Izio Felder/Jack Fields passed away in 2013

Izio Felder/Jack Fields 1925-2013 

https://www.mck.org.au/search/1527 

Any word on Jack/Izio Fields/Felder?

 Looking for news about long time Przemysler and friend of this blog Izio Felder, known post Shoah in Australia as Jack Fields. 

If anyone has information about Izio/Jack please forward. 

Here is Izio in a class photo in post-war from of the excellent Jews of Ostrowiec website.

U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum acquires photos that were stored in Miami home

 From the Miami press...

U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum acquires photos that were stored in Miami home

 

By SERGIO CARMONA

JEWISH JOURNAL |

JAN 21, 2022 AT 2:56 PM

For more than 30 years, a collection of Holocaust photos were stored in a Miami home.

 

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. has acquired the collection, which includes more than 100 photos and documents. The collection includes rare photos of imprisoned Jews in a French internment camp.

 

During a cleaning spree of her childhood bedroom at the beginning of the pandemic lockdown in 2020, Miami resident Silvia Espinosa-Schrock came across a box that she had not thought about for three decades. As a 19-year-old art student in New York City, Espinosa-Schrock purchased a cardboard box of black-and-white photos on a sidewalk for $5 in January 1990. She used the box of photos in an art installation assignment as a Cooper Union student.

“When I took the photos to my studio, it dawned on me they were taken around World War II with the way the people were dressed, and I came to realize they were a Jewish family,” Espinosa-Schrock said.

 

Espinosa-Schrock was determined to find the family, but when she graduated in the early 1990s, she packed up the photos in storage boxes that were sent to her parents’ home in Miami. She had not seen the photos in approximately 30 years until the 2020 cleaning spree, having forgotten she stored them in storage boxes in the closet.

 

“Now that there’s internet, I wanted to see if there was someone out there who is related to the family in the photos,” she said.

 

When Espinosa-Schrock looked closely at the box’s contents, she found the name “Joachim Getter” written on one of the photographs. She conducted an online research of the name and found one of Joachim Getter’s pictures posted on the “The Jewish Przemyśl Blog,” created by David Semmel, a descendant of the family.

 

In April 2020, Espinosa-Schrock reached out to Semmel, who resides in Bloomington, Ind., and wrote: “I think I have something that belongs to your family.”

 

Semmel, who spends the winter month in Fort Lauderdale, had family members from Przemyśl, a town in Poland, who were killed in the Holocaust. When he when he received the photos from Espinosa-Schrock, he was overwhelmed to see pictures of his mother as a teenager, and also of his aunt Chaya and uncle Joachim, whom they called Muni. He donated them to the museum.

 

“After piecing together the family trees of the people in the photos using the JRI-Poland database, I realized how valuable this trove would be for Holocaust historians, and I contacted the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum,” he said. “I didn’t want the collection to sit in my attic, and I hope someone someday might recognize the other people from the photos when they’re on the museum’s collection website. Who knows? Another big discovery could happen.”

Espinosa-Schrock said, “I’m very delighted that I contacted David Semmel.”

“If he had not had that blog, these photos would still be in a box, in my room, and I would not know what to do with them,” she said.

 

Semmel said he is grateful to Espinosa-Schrock on several levels.

“Many in my direct family were not in the Holocaust, as most of my relatives came over to the United States well before the war, but there were some exceptions,” he said. “My grandfather’s sister and his brother were both lost in the Holocaust, and because of that, he knew very little about them. They were always people who were talked about in a sad way as people who didn’t get to live full lives. In the case of my aunt Chaya, we only had a single photograph of her when she was 12 years old. That’s all we knew of her. All of a sudden, I open this box, and I can see her whole life. I can see her back in the old country in Przemyśl.”

 

Suzy Snyder, a museum curator, assessed the collection and provided Semmel with documents to help him better understand the historical context of the collection. According to Snyder, the collection contains never-before-seen photographs of Beaune-la-Rolande, an internment camp in central France located 55 miles south of Paris, which the museum had limited visuals of. She also mentioned that the images belonged to someone named Salomon Abend,

“These photographs were sent from Salomon Abend to his then wife Paulette [born Perla Rosiner], two Jewish people who were both persecuted during the Holocaust,” Snyder said. “They are extremely rare because, somehow, these photographs were produced in a place that had extreme deprivation. Also unusual is how the photographs survived once they were sent to Paulette, who, herself, was likely in hiding during the Holocaust. We have no idea how these rare images survived, which, if Paulette had been discovered to possess, would have easily given her away as a Jew.”

Snyder said, “David donated the collection to us, and will we catalogue it, digitalize it and put it online in the next couple of years so that other people can use it as research tool.”

 

“We keyword everything so that the approbate collection is easy to find,” she said.

 

Robert Tanen, director for the museum’s Southeast Regional Office based in Boca Raton, said, “It’s a great feeling to know that we uncovered yet another piece of history that would’ve potentially been lost.”

Visit ushmm.org for more information.

 

Jewish Dance in Przemysl?

This came to me by email:

I am Zuzana Palanová, a Slovak dance researcher and dancer conducting masters thesis fieldwork in Przemyśl during this summer. I am looking for the stories or memories concerning 20th century popular and traditional dance in the city or surrounding villages specifically in the Jewish and Ukrainian communities. The stories might be personal or from family relatives. Ideally, I would connect with people who may know something about the local dance events, dance types, or genres that used to be danced within the different decades; the spots, clubs, festivals but also the common family meetings where dance was a natural part.I understand Polish and am able to meet in person if needed.

She can be reached at: zuz(dot)palanova(at)gmail.com Or thru me at david@semmel.com

 The following was left anonymously as a comment to this post about the only surviving jew of Rybotycze - Moses Rubinfeld.

After so many years, I came across this beautiful letter by accident.

I was born in Rybotycze, I grew up in Rybotycze, my father was born in the village of Borysławka after the war in Rybotycze, my mother was born and lived in Rybotycze.

My parents are dead, but I often heard from my dad that three different denominations people lived next to each other, they helped each other.

The town of Rybotycze was a developing town until 1918, and in 1918 there was the second fire in Rybotycze.

Dad remembers his childhood in Rybotycze very well, although after the war there was terrible poverty because in our country there were fights with Stalin for the eastern land until 1947 by the UPA.

Behind the village of Rybotycze towards Bircza, where we grazed cows, there is a large square and there was a lot of unevenness, then my father said that from the story he knows what a small child was then 7 years old that the Germans chased all the Jews from Rybotycze at night from the village and in the morning they had to dig graves in this meadow for myself, I will add that dad said that they had to stand at the graves and a non-German soldier was shooting at them because he said that it was too hard for his psyche, so he had to shoot a Jew, brother shoot his brother, sister, sister, mother, daughter and bury them only when he was last, the German killed and buried him.

This story is very remembered by my dad and I also remember when we are in Rybotycze in the summer, I often think about this square where as a child I fell cows and in this land so much pain and so much blood was spilled.

I do not know if you are still alive, but I will say that the people you mentioned are mostly dead. If you are already dead, your children or friends may read it.

Yours sincerely Jadwiga Sroka

Przemysl in winter

Przemyślu 20.02.2021

 

Article in the JC: Holocaust survivor accidentally discovers ‘hero’ who hid her relatives from the Nazis

 

Photo: Wladimir, George and Eva Riszko with Rennie and her brother Sol Schildkraut pictured in Vienna after the war

Click to see full to article

"The name of this righteous person was Wladimir Riszko"

See previous post, and this amazing, wonderful thread:

Chaim Feingold, Salya (Sarah) Feingold (nee Sperling) and my dad Dov.

David hi,

My mom told me today, that the person who saved my grandparents and father, 16 Jews in all, married one of the Jews he saved and moved to New Zealand. Maybe that is a lead? Add to the blog post?

Thanks, Sara

So Sara emails the New Zealand Holocaust Memorial and gets back:

Hi Sara

I am the daughter of Wladimir Riszko and Rennie Riszko ( nee Rivka
Schildkraut).

Your email seems like a miracle because I have wanted for years for my
father to be recognized as a Righteous Gentile but we felt there wasn't
enough proof.

I have the names of several people whom my father hid in his house but
there are no Wolfs among them.

My mother was so traumatized by the loss of her birth family that she
could never give us a coherent, sequential story of her Holocaust
experiences so my brother, George and I have pieced together some of it.

How did you know that we eventually ended up in New Zealand?

A friend of mine volunteers at our Holocaust Museum and knew enough of
my parent's story to recognize that it could be my father who hid your
family. He lived in a hamlet a few kilometers from Przemysl which is he
was able to hide so many people.

So looking forward to taking with you and learning about your family!!

Eva

Sara replies:

This morning was very overwhelming for both myself and Eva Riszko Woodbury. For years I have been haunted about not knowing who it was who saved my father and grandparents along with 13 other Jewish people right outside the Przemysl Ghetto, and today I know and have been in touch with the children of this man.

The name of this righteous person was Wladimir Riszko and he was only about 30 years of age at the time. Wladimir married one of the Jewish women whom he saved, Rennie Riszko (nee Rivka Schildkraut). They have a list of the Jews who were saved, amongst them, the Feingolds, our original family name

Eva told me that none of those who were saved made contact over the years and that she wants more than anything for her father to be recognized, posthumously as a Righteous Gentile.

The Riskzo's had a child while in hiding! This is George, who was born about 3 weeks before liberation by the Russians, when Rennie was somehow whisked out of the hiding place to Wladimir's cousins for the birth, of their child, a Jewish child.

Eva their daughter was born later and she told me this morning that she has been back to Przemysl and says that the hiding place was in a hamlet a few kilometers out of Przemsyl.

We spent a good hour talking on video camera. 

How did she reach me? Late last night Israel time, I sent a message to the New Zealand Holocaust Memorial, unbeknownst to me on the receiving end was Dr. Anne Beaglehole, a refugee herself and a  historian of refugee immigration to New Zealand, friends of the Riszko family who had interviewed George in 1988 for her work and knew of their stroy. She right away sent them an email and this morning I woke up to an email from George followed by one from Eva, who then found me on Facebook.

The Feingold-Bank/Sperling families of Przemysl

Granddaughter of survivors writes:

My name is Sara. My father was born in 1939 in Przemysl. His mother's family, the Sperling family, had lived on Kilinskiego Street. Everyone but my grandfather Mr. Charles Bank (Chaim Feingold-Bank), my grandmother Sally Sarah and my father Dov, were killed.

My grandfather managed to get out before the liquidation of the ghetto. They were hidden by a righteous gentile along with others, numbering 16 people who were hidden in an underground cellar of a building just 125 feet from the ghetto for 2-3 years, until liberated by the Russians.

I am writing in hopes that one of those other people survived and perhaps knows more details as to who saved them and more exactly where.

I recently had the attached letter translated from Polish.  It reads as follows and I believe it was to his friend and landsman who later with his wife, became our Uncle Maurice and Tante Vera Schweber.  As mentioned, they were in hiding right outside the ghetto of Przemysl.

My Dears,

Three months have passed since the Red Army liberated us from under the oppressive Hitlerite bandit murderers. I have not written until now because I did not have information on your brother, Bł.P (Błogosławionej Pamięci - of Blessed Memory.)

Now I am in the position to inform you that he was killed together with all the others in September 1943 during the liquidation of the last ghetto. I, my wife and child were saved by miracle and I unfortunately was not able to write to you from my hiding place. Of the 7000 Jews in the area  that was liberated, only 350-450 Jews remain alive so you can imagine the totality of the massacre that the murderers committed. The details of which you will learn sometime after the war ends.

If you have the possibility, I would ask you to send clothes for me, my wife and child who is now 6 years old.

I await your reply. Big regards.

P.S. If you are able to send food too that wouldn't bother us either.

Silvia's box of Getter photos

About a month ago, I got an email from a woman in Miami who found this blog by searching the name Muni Getter.

Chaya and Muni

That name is quite meaningful in my family. Muni Getter married my grandfather Emil Silbermann’s sister Chaya (see this post) in Przemysl ~1925 then moved to France where they had Florine ~1928. In 1941, they managed to hide the 13-yr old in a convent in Grenoble before they were rounded up by the Nazis and shipped to Auschwitz. Chaya was murdered on arrival while Muni became slave labor and somehow survived. In ’45 he came back to France and after searching for a year, found his daughter in Paris. My grandfather bought them passage to NYC and Muni and Florine lived with my mom and family. Chaya has always been a family tragedy and mystery.

Florine, Dorothy (my mom), and Fannie (my GM)

The path that led the woman who found me, Silvia, is rather amazing.

30 years ago, when she lived in NYC, she found a box of old photos in a trash can on the street in front of the brownstone she lived in. She said it looked like an apartment had been cleaned out, perhaps because someone died.  Curious, she took them home then forgot about them. They followed her to storage when she moved to Miami.  A month ago, bored in COVID lockdown, she remembered the box, dug it out of storage, and found the name Muni Getter on the back of a photo. 

She sent me scans (I now have all the photos) a few of which were of my mother, grandmother, and grandfather. There was even a book of matches from my parents wedding in 1953 – all in a box in the garbage 30 years ago!

I think the photos belonged to Muni’s 2^nd wife, Paulette (Perla). There are many of her (previously unknown) first husband Salomon, Muni and his family,  dozens of pix of Chaya and Florine in France, some of my grandparents and mom, and a bunch of still unidentified people. There is a lot of Yiddish script I need to get translated to piece all this together.

Paulette and Saloman

Among the photos are several sent presumably to Paulette from the French concentration camp at Beaune la Rolande. Group photos of inmates, passed by censors, and a hand drawn card from Solomon to Paulette that is heartbreaking. 

The other interesting thing is that many of the earlier photos of all the people were taken in Przemysl. Obviously, I know the Chaya was from there and that Muni and his family lived there (the Getter/Turkeltaub were originally from Czortkow). Paulette and Salomon seem to be from Przemysl too, but I don’t know their family names, yet. I’ve found several of the people in the deportation records from France. I also don’t know how Paulette survived or if she and Muni knew each other pre-war, which is likely. 

You can see all the scans here.

A million thanks to Silvia and Tim for saving this trove of family treasures. I'll be posting more of the photos soon.

2020 Raise: It's that time again

Every two years we ask our friends to pitch in so that we can continue to restore and maintain the unique and wonderful Jewish cemetery in Przemysl

Please donate what you can by clicking HERE

100% of funds collected by Remembrance and Reconciliation (a US 501c3 tax deductible charity) go to Poland and are used in support of the cemetery. It costs about $4,000 every two years just to maintain the site, more after bad winters and storms.

An Ill Wind Blew

Weekend storms uprooted trees and left a huge mess at the Przemysl Jewish Cemetery. 

There are at least 10 large trees that need removal, one hanging precariously over a row of Matzavot.

Remembrance and Reconciliation, Inc. will pay for the cutting, hauling, and cleanup but this will leave us short on funds for the summer and fall. If you'd like to help us out, go HERE. 

Thank you! 

HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAYS in Przemyśl

January 2019

The passing of Dr. Thaddeus C. Radzilowski

We are sad to report the passing of Dr. Thaddeus C. Radzilowski, longtime Remembrance and Reconciliation board member and supporter of our work in Przemysl.

PIAST INSTITUTE

MOURNS THE PASSING OF DR. THADDEUS RADZILOWSKI

Today, Piast Institute, our Polish-American family, and our Hamtramck community lost a great leader in the passing of Dr. Thaddeus C. Radzilowski. Earlier today, July 20^th, he passed away surrounded by loved ones.

Dr. Radzilowski was a highly accomplished historian and academic studying Poland and Central and Eastern Europe, producing countless manuscripts on these important topics. Over the course of his rich academic career he has taught at University of Michigan, Madonna University, Heidelberg College, and Southwest Minnesota State University. He also served as the President of St. Mary College. Over the years, he not only educated thousands of American students about Polish and Central European history, he also mentored many of them and fostered countless community leaders.  

In 2003, Dr. Radzilowski co-founded the Piast Institute with Virginia Skrzyniarz. It quickly became the largest Polish-American think tank in the United States. As President of Piast, Dr. Radzilowski has focused the organization as a major research center, one of U.S. Census Information Centers, and as a representative of Poland and Polish-Americans in the United States, with worldwide network of accomplished fellows. Under his leadership, the Institute produced position papers, school curricula, research reports, conducted surveys, organized conferences and exhibits, and was very involved in the life of American Polonia. He also cultivated many relationships with Polish universities and institutions.

Over the years, Dr. Radzilowski received many awards for his academic work, community involvement, and leadership. He was a corresponding member of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN). He served as an advisor and consultant to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and the U.S. Bureau of the Census and was a member of the Ford Foundation Commission on Ethnicity on American Life. In 1999, the President of Poland presented Dr. Radzilowski with the Cavaliers Cross of the Polish Order of Merit for distinguished contributions to the dissemination of Polish culture in the world.

In addition to his contributions to preserving Polish heritage in the U.S., Dr. Radzilowski was an American patriot, a veteran of the U.S. Armed Forces who served his country in Vietnam.

Those who knew Dr. Radzilowski well will miss him for his charm, his sense of humor, his countless stories, his sharp mind, and his infectious cheerfulness.

Dr. Radzilowski is survived by his wife, Kathleen, three sons, John, Paul and Stefan, grandchildren Radek and Diana, sisters Fran and Cynthia, and brothers, Norbert and Fred.

Details on a celebration of Dr. Thaddeus Radzilowski’s life will be announced shortly. Please direct any questions to the Executive Vice President of the Piast Institute Virginia Skrzyniarz, Skrzyniarz@piastinstitute.org or (313) 733-4535.

Announcing... An Inventory of Przemyśl's Jewish Cemetery

Finally... a website to search Przemyśl's Jewish Cemetery! Photos, GPS locations, translations, and more!

On behalf of Remembrance and Reconciliation, Inc., and using data sets from Andrew Kier Wise, Professor of History, Daemen College, and his students, as well as from Jacek Szwic, Piotr Szwic, Yale Reisner, and Lukasz Biedka, I've created a site where you can search the cemetery.

The site is JewishPrzemysl.com

Please report all bugs, errors, or suggestions back to me!

Please donate to maintain the cemetery!

Summer 2016 Fundraise for the Cemetery

Click below to donate via PayPal - or go here for more options

Up to $3,000 of donations made through August 31, 2016 will be matched by an anonymous donor!

Re-dedication in Przemysl

Below is from the flyer announcing the rededication of the memorial monument dedicated to the Jews of Przemysl murdered by the Nazis between 1942-3. It takes place June 17, 2016 at 11:00 in the square behind the building of the Specjalny Ośrodek Szkolno-Wychowawczy no. 1,Kopernika 14 Street, Przemysl.

The initiator and founder of the works is Janusz Galiczyński of Przemysl.The honorary patronage over the ceremony was taken by the Department of Culture and History of Jews of the Institute of History of Rzeszów University.

For more information, contact: Joanna Elżbieta Potaczek, tel. +48 782-682-544, e-mail: joanna.potaczek@onet.pl

The history of the place.

The place to commemorate in Kopernika Street in Przemyśl is connected with the tragedy of the Przemyśl Jews murdered in the years 1942 1943 - mostly in September 1943, during the liquidation of the ghetto. At this location the Germans killed at least 1,580 Jews. The victims of murder undressed in a nearby building of the Judenrat, then walked to the back of the prison, and there they were killed at the wall. The Germans burned the corpses on the spot and threw the ashes into the San.

In 1956, under the Death Wall a small monument was erected with a plaque situated informing about the murder of 1580 Jews from the Przemysl ghetto by the "Nazi thugs".

In March 1989 an eyewitness of the tragic events - Julek Wachs attached to the monument another small plaque informing about the murder of the Jewish children, women and men in summer 1943. In the vicinity of the place the corpses of the victims were burned and the following were forced to do it: prof. Silber, Cuba Rosenzweig, Benjamin Wider, Wolfing. The fifth name he did not remember.

For many years this place has become neglected. The tourists visiting it faced the ugly sight of the ruined monument.

The initiative for restoration was put forward by Janusz Galiczyński a Przemysl social activist. After celebrating VIII International Holocaust Remembrance Day in Podkarpackie in January 2016, with his own effort and funds, he led to the restoration of the monument, its environment and the wall adjacent to it, under which the Jews were murdered. The construction work were done by the inmates from the prison in Przemysl.

Mr. Galiczyński throughout the whole period of restoration was supported by Norbert Ziętal the manager of the Przemysl branch of Nowiny. Janusz Galiczyński is not a wealthy man. Asked why he did it? He responds - out of respect for these people. Out of respect for the murdered Jewish residents of Przemyśl, who once lived in this town and were an integral part thereof. In his act he sees a moral obligation to respect other people and to honor the for the murdered people at this place, because every death should be respected - especially such a tragic death.

Joanna Elżbieta Potaczek
Norbert Ziętal

Summer 2016 Fundraise for the Cemetery

Click below to donate

Up to $3,000 of donations made through August 31, 2016 will be matched by an anonymous donor!

Restoring and Remembering the Przemysl Jewish Cemetery

For much of the past decade, the Foundation has lead the effort to restore and maintain the Slowackiego Jewish Cemetery in Przemysl. We have spent nearly one hundred thousand dollars to transform a forgotten, deteriorating field into one of the best Jewish cemetery sites in all of Poland. The work was initially focused on security and reclamation -- completing the surrounding fence and clearing half a century of overgrowth. The next phase saw us restoring the many deteriorating stones and markers, including the re-dedication of the Shoah mass grave monument. We've come a long way, but there is still much work to be done. It costs nearly ten thousand dollars per year just to maintain the site, funds that today come 100% from donors to Remembrance and Reconciliation.

The Old Cemetery

Marcin, a tourist guide from Przemyśl, sent me these photos of the new plaques on what remains of the old Jewish cemetery in Przemysl. What does the Hebrew say? And can anyone tell me who paid for this?

Family Herzfeld

December, 2021 - Some updates from Samuel

Regarding the article on my family that is published on your blog there are a few elements that should be corrected - we received some new info this year from Mr. Diamond (JRI Poland).

List of siblings : Malvina, born in 1914 (not 1905)

We can add Rachla, born in 1902, died in 1918 from tuberculosis.

The family picture was actually taken in ca. 1916, not in 1921. My grandfather Eliasz is actually not in the picture (he wasn’t born at that time). The baby right to the mother is Malvina and the teenage girl is Rachla.

Like most of these tales, it starts with an email...

My grandfather was Eliasz Herzfeld, born in Przemysl on October 5th, 1919.

He was in the Przemysl ghetto until the very end of its existence and was then deported to Stalowa Wola labour camp in 1943. He escaped miraculously and hid until the end of the war. All his relatives who were in Przemysl at the time of WWII perished in the Holocaust, either in the gas chambers of Belzec or in the Przemysl ghetto, a question mark that remains unanswered to us.

His siblings were:
- Izak Herzfeld, born on April 9th 1904, married to Beracha
  Tenenbaum. They had a child, Hadasa Herzfeld, born on
  September 5th, 1932.
- Malvina Herzfeld, born c. 1905
- Markus Herzfeld, born on August 12th, 1906.
- Aron Herzfeld, born on March 1st, 1911. He immigrated
   to Belgium before WWII and hid during the war.
  He passed away in 2013 at the age of 102.
- Moische Herzfeld, born on January 16th, 1913.

His parents were Salomon Herzfeld, of whom we unfortunately don’t know much (no picture, no place & date of birth) and Dwojra Tanenbaum, born on August 5th, 1878 in Przemysl.

If you have any information concerning the Herzfeld & Tanenbaum families from Przemysl, or might know anybody who could help, I would be much grateful. Samuel

The Herzfeld family in Przemysl c.1921- left to right: Aron ; Moische ; the mother Dwojra ; Eliasz; Malvina and Markus . Absent from the picture are Izak and the father Salomon. Aron and Eliasz were the only members of the family to survive the Holocaust.

Aron (3rd from L) and friends in Przemysl (the Rynek?) c. 1928

Aron in the Chorus of the synagogue c. 1924

New photos of the New Cemetery

From the wonderful Domi...

Click here for all the photos

Private investor buysthe house in which 13 Jews found shelter during World War II

From Virtual Shtetl:

NEWS

2015-05-22

ENTREPRENEUR WANTS TO SAVE THE HOUSE - A JEWISH HIDEOUT

In Przemyśl, a private investor has purchased a house in which 13 Jews found shelter during World War II. He wants to preserve this place for future generations.

The place in question is the old tenement house at 3 Tatarska Street. Since 1942 up to the liberation, two orphan girls – 16 years old Stefania Podgórska and her 9 years old sister Helena – had provided an asylum to the Diamant family of 13 people. They all survived the war. After the war, Stefania Podgórska married one of the rescued Jews – Maksymilian Diamant.

In 1979, both women were awarded the title of the Righteous Among the Nations.

In 1996, this extraordinary story became a base of the film “Hidden in Silence” directed by Richard A.Colla.

Three years ago, the deserted and neglected building at 3 Tatarska Street was put up for sale. Social workers and politicians came forward with various ideas concerning its future. There were suggestions, for instance, to make the building over to the Foundation of Jewish Heritage in return for giving up a part of claims concerning the restitution of property of the former Jewish community in Przemysl.

In April, the house was purchased by Maciej Piórkowski, owner of a private enterprise “Orion” dealing with renovation of monuments of history.

During today’s telephone conversation with a representative of the Virtual Shtetl website, Maciej Piórkowski said: “You can call it a whim but I wanted to save the historic building from oblivion and preserve it for the sake of its history. I do not have any precise plans at this stage. I would like the house to be accessible to visitors where they would be able, for example, to watch a film telling the story of hiding Jews there.”

The house is in a poor technical condition. Now, the new owner faces a difficult challenge of renovating it.

Author: Krzysztof Bielawski
Sources: Polskie Radio Rzeszów, own information

Family Nussbaum

The Nussbaum family owned Przemysl's first electric mill in the '30s. Judging from the photo, they also played tennis.

Hi David,

My husband’s family, the Nussbaums, were from Przemysl. They owned the first electric mill in Przemysl. Attached is a picture of my father-in-law taken sometime in the late 1930’s in Przemysl. My father-in-law is the man seated. Mojżesz Nussbaum, born 1918. I do not know who the other people are – probably cousins. My father-in-laws father was Sali (Shlomo) Nussbaum. His first wife (mother of my father-in-law) was Leiba Ehrenfreund. She died young and Sali married Shoshana Ehrenfreund. Sali was from Hussakow, Mosciska. His family were bankers. Most of the family perished in the Shoah. Only my father-in-law and his brother, Berisch survived.

Regards Penni

Helene Rosenbach Deutsch

I've just learned about Przemysl-born Helene Deutsch in an email from a Polish journalist living in Vienna. Born Helene Rosenbach in 1884, she lead an extraordinary life.  After a brief affair with Polish socialist leader Herman Lieberman, she traveled to Vienna and joined Sigmund Freud's infamous Wednesday night meetings of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, first becoming his assistant and later, colleague. She moved to Boston in 1936 and died in 1982 leaving behind pioneering work in woman's psychoanalysis and psychology.

I'm a Polish journalist living in Vienna. I have a very close relation to Przemysl, the hometown of my mother and my summer stays during my childhood (not so remote, whatsoever!).

I wanted to draw your attention to a fascinating biography of Helen Deutsch. Born in Przemysl, she was Sigmund Freud's long time assistant and later successful authoress and psychoanalytic in the US. Her autobiography "Confrontations with Myself", containing a description of her childhood environment was published originally in 1973, got translated to Polish only in 2008. This book was greeted with much interests and brought anew attention to Przemysl's Jewish past. This is also when I realized that the house Helene Deutsch would grew up in (described in her memoir) , was the same house that the family of my mother lived!

Also in Vienna the biography of Helene Deutsch is again brought to light. In 2000 a city park was named after her. In 2008 in the in the campus yard of the main university of Vienna, an artistic intervention took place. Its aim was to change the male-dominated image of this institution. The plates with the names of female scientists were put on the 154 busts of their (male) famous colleagues, a.o. Helene Deutsch was remembered.

For some time I've tried to document Deutsch's biography and those latest signs of commemoration, ie running the blog: rynek26.blogspot.com. I had the privilege to get in touch with Dr. Sanford Gifford (1918-2013), who was one of the closest friends and colleagues of the Deutsch family, after they moved to the USA. I also know about an extensive collection of private documents which is stored at Harvard University. It contains Deutsch's notes and research on Przemysl. Attached to this email I'm sending you some excerpts that I could receive - should you once be interested in exploring this archive, I'd love to help you!

There are many other biographies linked to Przemysl (and Vienna as well), a.o. Karl Duldig or Franz Marek , but anyway, I'm keeping my finger crossed for your very valuable work! I hope there is not only the past, but also the future for the Jewish life in Przemysl!

Warm greetings from Vienna,

Happy scenes in Przemysl 2 years before the Shoah

From blog-friend Michal in Israel:

Skiing Przemysl's Tatar hill with the Yeti?

Some pre-war photos of my grandmother's parents and sisters, the city is Przemysl in Poland and it's about 1937.  My grandmother loved dogs and she worked as a pharmacist all her life. Except my grandmother who escaped to Leninbad during the war they were all murdered by 1942. I'm always looking for information about Bethauer, Dawid and Kudesch families from Przemysl and L'vov.

The happy dogs of Przemysl!

Strolling...

The family store

Laura/Lea Walder (Bethauer) - Michal's GGM

2014 Przemysl Cemetery Appeal

Please help us again this year with a generous donation to fund the yearly maintenance effort.

Dear Friend of Jewish Przemysl,

Again, it is time to ask for your help in maintaining the Przemysl’s Jewish cemetery.

As you know, the cemetery sits on a hill, and this year, undermined grave foundations, washed out pathways, and soil erosion/vegetative overgrowth from storms has been particularly bad – and costly to repair.

While we have a host of upgrade projects waiting on financial sponsors - constructing a path through the whole of the cemetery so that the older parts are more accessible and creating historical brochure for the cemetery to give visitors historical perspective, to name but two - 100% of the funds we are asking you to contribute today are needed just to keep us ahead of the elements.

US tax-deductible donations may be sent to:

Remembrance and Reconciliation, Inc. 

 c/o David Semmel 2256 E Gramercy Park Dr. Bloomington, IN 47408

Or by PayPal at: http://www.remembrance-reconciliation.org/contribute.php

While you will hear much, much more from us in the coming months regarding Przemysl’s Scheinbach Synagogue, formerly used as the town’s library, we invite you to click this link for a little teaser of what is coming: http://www.jewish-heritage-europe.eu/2014/07/22/update-on-state-of-przemysl-synagogue-new-challenges

And please, click below and “LIKE” us on Facebook! It is the best way to stay current on R&R news and to connect with others interested in Jewish Przemysl. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Remembrance-and-Reconciliation-Foundation-Inc/122028827857921

Thank you for helping to preserve the cemetery-and soon, the Scheinbach Synagogue, two of the remaining Jewish treasures in Przemysl, Poland.

Warm regards,

David Semmel
John Hartman
Marla Raucher Osborn

For Remembrance and Reconciliation, Inc.