one could understand why he declared Yiddish, a language rejected by the Zionists, as the official language of the Jews in Litzmannstadt and later of the Litzmannstadt ghetto. Many believed that he was ordered to do so by the Nazi occupiers.

At the upper part of the pyramid, just below Rumkowski were the 31 Chief Directors of the various departments and social agencies who had been appointed directly by him. They occupied the best housing in the center of the ghetto and in villas in and around Marysin. They also received very enticing (larger than all others) first Beirat food rations.

The second tier consisted of the directors and managers of the social service agencies, distribution centers, resorts, law enforcement units, etc. The third tier of the elite, consisted of lesser government employees, law and order enforcers, legworkers and other bureaucrats.

All of the above wore white armbands with various styles of blue Mogen Dovids and enjoyed various degrees of privileges, including special allocations of food and clothing. They also had various degrees of other privileges — such as being allowed to frequent ghetto theaters, concerts, nightclubs and other entertainment (after the war, I was told about an established prostitution house for the elite and some German guests). Of particular importance to them was the priority they exercised in the long lines for bread, food, and coal at the distribution centers. What’s more, they had Rumkowski’s promises of security — for themselves and their families — during periods of “resettlement”. This was probably the most significant incentive for many to be compliant.

Khaim Rumkowski claimed that the protection of children, particularly orphaned children was his primary interest. He organized orphanages, old age homes, hospitals and dzialkes (garden cottages shared by ghetto youth). His main interest in the dzialkes was the advancement of Zionism among the young and that the young become efficient in agriculture. Despite his alleged “love for the children, the sick and old folks,” he was willing to sacrifice them on the altar of death, in order “to save the rest of the ghetto.”

Though it sounds unbelievable, many of his Jewish right wing colleagues, whom he had assigned to important positions, and even the Jewish Rabbinate, supported him in his attitude of collaborating with the Germans. It was never clear to me whether this was because they (like Rumkowski) agreed, at least partially with the Nazi’s super-nationalistic philosophies and believed in their final victory, or because they were primarily concerned in saving their own and their family’s skin. Even during the darkest moments of mass deportation, the Rabbinate voted in favor of the Jewish authorities continuing to perform the dirty work of capturing and delivering the victims to the Germans. Evidently, they too were willing to pay the biggest sacrifices in exchange for their prioritized opportunity to promote their own nationalist and religious goals, rituals and practices.

Rumkowski was used by the Nazi administration only as long as he was useful to his overlords, but he fully cooperated with them until the bitter end.

My maternal grandmother was considered by everyone to have been an observant and righteous Jewish mother, grandmother, neighbor, friend and member of the Jewish community, who had always been helpful to people in need — particularly to Jewish orphans. I overheard conversations about her devotion to poor children, and particularly, about incidents where she had cured small neglected children from canker, though others shied away from them. She was a very religious person and never missed Synagogue on Friday nights, Saturdays and Jewish holidays. This was the first Yom Kippur during which there was no seat in any synagogue for my grandmother to pray in. The Old Jewish Synagogue on Wolborska Street, had been blown up with dynamite. As I remember, it happened the same day as the other synagogues in town and the statue of Tadeusz Kosciusko on the Freedom Square, as well as some streets in the Jewish areas of Lodz (among them the Polnocna Street, where I was conceived) were destroyed. One day, we heard a big explosion followed by several other explosions, and people said that within minutes all these cherished places and relics were gone.

The experience during the High Holidays that year in the ghetto, was a particularly painful one for my grandmother to live through. She was still recuperating from a seriously broken leg that she suffered in a fall in early 1940. She had just returned to our home after several weeks in her daughter Khaye’s apartment, where she was rightfully accused by my cousin Sore Keyle to have been “stealing some food for me.”

Buba was very upset that there was no place for her to pray on this High Holiday. But the most painful experience for my grandmother occurred while observing the ghetto elite and their German guests stream toward the Cinema Bajka that had been turned into a synagogue for the holidays. They were demonstrating — in their new suits, holding taleysim (prayer shawls) and tfiln-zeklekh (boxes containing scripture) — under their arms and walking haughtily to the Yom Kippur services. We could clearly see the parade across the street from our window. My mother was able to point out every elitist and German official in the procession. It was an overwhelming experience. At the moment when she noticed the oncoming procession of known German ghetto administrators and overseers — famous Jew killers — being escorted by the Prezes who was dressed in the ceremonial garb of a high priest (a royal white robe with an ornamental collar, a white yarmlke and white slippers), then followed by the ghetto councilmen, directors and other Jews with elite positions in the ghetto, my grandmother was overcome by sorrow and exclaimed:

“Oh, how disgusting!” She turned her head up to the heavens and asked: “My God, is there such a thing as a God?” And she added softly: “For the murderers there is room to pray, but there is no place for me to pray on this High Holiday!”

I felt very bad for my pious grandmother and thought that the dramatic question and statement she expressed was that of a very religious person, inevitably turned agnostic at this very moment. She was turning toward God asking whether he existed! She could not understand how an all seeing, all-knowing, loving and powerful father could look down on earth and allow the atrocities and injustices we were witnessing, spurned on by our own people.

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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The Resort

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
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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Shimon

In 1940, my mother’s name had been submitted to Prezes (President) Chaim Rumkowski for an Etat (government) position in the ghetto. A man named Jochimek, who was employed as a special courier or secretary for Rumkowski and had access to the office, saw to it that my mother’s application appeared at the top of the request pile. When my mother received the notice to report for an interview, she somehow managed to arrange for my brother Shimon to replace her. She explained that her future was much more uncertain, whereas Shimon was young, able, intelligent, and had more of a chance to succeed. She said that if Shimon got the job instead of her, our whole family would benefit from it and perhaps we would all have a chance to survive the war. There were several levels of Etat jobs. We did not expect either my brother or my mother to get a very high level position, but we were hoping for the best under the circumstances.

Shimon returned from the interview with Rumkowski very jubilant. He told us that Rumkowski, who was famous for his swinging moods, was apparently in an unusually good state of mind when they had met. He asked Shimon mainly about the composition of our family. As soon as Shimon told him, Rumkowski yelled out: “A mother, a brother, a sister and a grandmother, too? Oh, I’ll make sure that you get a good position!”

It took several months before Shimon was notified regarding a privileged job as a guard in a butcher cooperative. In the meantime a change had occurred in Shimon’s life. One evening, he told our mother that he and his fiancée, Shprintse, had decided to escape eastward to the Soviet occupied part of Poland. They had one problem, however: her parents, who were Khasidic Jews, wouldn’t hear about their daughter running off into the world with her fiancé before marriage. “So, mama, I would like to get your approval to marry the girl I love as soon as possible,” he said.

My mother expressed discontent. “First of all,” she said, “the year of mourning after father isn’t over yet… Secondly, you are not even nineteen years old, so you are too young to become a husband, let alone — a father. These are horrendous times and Jewish children are being condemned to death before they even have a chance to be born. Thirdly,” she asked, “how in the world could a young couple begin a decent marriage on ‘unstable footing’ — homeless, away from their families and without any of the material conditions necessary for a marriage to last?”

Shimon responded that he had known Shprintse for a long time, that he loved her dearly, that he must marry her soon, and that he could not live without her. My mother’s oldest and favorite son knew how to manipulate our mother.

So eventually, he had his way — but my mother managed to persuade him to postpone the wedding until the following spring. On March 27, 1941, the marriage between my brother and Shprintse took place in the bride’s home.

All of the attendees wore their best clothes – made before the war – for the occasion. Everyone looked very elegant and cheerful — that is, everyone but my mother. She sighed and cried a lot, mainly because my father had not lived long enough to share in the joy of seeing their son being married. Also, according to the religious custom followed by Shprintse’s father, my widowed mother could not escort her son under the khupe (wedding canopy) — because “as she was being a widow at the time she was not regarded as a married woman.” Eyl Mole Rakhamim (a prayer for the dead) was recited in the memory of my father and my mother cried again. Aunt Leytshe and Uncle Yosef accompanied Shimon under the canopy.

A wedding reception followed the ceremony. At the two long tables, with the bride and groom at the head of each table, sat the young couple’s parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts and uncles — a total of 45-50 individuals. We ate, sang, and prayed, and I recited a poem that I had written for the occasion.

The newly married couple got a room in the back of an old wooden, dilapidated building in the poorest and oldest section of Baluty. Before the war, this section (Fayferurke) was known as an area where the underworld and paupers resided. Both my mother and the mother of the bride, as well as several relatives of the young couple, tried their utmost to provide them with bedding, cooking utensils and other household items.

Shimon finally obtained the promised job (in a butcher’s cooperative); Shprintse, along with her twin sister Rozka, got jobs as seamstresses in a shirt factory. Very shortly afterward, the rest of Shprintse’s large family, the Zytenfelds, who did not have jobs and were therefore termed as “undesirables” (by the Nazis and by Rumkowski) — were deported to a concentration camp, and Rozka moved in with the young couple to live in their one bedroom apartment. I once overheard Shimon complaining to our mother that he and his newly married wife had lost the intimacy of marriage at a very early stage in their marriage. By that time, getting out of the ghetto had become virtually impossible.

On his privileged job, Shimon’s duty was to guard the lines for meat so that they moved in an orderly fashion and no one pushed in front of others. It was considered to be a third level etat job in the ghetto. Besides the special food allocations as a Government employee, he also received additional allocations of meat from the director of the cooperative. He also wore an armband with the blue Mogen Dovid (Star of David).

Shimon did not, however, hold this job for too long. A horrible experience almost cost him his life. It happened like this:

When Shimon was appointed to his new job, it was explained to him that his duties would be to make sure that the meat line moved in orderly fashion and that no one was allowed to push in front of others. It wasn’t explained to him that the police, firefighters and others wearing armbands — the privileged ghetto inhabitants — were exempt from these regulations. Shimon, a firm believer in justice, couldn’t see why the sick, skinny, undernourished and hard working ordinary people who could barely keep their equilibrium, should stand in line for hours; whereas the relatively well-to-do, well-fed, strong, privileged and not so hard-working ghetto elite should be allowed to get their meat rations without waiting in line for their turn. Shimon treated everyone equally, and didn’t allow anyone to push in front of others. The privileged, especially the police, didn’t appreciate his attitude, and repeatedly warned him that he would pay for his behavior.

One late afternoon, on a day that all the butcher cooperative employees received their special meat allocations, Shimon, who was heading home, was arrested by two policemen. He was charged with theft of meat. Inside the police station he was beaten up with blunt instruments and thrown into a jail cell, where they kept him until the director of the butcher store bailed him out. The director testified that he had personally given Shimon the meat and assured them that Shimon was a very honest young man.

Since the police station on Franciszkanska was practically across the street from us, after his release from jail, Shimon’s first stop was to our home. He told mama all that happened to him that afternoon. For the first time in my life, I saw Shimon crying like a baby. Mama was speechless and tended to his wounds. Soon thereafter, that meat cooperative was closed and my brother got another job as an attendant in a ghetto factory on Swiety Jakuba Street. Thus came the end to his special meat allocations, his armband and the special status.

Elek openly expressed resentment because mama had turned over her interview and thereby her potential good job to Shimon, who was sharing the allocations with his wife and his sister-in-law after his marriage — but not with us. Elek felt that if my mother or he had the better job, our whole family might have been in better circumstances and the job would have been more secure.

Shimon’s health rapidly declined — both physically and psychologically. It was heartbreaking to see this gorgeous looking young intellectual, chessmaster, excellent mathematician, talented caricature drawer, poetry lover and writer, and pre-war, Tsukunft-Shturem militiaman, reduced to an always hungry, and increasingly withdrawn person, continuously obsessed with searching for food. His eyes were now always wandering — looking to the ground, onto tables, or wherever — to find bread crumbs or anything else resembling food. He would pick up anything that came his way and shove it into his mouth. I could not understand what had happened to my older, handsome, talented and favorite brother, who had been my idol and my model. I couldn’t understand why he, who had more food than the rest of us (even if it wasn’t much more than we had), could become such a weak and helpless person. I felt both great pity and great resentment toward him.

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Daily Struggle

One day, my two cousins — Doved Yosef and Yakev Hersh (the sons of Aunt Khaye and Uncle Kive Chencinski) — were captured for Zwangsarbeit, tortured and returned barely alive. Uncle Kive came to the realization that they must run away from the savagery of the occupiers in Lodz. Though the family always lived modestly, Uncle Kive was quite a wealthy man prior to the war. He was the owner of two paint and glass stores in Lodz as well as of a glass manufacturing factory in the suburbs of the city. He served as the respected President of the Small Business Association, and was quite a knowledgeable man. Despite the differences in their political outlooks and in their religious beliefs (or disbelief), my mother and Uncle Kive were very devoted to one another and always seemed to enjoy one another’s company and advice. When his very large family — including their six children, two daughters-in-law, one son-in-law, and two grandchildren — left the city for the province-town Kalish, he invited us to come along. For some reason, it was decided that they would leave immediately, and take along some of our belongings on the hired horse-drawn wagons. We were to follow soon thereafter. Uncle Kive was born in Kalish, where his parents and some of his siblings were still residing. Like most of the people in Lodz, he believed then that it would be safer, that food would be more available and that survival would be more probable in the provinces.

Only two days after their departure, the Chencinski family returned – robbed of the horses, wagons and the belongings they had taken with them, including our luggage that they had taken along. They had also been severely beaten. Large sections of my uncle’s beard and my cousin’s mustache had been torn out — with the skin. They never even got halfway to their intended destination.

After they returned, they knocked at the door of their ‘good Polish neighbor’, with whom the family had maintained a close friendship for thirty odd years and had shared many joyous and sad occasions including their children’s births, circumcisions, christenings, communions, bar mitzvahs, marriages, illnesses, and other important events. Before my relatives left Lodz, they had left my aunt’s fur coat, my uncle’s fur jacket, golden watches, their silver candelabrums, cups, cutlery and other valuables with them for safekeeping. To their amazement, their devoted neighbor and friend of yesterday, now identified himself as a VolksDeutsh, was wearing an armband with a swastika and told them that “if they didn’t clear out immediately, their bodies would be removed from the premises” – meaning that they would be killed.

The coal, wood, potatoes, sugar, flour and other groceries that my mother had prepared at the outbreak of the war was of great help to the family during the first winter of the war. We used our supplies sparingly, but I believe that we were not as cold and desperate for food as were other starving people in the city (at least, not I personally). Since I refused to consume food or liquids that contained saccharin sweetener, the family decided that the small amount of sugar in the house should be saved for me (the youngest, pampered child).

Soon, these supplies came to an end. My 16 year-old brother Elek went into “business.” He started by buying loose tobacco and tissue papers, rolled these into cigarettes which he sold in the streets, chanting: “Papierosn — gute gemachte (well made cigarettes)!” His next endeavors were: selling some form of bread rolls made of chestnut flour, then homemade toffees, saccharin and other items. Elek tried to encourage Shimon and me to help him in this new endeavor. He put a little stool in front of our window, put the merchandise on top of the stool, taught us how to attract passersby with a sales pitch to buy the items and how much to charge.

Shimon categorically refused. He said that he “wasn’t going to become a street peddler.” I did not refuse, but I didn’t embrace my new role either. I, too, was actually embarrassed. Every time someone passed by, I imagined that I recognized a familiar face and felt uncomfortable about it. So I often tried to stand silently in front of the stool to hide the merchandise with my body and large shawl. I never actually told Elek or my mother how I felt about being a street salesperson, because though illegal, the sale of these items helped us subsist through the bad times and to survive for a while. If it weren’t for Elek, we wouldn’t have lasted very long.

In February, 1940, an order was issued by the German authorities that all the Jews living outside the area designated as the Jewish ghetto were to vacate their premises and move into the ghetto-area, and all the non-Jews residing within the perimeter of the designated ghetto, were to move out.

I watched my friend Marysia Krawczyk, her lovely mother Janina, her disgusting anti-Semitic father Jozef and her five-year old sister Sabcia, leave their tiny room under the staircase, across the hallway from our regular one-room apartment. I was choking back tears in my throat. Marysia and I had shared many intimate and interesting moments, and I felt very sad that she was moving away. I did not approach them, however, to say farewell, because my friend’s father, an alcoholic, known to be a member of the Polish Narodowa Demohracja (National Democracy – a Polish nationalist party similar to the Nazis), was walking right beside her. Before the war, on paydays (each Friday), Jozef used to stop in a bar on the way home from work, spend all his wages on vodka, turn the bottle over and pour it into his throat. When he eventually came home, he battered his wife, children and whoever else was under foot. He later blamed and cursed the Jews (including the poor working Jews) for his poverty, and did not allow his children to play with Jewish children. Whenever he was around, Marysia and I had to pretend that we were complete strangers. Had he found out about our friendship, he would have severely beaten her up. (About six months before the war, he had brutally beaten up his five-year-old Sabcia by kicking her in the belly, and the little child had to be brought by ambulance to the city hospital with a ruptured appendix.) For the same reason Marysia and Janina didn’t come over to say farewell and kiss me goodbye. We merely stared at each other with regret in our eyes, and each of us knew exactly what the other might have wanted to say and what remained unsaid.

At around the same time, my Aunt Surtshe, who resided with her husband and three teenage children in a luxurious and spacious apartment on Andrzeja Street, were forced to move into the overcrowded, and generally dilapidated part of the old city. They brought several pieces of furniture, kitchen utensils, clothing and some personal belongings with them, on a handcart or in their arms. My grandmother, who had returned home after she fully recuperated from her paralytic stroke, went one freezing day to help her daughter and family bring some of their belongings to their new living quarters that were assigned to them in the ghetto.

She managed to successfully walk for about a half-hour with the heavy load in her arms, but when she reached the corner of our street, she slipped on the ice and broke a leg in several places. Grandma, a strong 82 year-old woman, who could easily have passed as a gentile and taken the tramway, later claimed that she felt safer walking with the belongings in her arms than she would have felt using the forbidden public transportation system.

My grandmother spent several weeks in traction in a big hospital. When she was brought home she was still bedridden — in a cast and in traction. It took her at least six months to have the cast removed and to be able to stand up. I loved my grandmother dearly and helped her as much as possible through the difficult period in her life. I sponge-bathed her, tried to keep the area under the cast clean, frequently fed her and I somehow managed to bring her outdoors for fresh air. When she was ready to stand up, I was training her step-by-step to walk again. At first, I did it by pulling a chair in front of her with her holding on to the chair, thus teaching her to just take a few steps. As she progressed, I held her tightly around her waist with her whole weight leaning on me. Gradually my grandmother was able to walk alone with a cane.

My mother’s two sisters, Surtshe and Khaye, often brought cooked meals for their mother. Grandma used to pretend that she had just eaten something and would ask my mother to save the fresh warm food her daughters brought her “for later”. She did that deliberately so that my aunts would not complain about grandmother sharing the meal they brought for her with my mother, with me, or my brothers. My mother used to beg her, “Mother, don’t do that! Your daughters are bringing the food for you, and you ought to eat it!” But my grandmother insisted that if she did not share the meal with her daughter and grandchildren, she would end up choking on the food, and that if she couldn’t share the delicious food with us, she would rather not get it at all.

My Aunt Laytshe used to join the throng of young men, women and children digging for sunken bits and pieces of coal, wood and coal dust in the old garbage dumps and places where there had once been coal magazines. She would bring some of her finds in a little bundle and share these with my family. Once, my aunt took me along to participate in the dig. I had the opportunity to observe her, and all others who were squatting, kneeling, sitting or Iying down on the hard ground — with spoons, knives, forks, spatulas, hooks and other primitive tools or utensil that they could get hold of. They would continuously dig, search, and sift in the mud, and collect their meager finds in little bundles. The finds were minimal, the labor was extremely demanding and the dig was generally unrewarding. One had to be very determined by nature to do it. To share these finds with others, one had to be very loving and willing to sacrifice. Of course, my Aunt Leytshe had always been a most unusually good-hearted individual, a truly righteous person who would share her last morsel of food with others who were needy. She would surely, even at the risk of losing her own life, do anything possible to help my mother, my grandmother and me. Her husband, uncle Yosef, whose horse and droshkes had been confiscated, was then in his middle sixties. He now had to carry heavy sacks and luggage on his back to earn a living. Despite extreme food deprivation, he too was willing — until his last breath — to share with me the little food he had.

After soup kitchens were organized throughout the ghetto, I would often go to the backyard of the kitchen on Lutomierska 2, where Khaver (Comrade) Angielczyk, the father of one of my school friends and a leader of the Textile Workers’ Union, was distributing coupons for soup. Since my father had been a member of that union, my family was entitled to receive soup allocations. It’s possible that Khaver Angielczyk was treating our family a little more favorably than some others.

After one obtained the coupons, it was necessary to stand in line when the soups were ready to be distributed, but that was handled by other members of my family.

One afternoon, when I returned from school, I found my grandmother very excited. She triumphantly told me how she had deceived two policemen who came to search our living quarters. “They were searching in every corner, in every drawer and every pocket in the closets,” she said. “In one of the pockets they found the little purse with the secret pocket that Shimon made before the war.”

Actually there was a trick to opening the little secret pocket. One had to hold two sides together and pull threads apart with other fingers. Everyone in our household, including my grandmother, knew how to pry that little purse open. “In order to divert their attention from whatever they were searching for, I pretended that I didn’t know how to open it. I merely told them that as far as I know, my grandson is the only person who knows how to open it, and that he is claiming that there was a magic trick to it!” The two policemen were intrigued by the ‘magic purse’ and were curious about the treasure it held — a worthless monetary Polish silver coin. In the meantime they had forgotten what they actually came to fmd in our home.”

Actually there was a trick to opening the little secret pocket. One had to hold two sides together and pull threads apart with other fingers. Everyone in our household, including my grandmother, knew how to pry that little purse open. “In order to divert their attention from whatever they were searching for, I pretended that I didn’t know how to open it. I merely told them that as far as I know, my grandson is the only person who knows how to open it, and that he is claiming that there was a magic trick to it!” The two policemen were intrigued by the ‘magic purse’ and were curious about the treasure it held — a worthless monetary Polish silver coin. In the meantime they had forgotten what they actually came to fmd in our home.”

The following day, my Uncle Kive (as well as his son Shmul Nute, the accountant in his father’s glass and paint businesses until the war broke out), was arrested by the police and taken into the KRIPO (German Police Station). They were kept there several days, and were being interrogated and severely beaten with various instruments in a room surrounded by mirrors. There, they were “persuaded” to disclose where they had hidden their treasures. We now understood why our home was searched. Actually some of Uncle’s “treasures”, cans of paint, had been hidden in our cellar (underneath the house where the coal and some food supplies had once been kept). Evidently somebody who knew our relationship with the Chencinskis, denounced us. My dear Buba’s strategy in detaining them from further search saved uncle from more extreme torture and from being deprived of the cans of paint which he later sold on the blackmarket in order to get money to purchase bread and other necessities for the family to survive.

My brother Elek once came up from the basement with two cans of paint in his hands. When my mother questioned and scolded him for stealing our uncle’s goods, my brother claimed that if we were risking our own lives for Uncle Kive, uncle could surely spare a few cans of paint to save us from starvation too. An hour later he returned with some food. My mother disapproved of Elek’s deed, but my grandmother, Shimon and I thought that he had the perfect right to do it.

One day a boy came in to our home and hand-delivered a message from my brother Elek:

“Mama, Please forgive me for leaving you at such a tragic time, but I just have to do it. I feel that I have no other choice. I am leaving Lodz hoping to reach Nute in Pruzany!

It was a difficult decision. I am leaving with a heavy heart and a lot of guilt, but I feel compelled to do it! Again, there is no other way for me!

With great love,
Elek.”

And Elek, once thought of as a mischievous, “problematic” child, Elek who had become a most devoted son and brother, and had become instrumental in our day by day survival, was gone from the scene. Though it was a bitter pill to swallow, no one blamed him for his determination to escape the horror under the Nazis and to save his own skin.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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School — Part 2

Our own teachers maintained a distance from the new teachers who were forced upon us. One day, when we were ordered to come to the schoolyard to pose for a school photograph, they demonstrated their dislike toward them openly. We were all congregated in front of the school, waiting for our teachers to join us, but they merely walked by and did not participate in the picture taking. We wanted to follow them, but it was too late – the photographer hurriedly snapped a photo. And we felt — ashamed.

In our repeat of the sixth grade, a fourth girl — Rutka Dombrowska, a physically unusually well developed adolescent who always laughed a lot — became one of our intimate friends. Based on a Polish story, “Nasza Trojka W Lasach Beskidu,” (“The Three of Us in the Woods of Beskidy Mountains”) we stabbed our fingers with a needle, squeezed some blood onto a sheet of white paper and mixed our blood together into the shape of a heart. Then we artfully inscribed the name of our newly formed “sisterhood,” SHAFER inside the heart, formed from the abbreviations of our names. We signed our names and used this page as the cover page for a journal we kept. We revealed our most intimate thoughts, dreams, ideals and personal secrets — both to one another and in the journal. Since we thought that our aims were great and that it would be beneficial to spread our ideals to others, we later expanded our circle to include several other youngsters from our class. Among our aims were the following: to provide excellent orphan homes and to build a just, equal society for everyone.

At first, Rutka was fun to be with. She revealed to us her knowledge of developmental sex differences, which were largely hidden from us until then. Soon, however, I became disenchanted with her and it was difficult for me to embrace her as a friend any longer. I thought that she was extremely loud, laughed too much when it wasn’t called for, was constantly preoccupied with sex, mocked others, and was very boisterous and unreliable. One day she blasted out – aloud — about my puppy love for a boy in our school. I was very upset about it, and in protest, I left our SHAFER circle and never rejoined. I still loved Feygele Falc and Sorele Olsztejn, both very intelligent and decent girls, but I made the decision to leave the group if Rutka remained part of it. I believe that Feygele and Sorele were still fascinated by Rutka because she satisfied their curiosity about their bodily development, the menstrual cycle and desire for boys. Rutka was infatuated with Geniek Boczkowski, one of our two young teachers, and she showed it whenever she had the opportunity. Sorele, Feygele and I were different.

I was invited by my new close friends, three beautiful but modest girls — Rivkele Shuman, Esther Chaimowicz and Libe Zelmanowicz — and three short but most adorable boys — Leybele Bornsztajn, Abramek Szalewicz and Szmulek Ber — to organize a drama club. The drama club met in the one-room, walk down apartment where Rivkele lived with her mother. We liked this meeting place because it was very close to school, only a few houses from the Dworska gate. We were able to use the gate to cross Zgierska Streets, though using an alternative route from school.

Rivkele’s mother made us feel most comfortable in their home. We spent two or three hours daily there, several times a week, in a world of make believe. Each one of us – individually, in twos or larger groups — gave presentations of poetry reading, story telling, dancing, singing, or play-acting. We were also rehearsing for a large open performance, which never came to be. It was a very jolly place. Whenever we met there, it became a place full of laughter. This drama club became our escape from the daily hunger, drudgery and tragedy around us, but in addition to that, it was also a source of important educational nourishment. On our lengthy walks to and from the drama club, we often discussed Yiddish and Polish books – including certain literary translations from other languages. During the last phase of the drama club’s existence, our favorite discussions were centered on sex education. The translated Yiddish version of the German book “Knabe-Mädchen” about maturation, physical development, sexual relationships and pregnancy — became the most popular topic of our conversations.

Often, we visited our sick friends. Among them was Marylka Lustigman, who lived in a tiny, narrow attic room with her mother (and according to one friend’s version — her father, too. I actually never met him and thought that he had escaped to the Soviet occupied territories of Poland.) Her older sister, who had been at the time of the outbreak of the war in the Medem Sanatorium, had remained there, because she was unable to return home. Marylka had pleurisy and water on both lungs. We were very sorry for her, but we were unable to help her other than to try to cheer her up.

Despite the fact that death was lurking at our doorstep every minute of every day, life still seemed to be bearable as long as we were attending school. Among my hardships at that time, during the bitter cold winter mornings, seemed to be getting out of bed, changing my clothes in our unheated home and combing my long hair with a frozen steel comb. Quite often, my grandmother would put the comb and the clothing I was to going to wear that day under her bed covers, and also rubbed them with her hands — to warm them up. Many people were telling us about ghetto inhabitants who actually froze to death in their beds and in the streets.

One afternoon, instead of a regular singing lesson with Geniek Boczkowski, he arranged a free singing class. Anyone, who wanted, could present a song. Some of the songs were sung solo, some in duets, and others by the whole gathering. We were standing in a circle around the popular Geniek, who loved to sing. One of his favorites was “Di Krenitze” (The Well). We all sang along. Suddenly, he began to sing in Polish “Czuway” (Guard) — a song we never heard before — about a prisoner who gradually filed through the prison bars of his cell, and when he finally jumped through the window toward the long awaited freedom, a gunshot rang out and he was killed. As he fell to the ground, his blood scattered around him in the white snow. The prison guards, indifferent to the fate of the man, continued the watchword “Czuway!”

I was standing next to Mumek Morgentaler. I noticed him wiping his eyes. His face was tear-stained. I pretended not to have noticed his emotions, because I was uncertain what his reaction would be had he been aware that I knew that he cried. Mumek’s father was a Trade Union leader in Lodz, and as such, he had been among the first arrested hostages who were executed by the Germans in Radogoszcz.

Our school, along with the all other ghetto schools, was permanently closed in or round the late spring of 1941. Of the sixty-two children from the two classes, only 8 survived the war, one of whom died soon after from complications of a disease contracted in a concentration camp. To the best of my knowledge, only 2 children from the lower class survived.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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School — Part 1

I do not remember exactly when my Medem Shul opened that autumn, but I do recall that when we came back to school, many of the children and most of the teachers were missing. After the war, I heard that Lerer (Teacher) Lozowski — our school principal and teacher of music and mathematics had run away to the Soviet Union, where he was arrested, “found guilty” of “conspiring” against their state, and lived through the war in one of their prisons. (Prior to the war, Lerer Lozowski had written a pamphlet criticizing the communist system in Russia). Lerer Shloyme Melman (teacher of history and literature) and his wife Lererin (Female Teacher) Yitke Lazar (teacher of Yiddish and Yiddish Literature), had fled to Warsaw with their son Yos, and became active there in the underground movement (the Joint Distribution Committee). After the ghetto uprising in the Capital of Poland, the three of them were hidden in a Bunker. Near the end of the war, the Pole who had been hiding them had a fight with his paramour and, following their fight, she denounced him to the German authorities that he was hiding Jews. As a result, the Pole, along with everyone who had been hidden in the bunker, was forced outside the building and shot on the spot.

Another teacher, Leyb Fridman, who also fled to Warsaw, had similarly become active in the underground movement. He shared the plight of the children and teachers of the Medem Sanatorium (that is, liquidation of that facility, deportation and annihilation). Lererin G. Muster-Shuster had fled to Krakow and was active in the underground movement over there. I assume that the other teachers — Lonia Joskowicz, Moyshe Elentuch, E. Chardak, I.B. Grundman, Berta Winograd and Eva Kozlowska — as well as the many school children who had not returned to school, had either fled to other towns and villages in the Nazi occupied territories, across the border to the Soviet Union, or died on the roads under the hail of bombs.

Only two of our pre-war teachers were left in Lodz and continued teaching at our school — Lererin Khane Kirshnboym and Lererin Halina Bornstein. Teacher Kirshnboym (teacher of mathematics and Geography) became the new headmaster. Heniek Morgentaler and Geniek Boczkowski, two pre-war alumni from our school, joined the teaching staff. Geniek became the teacher of singing and geography, and Heniek — of Yiddish, Yiddish literature and the German language. The two teachers who remained from the pre-war period covered all other subjects: math, history, health, home economics, etc.

For a short time, our school classes resumed in the old school premises, but soon we were forced to move from the city to new quarters that had previously, prior to the war, been occupied by a school for the deaf and mute. The new quarters were within the area designated as the Jewish ghetto.

I remember very little from the time when we were still in the old quarters. What stands out in my mind is the fact that we used different routes to and from school, and that we thought that we had found a marvelous solution to some of our problems of being degraded by the Nazis. In order to avoid bowing and stepping off the sidewalk to pay “respect” to the “superior” German nationals, we decided to walk on the pavement, alongside the horses, trolleys and autos. We felt that we were beating the inhumane system we had become subjects of and were very proud of it.

I also remember that on the day I returned to school after my father’s funeral, the children and teachers were unusually kind to me. I spent a lot of time at the wide school window, imagining that I could see my father up in heaven. I believed that I could communicate with him in silence. I just could not accept the reality that I would never see or hear him again, and the imagined communication with my father helped me somehow to cope with my bad fortune.

By Passover, 1940, the Litzmannstadt (Lodz) Ghetto was surrounded by barbed wire and soon thereafter the gates were permanently sealed (for most of us forever). Inside the cage, we became subjects to the whims of a Jewish madman willing in his zeal to rule over others to cooperate with our enemies. On the outside we were surrounded by a brutal military giant who claimed racial and national superiority, derived pleasure in torturing us and had the ultimate intent to destroy us completely. Our pride and interest in learning then dissipated. What interest could we have — during that period of confinement to the small, congested area, confrontation with hunger, disease and death — in learning the geography of the Delta of the Nile, or the history of military conquests by kings thousands of years earlier? We were certain of the ultimate defeat of the ferocious savages occupying the land and would have been happy to carry arms against them, but the unique circumstances of the Lodz ghetto did not allow us that prospect. So we found consolation in maintaining hope, and in having the strength and courage to endure. To talk about insignificant distant geographical locations or historical events seemed to us irrelevant. Yet, we were interested in learning and in continuing our schooling – both for social and educational reasons.

To get to our new school premises, located in the eastern part of the ghetto, most of us had to get across dangerous intersections on Zgierska or Limanowskiego Streets. These roads belonged to the non-Jews. Tramways, motorcycles, and other means of transportation carried Poles and Germans through this ghetto area, although the Jews occupied the housing in these streets. We had to walk across either by passing one of the high wooden bridges or through the gates that were at times opened for us to speedily get through. In either case, it was a risky endeavor. In addition to the barbed wire on both sides of these streets, there were German guards constantly watching — us as well as the Poles — to make certain that nobody trespasses or smuggles in any goods. The guards often found it amusing to utilize their power with their rifles in order to harass and intimidate us, and often — to kill us.

Since our classrooms were much smaller in our ghetto school, and because of the shortage in teachers, our classes had to be combined. We also did not have any teaching materials and teaching aids or access to the science laboratories, zoos and parks in order to further our knowledge. Thus the level of education suffered greatly. The curriculum was reduced to a bare minimum.

The biggest advantages of going to school were: It was warm there, whereas in our homes we were freezing; We were fed there, whereas at home our bellies were convulsing from hunger; We could escape there, into a world of play, games, fantasy and at the same time be stimulated to acquire some new information, whereas at home one could not escape the reality of the war. Being together during the school hours -while learning, playing and laughing — enabled us to temporarily forget the miseries of daily life in the ghetto. We considered that a big blessing.

Part of our curriculum became gardening which replaced the sciences. It helped us to both learn about agriculture as well as to gain additional food. We embraced the subject of gardening with open arms. Most of us, being city children, had never even seen an actual vegetable garden, and we thought that it was a rather interesting experience to grow these vegetables ourselves. We performed our gardening work with great joy, while singing, laughing and joking.

During the summer of 1940, I became very attached to two school mates — Sorele Olsztajn (a daughter of a pre-war factory owner) and Feygele Falc (who was a friend of mine since kindergarten, but because we had previously resided in different parts of the city, we were unable to maintain a close friendship after school hours). The three of us shared our most intimate thoughts, feelings and secrets, and studied together for the entrance exam to the newly formed ghetto gimnazye (high school) that we were hoping to be accepted into after the summer break.

To everybody’s surprise, not one of the three of us passed the entrance exam with high enough marks, so our aspirations to enter high school were shattered. According to rumors, only students with remarkably high grades and very “big protektzye” (connections) had a chance to enter the ghetto high school – which had room for only a few. Our school principal, teacher Kirsznbojm allowed the three of us, and a few other students, to remain in school for another year. Since there was no longer a seventh grade, we had to repeat sixth grade. Actually, I preferred the children in this class, because we were closer in age. In our previous class I had been — one, two and even three years younger than most of the children. That was because I had been one of three children who had been skipped from kindergarten to second grade, and because some children failed to be promoted to the higher grades and had to repeat the class several times. I never felt comfortable with our age differences.

Although we had divided into several cliques, the new class as a whole was generally very cooperative. Both the children and teachers were concerned for one another. Some children, who had previously attended the now closed Borochov shul in Lodz, became students in our school. Of these, two girls in particular — Rozka Rapaport and Bela Schwajcer — became our new close friends.

I cannot forget one incident, when Lererin Kirsznbojm stopped me in the corridor and asked me: “Feygele, do you still have to be begged and coaxed to eat something?”

“No, Lererir’ Kirsznbojm.” I answered embarrassed that she too knew what a poor eater I had once been. “I wish I had enough food, any food to fill my stomach!”

One event of student solidarity remains engraved in my memory. Our young teacher Geniek Boczkowski punished Kisek Grundman with suspension from school for a lengthy period of time — for some “delinquent behavior.” Although we agreed that Kisek had behaved inappropriately, we believed that the punitive measure was excessive. We were not concerned about Kisek’s loss of schooling; we were rather agitated about our friend being deprived of the essential food that we received in school. We were convinced that the punishment was, under the circumstances, too severe. So, the whole class walked out in protest and stayed out for the following two days in the schoolyard — also being deprived of our food allocation — until Kisek was allowed to return to school.

Soon, three new teachers appeared on the scene. They were appointed to their positions by the Ghetto Board of Education. One was an assimilated Jew, who spoke to us in the Polish language only. He came in as the new headmaster but we thought of him as a Commissar. Another teacher, whom we considered as a very comical and pitiful provincial caricature, taught us Hebrew. He had come from a provincial southern town, spoke an ungrammatical Yiddish in a strange dialect, mixing in many foreign words, and his mannerism invited a lot of ridicule. The third new teacher was a woman who taught us Bible Studies — prayers, religious hymns and about the greatness and benevolence of “a just God, who was leading the Jews.” Of the three teachers, we eventually accepted the new headmaster, who had a great sense of humor and knew how to influence children. Because we liked him, we felt like traitors toward our own long time teachers. The other two new teachers we considered pathetic beings. They had absolutely no sense of humor and no influence on us at all.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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My Father’s Death

It was a cold and cloudy October evening. The table was set for five because my grandmother had suffered a stroke two days earlier while visiting Aunt Leytshe and was recuperating there after her “mekhutn” (relative by marriage), Moszkovicz Feltsher, miraculously saved her by “cutting bankes.” This is a procedure in which an incision is made to draw blood into a cup called a “banke.”

The four of us were sitting around the table waiting for my father to return after a day of Zwangsarbeit. We were anxious, restless and continually glancing at father’s empty chair. Though we were very hungry, and the meal was ready, we would not start eating the meal without father at the head of the table—as was customary in “good” Jewish families in Poland.

I turned toward mother – mainly to break the silence: “Mama, why is father not home yet? He always returns much, much earlier!” Everyone else knew that it was late for father to return from Zwangsarbeit and also seemed to be concerned. No one knew why, but no one else asked questions. We sat there in silence — worried and anguished.

Mama was constantly getting up, nervously walking to and from the kitchen, and continually tasting the food on the stove — pretending to be adding once again the final touches to the meal. The aroma from the food was very inviting. I picked up a half-knitted sock that grandma had started, and began to move the five knitting needles as grandma had taught me, but my hands were shaking and I was unable to concentrate on the work — so I soon put it back down. My older brother, Shimon, closed the book that he had pretended to be reading, crossed his legs, half closed his eyes and became lost in deep thought. Elek, who had returned from Zwangsarbeit about one and a half hours earlier, stood up, walked over to the window and remained on the lookout for father coming home.

The silence, restlessness, monotony and worry were growing with every passing minute. Though I was a by nature a fairly happy girl — lively and full of laughter, — I recognized the gravity of the situation; but I believed that the door would soon open, father would enter and our family would once again start the meal in a pleasant atmosphere.

The door opened slowly. Barely moving, holding on to the doorframe, my father entered. He was bent, his face was unusually pale and he was very unsteady on his feet. He was hardly able to remain standing. I thought that father’s appearance and expression had changed an awful lot since the previous evening, when I last saw him. His gray hair seemed to be grayer, his pale face – paler and thinner, and the creases on his forehead were deeper.

Highly alarmed, we all ran toward the door and helped father to be seated at the table. Mother asked him what happened. We were staring at him with great curiosity and concern. Father realized that we were all hungry and suggested that we start eating dinner. Eventually five spoons were dipped into the plates of soup in front of us. Not much of the food was consumed, however. Father merely smelled the delicious food, tasted it and returned the spoon to the table. His hand fell down powerless, and with a weak voice he whispered: “Please, Rukhtshe, get my bed ready for me to lie down. I feel circles in front of my eyes; my head is spinning and pounding; my whole body is shaking, and I have terrible stomach cramps.”

Mama immediately fixed his bed. After she helped him change his clothes, she tucked him in and brought him a cup of tea. Soon father was resting — but not for very long. He was up and about — moaning and groaning due to diarrhea and excruciating cramps.

My brother Shimon went to fetch the doctor. When they eventually arrived (quite some time later), the doctor explained that he had to attend to many sick people that evening. My brother later told us that he had been running around from one part of town to another throughout the city until he eventually found this doctor.

My mother stayed at father’s bedside, and we remained close by. We were anxious to find out what the doctor had to say about my father’s condition. After the doctor examined him, he said something in a whisper to my mother and Shimon. I was unable to understand the conversation, but I thought that I overheard something about an epidemic of Dysentery being rampant in the city.

My father was continually throwing up and relieving himself in a pail that was kept in a distant corner of the room. Throughout the night, he was running, moaning, holding his stomach and complaining of excruciating cramps. I had never seen my father in such a helpless state. I tried to cheer him up with funny jokes, but my mother told me to be quiet and not to bother him.

In the morning, my mother packed some of my belongings and took me over to Aunt Leytshe’s home. On the way there, she explained to me that this was just for my safety – in case father’s illness was contagious. She also told me to be careful, because I would have to share the bed with my sick grandmother who was recuperating from the paralytic stroke.

Although my grandmother was bedridden, weak, and hardly able to utter any words, we knew that she was going to recover. She was already able to move all limbs slightly and was gradually regaining the ability to speak. I tried to be very still when I was in bed with her, since I was afraid that I might hurt her and worsen her illness.

For the next seven days, I did not get to see my parents, or my brothers. I was instructed not to come home until I got permission to return. I couldn’t understand why I was the only one to be removed from the house every time there was fear of a contagious disease (as at the time when my brothers had scarlet fever); why in this case, might there be a danger for me and not for my brothers

My mother did not come in to Aunt Leytshe’s home after she left me there, though I sometimes noticed her peeking through the window— to see me, grandmother, and my Aunt and Uncle. On the eighth day, mama came in, kissed each of us, and told us that she was going to take me home. She explained that father had been admitted to the hospital because his intestines may have gotten twisted from the diarrhea and that the doctor might have to perform an emergency operation on that day. On the way home, mama told me that father did not want to go to the hospital without seeing his little girl beforehand, but that his condition had deteriorated to the point that it could not be delayed. She also assured me that her friend, Ms. Engel, who was working on the floor where father would be staying, was going to take excellent care of him.

I hardly slept that night. The other three in the room (mother and my two brothers) probably did not sleep at all. At a certain moment, I heard Shimon fall over something in the room. When my mother asked him what time it was, he said that it was exactly two o’clock. “Oh”, my mother exclaimed, “I feel that Shimon’s fall was a bad omen! I have a premonition that something terrible has happened to father!”

In the morning, as the clock struck 6:30, we heard a tap on our windowpane. My mother quickly jumped off the bed and ran toward the window. As soon as she opened the shutters and took one look at Ms. Engel, she let out a hysterical scream: “Children, you no longer have a father!”

Evidently my mother, who understood the seriousness of my father’s illness, recognized our tragedy as soon as she noticed her friend’s facial expression.

Sobbing broke out in all corners of the room. Ms. Engel, who was standing outside in half-darkness, was trying to calm my mother: “Rukhtshe Infeld, your husband was operated on. He was brought out of the operating room just before 2:00 in the morning. He woke up from the anesthesia and asked me how soon he could see you and the children. He begged me to stop over on the way home to tell you that he loved you very much, and that he wanted you and the children to come to see him as soon as possible.

My mother, though she knew her friend as a very honest person and tried to believe her words, but she had picked up the other woman’s body language. Ms. Engel’s posture, her downward looking eyes, and sloping shoulders told her more about my father’s state than her words.

As soon as the curfew was over, my mother and Shimon went off to see father. Before they left, mama asked Elek to take good care of me and not to come to the hospital until she sent for us. But we did not obey. As soon as we got dressed, we ran over to the hospital.

My mother’s premonition was right. When Elek and I came to the stairs of the hospital, we found my brokenhearted mother and shattered brother Shimon, who had been waiting there for nearly an hour, coming down the stairs devastated with their heads drooping down. Our mother merely stared at us. She was apparently unable to utter a word. At last, Shimon told us that instead of being allowed passes to visit our father, they were told that Bernard Infeld woke up from the anesthesia but died a few minutes later, at 2:00 A.M., and that his body had been moved to the hospital morgue in the back of the hospital. We all walked toward the small gate in the back, but we had to wait till eight o’clock to be allowed in. As we waited, I leaned my head on my mother’s breast, but she did not pay any attention to me.

When the small gate in the back was opened and we were allowed to enter, they pointed out where my father’s body was. We passed by a corner with show-windows around it. One could not help noticing a young boy in a Polish military uniform, laid out on a table. Nobody came to view his body.

I didn’t cry like the rest of my family. I just felt as if heavy loads were pressing against my chest and my head. “Does that mean that now, at ten years, I am an orphan without a father?” I thought. “How could that be, how was it possible that my handsome, intelligent father, who was alive just yesterday, had departed us forever?” I could not accept the fact that I would not see my father alive again; that he would not hold me on his lap, test my knowledge of math, teach me the German language and German poetry (as he had in the past); that he would no longer check my school work and the neatness of my notebooks and nod disapprovingly if he found ink spots; that I would not see his proud, shining face, expressing pride after testing me on these subjects; and that I would not hear him singing again “nigunim” (songs without words) from his childhood.

We entered the tiny cool chamber. My mother bent down on the ground beside my father, and uncovered his face to see whether it was really he. There he was — on the cold stony floor — with open eyes and an open mouth. His face was cold and yellow like clay. The rest of the body, under the black cover seemed to have shrunken.

A new wave of tears covered the tiny chamber. I was now weeping too. I felt a sharp wound had opened that would never heal. Of course, the biggest impact of his death was on my mother who stared at him for a long, long time, observing his every feature — until she eventually covered his lips with hers. Shimon forcefully removed her from his body and the chamber. He indicated that I, a child, was around and that the scene was shocking and devastating to me.

Shimon soon went to make arrangements for father’s fmal rites and burial. My mother reminded him to make certain that they knew at the Rabbinate that the deceased was Berish Infeld from Piatek, the son of Reb Shimon, the Alexander Khosid. I could not understand why this suddenly became so important. My father never spoke about his yikhes and despised the strict upbringing in his home and at the Yeshiva. He referred to the learning of Torah as: “filling up heads with sawdust.” Elek said that because of his family ties, my father would be buried in a privileged grave – in an important section on a main road of the cemetery.

Despite the danger of being hailed with stones by the Poles who resided in a nearby area outside the Jewish cemetery, my father had a traditional and relatively large funeral. After the funeral, we sat down on low stools (as is traditional during the “Shive” week of mourning after the funeral) and Aunt Leytshe fed us with bagels and margarine. My father’s sister, Reysye, who had been estranged from my mother for many years, also sat with us. Whatever grudge had kept them apart in the past, seemed to have left them. After approximately 24 hours, my mother, declared that due to the abnormal circumstances of the war and contrary to tradition — Shive must be over and that we must now find a way to get on with our lives.

Although my father’s death is forever engraved in my memory as a personal tragedy, to me it also marks the beginning of our national tragedy, particularly, the suffering by the most innocent Jewish children in the German occupied territories This suffering has no comparison in the history of mankind.

I realized — for the first time — that despite the fact that the universe was so huge, our lives were so limited and constricted; that the sun does not shine for everybody. I thought that my father’s death was a multiple tragedy: for the first time in my life, I was feeling the pain of an orphan; my worry-free childhood thoughts and dreams had now evaporated; and though I didn’t know it then, this was the beginning of many more personal tragedies. My father was the first victim of the war among our large, extended family in Lodz. He died on the second of November, 1939, two months after the outbreak of World War II. More than five and a half years of suffering were yet to come.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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In the Beginning — Part 2

When the German army was about to enter the city, the active members of the Jewish Labor Bund were asked by its leaders (those who hadn’t yet fled from the city) to destroy anything in their possession pertaining to the organization — lists of its members and committees, or any other documents or photographs that might fall into German hands. My mother burned many items but three particular portraits remained — of Karl Marx, I. Chmurner and Israel Lichtenstein. I remember her handing these portraits to my brother’s fiancée, pleading: “Shprintse, these were the three Socialist leaders that I have revered and idealized throughout my lifetime — since I was a teenager. I just cannot destroy the portraits of these personalities myself! So, please, Shprintse, dispose of them — by burning them, burying them in the ground or by whatever means necessary!”

Jews were singled out for “special treatment” from the very onset of the German occupation. According to their master plan, we were to be gathered in concentration centers and eventually — completely annihilated. That plan was labeled by the Nazis as “the final solution to the Jewish problem. “

Immediately, the German occupiers in uniforms and the civilian Volksdeutchen (Poles of German descent) began to plunder Jewish homes, factories, stores and businesses — and to kill. Torture of the Jewish population became their favorite sport. Public hangings, mass shootings, book burning, desecration of the synagogues and cemeteries, crawling, whipping and side-curl “shearing parties” – all became daily occurrences. No place was off limits – these events occurred on streets, in houses of prayer and in private homes. Their favorite targets were people with “handicaps” — short, hunchbacked and hook-nosed Jews, wearing Yibetzes, Tsitses and Peyes (traditional clothing and adornments) – who were forced to crawl, stand, run, climb and pose in the most ridiculous and compromising positions. Often they would have to hang their tsitses on crosses of churches, while they were being mocked, ridiculed and photographed — so that the Hitler Youth in Germany could learn what “the typical Jew of Poland”, the “major enemy of the Reich”, looked like. The religious Jews were not the only targets, and it was common for these “sporting” events to culminate in massacres. The Poles were often happy to join in these activities

Jews were captured in the streets, dragged from their beds, and driven away to forced labor — many never to return. Some were forced to dig “trenches” into which they would fall dead when they were shot after they had finished digging their own graves.

The Germans drafted the remainder of the Jewish Community Council members into the a council or Judenrat (better known in Lodz as Beirat). They found an ideal pawn in Khaim Rumkowski, whom they designated as the Altester der Juden (elder of the Jews) in “Litzmannstadt” (Lodz, renamed in German) – to help them carry out their demonic plan.

As early as the tenth of October, 1939, the Germans demanded that the Judenrat deliver to them a daily contingent of six hundred young Jews for Zwangsarbeit (forced labor). Khaim Rumkowski and the Judenrat obliged them. Allegedly this voluntary cooperation with the German authorities was to spare the Jewish population from the daily and ostensibly unexpected abductions that would have otherwise occurred at the hands of the German soldiers, for the purpose of obtaining “slave labor”. Every day Jews from another section of the city were “invited” to deliver themselves to a given point in the city for Zwangsarbeit. Woe was to those who failed to report on time. The additional abductions did not, however, cease either and the sadistic torture parties continued. As previously mentioned, the main interest of the perpetrators in capturing Jews was in the sadistic pleasure of ridiculing and torturing the victims.

The most respected and beloved leaders of the Jewish community -leaders of labor unions, various political parties, rabbis and other community organizations – were arrested as hostages — their lives, the Germans claimed, would be sacrificed in exchange for any disobedience on our part. Among those arrested were many friends of my parents and parents of my school friends. These hostages were at first gathered in a prison in Lodz, later taken to a concentration center in nearby Radogoszcz, where they were tortured. Most of them were executed by firing squads soon thereafter.

The terror tactics and edicts were increasing daily.

Jews were required to bow and step off the sidewalk for anyone in a German uniform or with a swastika armband. In some parts of the city where many Jews resided — including Piotrkowska Street, which was the main street in the center of the city — Jews were not allowed to walk altogether. They were also forbidden to appear in certain non-Jewish quarters. Jews were forbidden to trade with non-Jews, to use public restaurants, theaters, parks, public or privately owned means of transportation, to buy in non-Jewish stores, or to have any form of relationship or dealings with their non-Jewish neighbors.

All Jewish properties, jewelry, gold, silver, furs, radios and other valuables were confiscated.

In order to be easily distinguished from the rest of the population, Jews from the age of ten on, were required to wear “Gele Lates” (Star of David patches) — one in front and one in the back of their outer garrnents. Large “Derken Zeichens” (Star of David signs) had to be displayed in the shop windows of all stores owned by Jews. Non-Jews were to boycott these stores. A special ransom tax was also instituted.

Many rumors were circulating among the population, on one hand about German plans for the “final solution to the Jewish problem” and on the other hand about “redemption by the allied forces.”

Fear, expectation of the unknown and survival became the daily way of life for the remaining Jews of Lodz (Litzmannstadt). Many of the older city dwellers constantly spoke of their experiences during World War I, made comparisons, and acted based on past experiences. As my father had predicted, many of those who had earlier escaped to villages and small towns (where they believed that it would be safer, more peaceful and easier to get food from surrounding farms), and many of those who went further east — were killed on the roads. Some managed to return to Lodz, some were arrested or were stuck on the border between Germany and the Soviet Union.

The shelves in the food stores, wood and coal magazines, and other shops selling essentials, had been emptied as soon as the news of the German attack on Poland was announced. Some people were, from the very onset, condemned to starvation and freezing. The groceries, potatoes and heating supplies that some people had managed to stock up in their homes at the outbreak of the war did not last very long.

In order to have the slightest opportunity to purchase bread, we had to get up at 2:00-3:00 in the morning, leave like thieves through windows, move quietly alongside the buildings in the dark of night and risk our lives during curfew-time, to be shot on the spot. Then, we would stand for hours shivering from bitter cold; eventually to be thrown out of the bread line — either because the Germans recognized us, because our Polish Christian neighbors denounced us as Jews, or because the owners decided that bread was no longer available for distribution to ordinary folk. After placing our very lives in jeopardy and standing in line for hours, we would leave empty-handed, while others — especially privileged, well paying old or nouveau riche or black marketers — would receive many loaves of bread through side windows.

From the very onset of the war, the hardest hit victims were the Jewish professionals and skilled workers. Since the Jewish factories, businesses and most of the schools, had been closed (or completely sealed by the authorities), the unemployed wage earners remained without means of subsistence and had no prospects for work. Most of these workers and their families, who had even before the war struggled, and could barely earn enough money for mere subsistence, had very little savings, if any. Even these people who had managed to save up some money from their meager incomes, were unable to withdraw any money from the banks ever since the mobilization of the Polish army began. I remember the chaos among the mob, waiting in despair both inside and outside the bank, as people were trying to withdraw their money for ongoing expenses so that they could make it through the hard times. But the Polish banks (the P.K.O. and K.K.O.) were closed for business. So, when the last pennies had disappeared from people’s pockets, their means of purchasing essentials (bread, groceries, heating fuel, etc.) were also gone.

My father and my two brothers, Shimon, 18, and Elek, 16, found a solution to our financial difficulties. Every day, they would sell their services to replace the relatively “well off”, who were called to Zwangsarbeit, but could afford a ransom to buy their way out of the toil and danger. There was no fixed price for these services. It was strictly a matter of supply and demand. The price depended on how many Jews had the means and were willing to pay the ransom on any given day, how many people were willing to risk their lives to replace them, and for how much money they were willing to do it. Of course, all this was dependent on the number of persons who did not return from Zwangsarbeit the previous day, and how many of those who did return had bludgeoned faces, broken ribs and bones, cracked skulls, and other injuries. My older brother, Shimon, was not very successful in his “new profession”. On the very first day of going to Zwar~gsarbeit, he returned beaten up, bleeding, with black and blue marks all over his face, shoulders and legs, and a fractured nose. Mama applied cold compresses and said that he “was not cut out for that sort of work.” My father and Elek were however, quite successful. They were well rewarded financially for their risk and services, usually ate well on their jobs, and even managed to bring home some food, soap and other items. My mother explained that Shimon was an intellectual and would have achieved greatness in normal times, but Elek had an inborn gift of being streetwise, knew how to get out of bad situations, and was a great blessing to himself and the family during these terrible times of war.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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In the Beginning — Part 1

It began on the 1st of September 1939, when the mighty German army attacked Poland. The whooping sounds of the sirens from the factories were frightening. The announcements from the speakers in the street warned: “Halo, Halo, uwaga, uwaga, nadchodzi!… Unharness your horses, people off the streets! Halo, halo, they’re coming!”

They came! At first the planes, the bombs, the shrapnel, and the panic. Then the Germans arrived — in neat, spotlessly clean, well-ironed uniforrns, in tanks, in airplanes, on horses, motorcycles and by foot — a seemingly endless, well-drilled procession. They were singing: “Deutschland, Deutschland, uber Alles” and “Wir Werden Fahren Nach (We’re driving to) England!”

The Polish front west of Lodz had been broken and the devastated army was retreating in chaos toward Warsaw, where they would mount the major battle against the enemy. Thousands of civilians ran along with the army. Some were hoping to run further inland, some thought to have the protection of the army or to carry arms; others were running toward the eastern border of Poland or toward the countryside. Most of these people did not actually know their ultimate destination. They merely wanted to escape from the rapidly approaching Germans.

My Aunt Laytshe and her husband Yosef Berlinski stopped in front of our house and invited us to join them in their escape to Pruzany — a little town in the northeastern part of Poland that was occupied by the Soviets. There their son Note (in Lodz pronounced Nute) and his wife Khane had settled down about eight years earlier.

My mother gladly accepted the offer and hurriedly packed essentials in six knapsacks, one for each member of our immediate family. She told me that I could take along two of my favorite lightweight items: toys, games or other personal belongings of my choice. I surely did! I was very happy to take along my autograph book that I had received for my tenth birthday six months earlier, and my new jacks. The whole idea of leaving our home was somewhat scary, yet it sounded exciting to travel to new places. I was overjoyed with the idea of again seeing my favorite and oldest cousin Note, his wife Khane, their charming child Esterke (who was only about two years younger than I); to see their milk farm, the beehives, the cheese factory, and their home. Before I had time to think and fantasize any more, our knapsacks, some bedding and a few other necessities or cherished items were loaded into uncle’s droshke which was standing in the backyard. Uncle was holding the strap of his brown horse, which was already harnessed and ready to leave. Buba and Aunt Leytshe were standing nearby watching out for our belongings on the droshke. My mother, my brothers and I were putting on the last layers of clothing that my mother hurriedly prepared for us to travel in. We too would be ready for the journey — as soon as father was ready to join us. We were just waiting for him to return, eat some food and change his clothes.

As soon as my father came home, my mother said to him that all our essential belongings that we could possibly bring with us were already on the droshke and implored him: “Hurry up, Berish, eat your meal, change your clothing for the journey and let’s go! Yosef, Laytshe and mother are already waiting for us outside.”

“What essential things? What droshke? What journey? Where do you want to go?”

“Yosef wants to take us to Pruzhene, now in the Soviet occupied territory,” she answered.

“Are you all crazy? You want to run from the cultured Germans to the backward ‘Asians’? Not me! I am not going!”

“Berish, what are you saying? We have to run away from the Nazi-Fascists! They want to destroy us!”

“Rukhtshe,” my father insisted, “Hitler is an idiot. Right now some German hoodlums are supporting him, but I know the Germans better — I lived among them, studied with them, had many friends amongst them! They are a fine and cultured people. They will not follow that maniac!”

“Berish,” mother shot back, “you are talking about Germans that you had known during World War I. Let me remind you that it’s now the year 1939, that we are at the onset of another war, and that a new generation is now ruling in Germany? It is a generation of crazy, blood-thirsty fascists who are following their leader, and they consider his trashy ‘Mein Kampf’ as their new holy bible!”

My father was unrelenting: “Anyway, Rukhtshe, if I have to die, I want to die in my own bed, in our home, among the things that I have worked for through my entire life; not on the road under shelling by the Luftwaffe! No, Rukhtshe, that’s a crazy idea and I am not going!”

“Tate,” my brother Elek interjected, “if you are ready to die, perhaps you have already had an interesting life! We have not! We have not yet begun to live! We want to live! We want to go!”

“We shall go! And if you don’t want to come, we are leaving without you!” Shimon stated.

My brothers were very determined to leave, even if father was to stay behind, but mama blocked their way with her arms and body, and cried out: “No,my children, during a war a family doesn’t separate! We will either all go together, or none of us will go!”

Aunt Leytshe, Uncle Yosef and Grandma were very disappointed but they also decided not to leave without us.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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My Family – Part 2

I used to observe my mother’s skillful workmanship with great enjoyment — while she was making a new wig, or while she was weaving long strands of hair (bought from customers) into a net that she would later tie into a braid. I enjoyed watching her set her client’s hair or headpiece through a process called “finger-waving.” I was hoping that when I grew up I too would be as talented and skillful at wig making and hairdressing as she was, but my mother would joke that it was enough to have one such “big-shot” in the family. She and my father dreamed of sending me to the Real Gimnazye in Vilne and later to a university in England for my studies.

I loved to listen to the sweet melodies and words of the songs my mother would sing while she worked and as she sat on a chair next to my bed and lulled me to sleep. I also liked to hear her sing when she held me on her lap, with her cheek closely cuddled next to mine. The fragrant aroma from her lips practically put me under a magic spell. “Sing, mama”, I used to plead with her, “Sing: Yankele, In a Kleyn Shtibele, Margaritkes, Blondzhet mer-nit in der fintster, Amol iz geven a Mayse.” I became familiar with quite a number of Yiddish songs in this way, and loved them dearly. I heard that when my mother was a young girl, she too attended a Yiddish school, known as “Di Brider Ashkenazi” and that she sang in a choir called “Di Harfe” (The Harp).

I recall my mother’s active involvement in everyday activities affecting both our family and our school. We all found the city especially exciting during the time of our Annual Garden Fair, which served as a benefit for our “Medem Shul”. My mother devoted many hours toward selling admission tickets, raffles, or buffet tickets for this event. Most of the nearly two and a half million Jewish residents of Lodz looked forward with great anticipation to the garden fair – which featured shows for adults and for children, orchestras, marching bands, singing choirs, poetry readings, sportsmen from the Morgnshtern Sports Club performing acrobatics, and many other events going on at the same time in various parts of the park. Of great enjoyment to the children were the animals in the zoo. The parents, the children, and most of the others in attendance were all dressed in their finest clothing for the fair, and the whole atmosphere in the park was extraordinary. I have very vivid memories of sitting with my mother at the raffle-ticket table, and falling asleep in her lap with my head leaning on her shoulder as the festivities went on into the early morning hours.

My mother was actively involved with the organization “TOZ,” a Jewish society for the protection of child health. I have a strong recollection of her standing there, at a table — in all kinds of weather — to collect money during days devoted to TOZ. She would pin ribbons on the lapels of passing pedestrians, who, in turn, would throw coins and paper money into a plate on the table, and bless my mother for her important work for the worthy cause. At times, my mother would limp away for several hours (she had a stiff leg) to weigh and measure infants at the TOZ clinic, or to visit children in their congested homes. While there, she would inquire about their health, find out their living conditions, open up some windows to let in fresh air, check whether nursing mothers had enough milk in their breasts, and, if necessary, teach them how to sterilize bottles and prepare the formula milk she got for them (free of charge) from Kropla Mleka (Drop of Milk) program.

I also have a vivid recollection of my mother at special events of the Jewish Labor BUND (Jewish Social Democratic Movement), YAF(Jewish Working Women), and various cultural events. At times my mother would be on the dais on the stage, and I was either among the general audience or with other children on the side of the stage. From time to time, I would be running to my mother to sit next to her. She caressed me, kissed me on my head and begged me to return to my seat among the audience.

I also have recollections from my pre-school years of my mother visiting my kindergarten as a representative of the parents’ committee. She would often converse with my kindergarten teacher, Miss Anka Frishdorf; play with the children, and lecture us about the importance of a rest period during the day. I remember that one day, we gave a performance in my mother’s honor. I always felt both proud and embarrassed about her unique role to the kindergarten. It was truly rare for the other mothers to come to question and give advice.

To my mother all of these aspects of her life — her home, her family, the school, the TOZ, the BUND and YAF—were very significant, holy and cherished institutions.

My father spent most of his days in the factory. During the few years preceding the war, he worked for his cousins, and also had the responsibility of opening and closing the factory. He would leave the house early in the morning while I was still fast asleep, and usually returned when I was asleep or in bed ready for the night.

On Saturdays, my father spent most of his afternoons resting. At times, I used to sit on a stool next to his bed and watch him in deep sleep. He was a very handsome man – tall and distinguished, with lovely gray hair, a straight and slightly pointy nose, rather narrow lips, a high forehead, very long eyelashes and bushy eyebrows. I used to enjoy using the power of suggestion on him. I would stare fixedly at his eyes and wishing that he would open them – until my wish was fulfilled. It was enough that my father opened his eyes and looked at me momentarily. That made me feel victorious. Whenever time allowed, my father would take me for long walks in the park, including a visit to the playground. We would visit his relatives and he would treat me to my favorite cheese pastries. He would also teach me math, the German language and German poetry. He felt that “every cultured person should also know these important subjects.”

I heard individuals in the family say that when my father had returned from Germany, in 1920, he brought with him a high regard for the German culture—their language, poetry, science, music and philosophies. Originally, he was brought to Germany as a Russian prisoner of war, but when he was released from prison after WWI ended, he remained there to study. Whether he learned it from the Germans or was naturally a spotlessly clean person, he was said to be a “great pedant” — in terms of the way he dressed, hung up his clothes or kept his personal belongings. He also expected all of us to keep our own belongings in the same condition. What a tragedy it would have been if he only found something out of place or an ink-stain on one of our schoolbooks or notebooks! He never laid a hand on me or on my brothers, yet we were afraid of him. I suppose that we had great awe of him and were just afraid of his stare and disapproving shake of the head.

At times, my parents would dress up in exceptionally beautiful clothes and walk off to a wedding, Bar Mitzvah, the theatre or some political or cultural event. My mother was always ready first and had to wait till father made sure that there was no dust, stain, or thread left on his neat and perfectly fitting suit.

I was the youngest of three children. One brother, Shimon, was seven and a half years older than I was; the other brother, Elek, was six years older. Clearly, I was a pampered child. When I was ten years old, my mother still ran after me with a spoon trying to coax me to eat “at least one more spoonful of food. ” Everyone knew that I was a “poor eater.”

My brother Elek teased me at times. He would try out new wrestling moves on me that he had learned, but he always protected me from anyone that would attempt to insult or hurt me.

I was particularly fond of Shimon. He was a gorgeous looking young man, with strawberry-blond hair, blue eyes and a protruding Adam’s apple that I used to like to play with. I was insulted by the fact that he preferred to go on dates with strange girls, instead of taking me places. I made sure that he knew about how I felt about it. I seriously objected to his dates, but he thought that I was being funny and laughed.

Both my brothers and I attended a Jewish secular day school, which we all enjoyed dearly. The language of instruction there was Yiddish. That is: all the subjects were taught in the Yiddish language; the curriculum included the Yiddish language, Jewish and world literature, Jewish and world history, mathematics, geography, botany, nature, physics and chemistry, home economics, drawing and painting, music, hygiene, physical education. Whatever we studied, we studied in Yiddish. We also played in Yiddish, laughed in Yiddish, fought in Yiddish and cried in Yiddish. The only two subjects taught in Polish were the Polish language and Polish History, which was mandated by the government. In the highest grade, some subjects were taught both in Yiddish and Polish, so that the children would be familiar with the necessary terminology in both languages if they prepared to continue their studies after graduation in Polish institutes of higher education. In addition, our school was renowned for its beautiful shows and for its great contributions to national children’s art exhibitions.

•••••

Lodz is still there, but my world was wiped out –
My school and my home;
My guiding lights — forever extinguished,
But continuing to brighten my life.

Behind Lodz there are fields of Marysin;
Where in unmarked graves –
Numerous scattered graves of my treasures –
The shining lights I so loved and cherished.

The rest of my treasures were deported
And they were destroyed
In places now known to the world
as places of chimneys and smoke.

(to be continued…)

©2001 Fela Infeld Glaser and Marty Capsuto
©2009 First Look Marketing All Rights Reserved

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