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David Bayer

“When I came back to our house there was Germans, in our house, robbing us, taking everything that they can. German officers and German soldiers, whatever they could. A lot of shoes, a lot of leather, they were taking whatever they wanted. We came in, the Germans asked, ‘What are you doing here?’ We said, ‘We live here, this is my house.’ They were laughing and making fun of us. We were scared, me, my mother, my brother, my two sisters, my father. My father was 40 years old then. And there was a German that asked my father, ‘Why do you, why do you, nobody likes the Jews. Why are you so afraid? Why nobody likes the Jews?’ Because, my father told him, ‘Because we don’t hit back.’ He made a gesture with his fist, I was scared I thought my father was going to hit him but he just made it with his fist. So every German laughed and they left.”
(postwar testimony)

Other Survivor Volunteers »

Our Survivor Volunteers

I hope for the day when people can practice their religion of choice; when race and discrimination is no longer an issue.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Survivor Volunteers at Volunteer Appreciation Night 2009. —United States Holocaust Memorial Museum


Who are our Survivor Volunteers?

At the Museum we have more than 90 Holocaust survivors who serve as volunteers who greet the public, act as tour guides and tell their personal histories. In addition to their outreach work, survivor volunteers spend time in the Museum’s library and archives where they help other survivors and their families locate information about themselves and their loved ones. Their presence is an invaluable asset, and their contributions are vital to the mission of the institution.

Questions?
For Questions or more information on how to become a volunteer, please visit the Volunteer Opportunities page.



Click on a Survivor’s photo or name listed below, and learn a little about their life during and after the Holocaust.

Livia Shacter Michel Margosis Sam Schalkowsky Bella (Berger) Mischkinsky Julius Menn Yona Dickmann Gideon Frieder Manya Friedman Rene Stolbach Elzbieta Strassburger Fanny Aizenberg Irving Horn Esther Starobin William Hess Goldie Gendelman Theodora Klayman George (György) Pick Martin Weiss Lore Schneider Johanna Gerechter Neumann Marcel Drimer Bob Behr Louise Lawrence-Israels Susan Taube Charlene Schiff Fritz Gluckstein Ruth Elisabeth Greifer Charles Stein Sam Spiegel Henry Greenbaum Katie Altenberg Inge Katzenstein Leon Merrick Josiane Traum Isaac Nehama David Bayer Flora Singer Haim Solomon Jacqueline Mendels Birn Susan Warsinger Gerald Liebenau Herbert Launer Helen Luksenburg Gerald Schwab Adam Kahane Welek Luksenburg Eve Kristine Vetulani Agi Geva Frank Liebermann Emanuel (Manny) Mandel Kurt Pauly Rabbi Jacob G. Wiener Nesse Godin Pete Philipps Hans (John) Sachs Morris Rosen Susan Berlin Isaac Dickmann Erika Eckstut Halina Yasharoff Peabody Estelle Laughlin Norbert Yasharoff Herman Taube Isak Danon Werner Katzenstein Nina Merrick Sheila Bernard Tania Rozmaryn Jill Pauly Helen Lebowitz Goldkind Regina Spiegel Catherine Liner Margit Meissner Alfred Traum Frank Ephraim



Fanny Aizenberg

Fanny Aizenberg (Fajga Orenbuch) top

Born 1916, Lodz, Poland

Fanny Aizenberg was born into an Orthodox family in Lodz, Poland. Fanny and her family moved to Brussels, Belgium when she was a young child. One of three daughters, Fanny’s family was very active within their community.

Katie Altenberg

Katie Altenberg (Kate Engel) top

Born 1936, Vienna, Austria

Katie was born into a Jewish family in Vienna and resided on an estate called Edmunshof in the state of Burgenland bordering Hungary.

David Bayer

David Bayer top

Born September 27, 1922, Kozienice, Poland

David was born to religious Jewish parents in Kozienice, a town in southeastern Poland. His father owned a shoe factory that supplied stores throughout the country. His mother took care of the home and children, and helped in the factory.

Bob Behr

Bob Behr top

Born March 1, 1922, Berlin, Germany

Bob lived in Berlin, Germany, with his parents until they divorced. He then lived solely with his mother. Bob attended a boarding school in Germany until 1935 when the Nazis forced the school’s closure.

Susan Berlin

Susan Berlin top

Born June 22, 1926, Roznava, Slovakia
Died September 5, 2008

Susan was born an only child to a conservative Jewish family in Roznava, Slovakia. Her mother and father owned a dry-goods store. Susan was thirteen years old when the war began. News of the evils of the concentration camps reached Roznava and Susan’s father decided to take his family out of Slovakia as fast as possible. Her father had a brother in the United States that would assist her family in receiving Visas. They sailed into New York City on the S.S. Washington on August 3, 1939.

Sheila Bernard

Sheila Bernard (Sala/Sara Perec/Peretz) top

Born 1936, Chelm, Poland
Died October 6, 2007

Sheila was the only child born to Bela and Isaac Peretz in Chelm, Poland. Chelm was a vibrant Jewish community. Before the war, her family owned a large building on Lubelska Street, and Sheila’s father managed a Singer Sewing Machine business. Sheila’s parents both had large, close-knit families, and her childhood was filled with love and joy.

Jacqueline Mendels Birn

Jacqueline Mendels Birn top

Born April 23, 1935, Paris, France

Jacqueline and her sister attended the local public school. Their lives were quite normal until Germany invaded Poland and the war broke out.

Isak Danon

Isak Danon top

Born 1929, Split, Yugoslavia

Isak was born in Split, a small town on the Adriatic coast of Yugoslavia with a prewar population of about 50,000 and a rather active Jewish life. Isak’s father owned a small dry goods store, and Isak helped run the family business along with his mother and three sisters.

Isaac Dickmann

Isaac Dickmann top

Born November 11, 1919, Stryj, Poland

Isaac was raised by his widowed mother who received support from a nearby uncle and an aunt in New York.

Yona Dickmann

Yona Dickmann (Wygocka) top

Born March 15, 1928, Pabianice, Poland

Yona was the eldest of four children in a working-class Jewish family. Yona’s father sold merchandise to Polish stores. It was a difficult life in Pabianice, but Yona’s family was very close, and many relatives lived nearby.

Marcel Drimer

Marcel Drimer top

Born May 1, 1934, Drohobycz, Poland

Marcel Drimer was born in Drohobycz, Poland a small town now part of Ukraine. His father Jacob worked as an accountant in a lumber factory while his mother Laura raised Marcel and his younger sister Irena.

Erika Eckstut

Erika Eckstut (Neuman) top

Born June 12, 1928, Znojmo, Czechoslovakia

Erika was born in Znojmo, a town in the Czech region of Moravia with a Jewish community dating back to the 13th century. Her father was a respected attorney and an ardent Zionist who hoped to immigrate with his family to Palestine.

Frank Ephraim

Frank Ephraim top

Born February 19, 1931, Berlin, Germany
Died August 27, 2006

Frank’s father was an inventor, holding several patents in the radio field until the crash of 1929. Frank’s mother worked as a secretary for a Berlin business firm. In February 1939, soon after Kristallnacht, the family emigrated to the Philippines.

Gideon Frieder

Gideon Frieder top

Born September 30, 1937, Zvolen, Slovakia

Gideon’s family moved to Nove Mesto, Slovakia, at the beginning of the war because his father, a rabbi, was offered a position there. Gideon’s grandparents were deported early in the war. His father was part of the underground “Working Group” of the Slovak Jewry.

Manya Friedman

Manya Friedman (Moszkowicz) top

Born December 30, 1925, Chmielnik, Poland

Manya was born in Chmielnik, a small Polish town that had a Jewish community dating back to the 16th century. Her father owned a furniture shop and her mother took care of the home. Manya had two younger brothers, David and Mordechai, and was surrounded by many close relatives.

Goldie Gendelman

Goldie Gendelman top

Born November 17, 1933, Lachowicze, Poland

Goldie was born to an Orthodox Jewish family in Lachowicze, Poland. Her family ran a successful two-room shoe factory from the home. In September 1937, she and her family sailed to Cuba, where they remained safe during the war.

Agi Geva

Agi Geva top

Born June 2, 1930, Hungary

When the German occupation of Hungary occurred on March 19, 1944, Agi, her younger sister Zsuzsanna and her parents, Rozsa and Zoltan Laszlo had been living in Miskolcz.

Fritz Gluckstein

Fritz Gluckstein top

Born January 24, 1927, Berlin, Germany

Fritz’s father, a conservative Jewish judge in Berlin, was extremely patriotic and a decorated veteran of World War I. He lost his job when Hitler came to power in 1933. Fritz’s mother was not Jewish and Fritz was considered a “Geltungsjude,” a counted Jew.

Nesse Godin

Nesse Godin (Galperin) top

Born March 28, 1928, Siauliai, Lithuania

Nesse was born to an observant Jewish family in Siauliai, known in Yiddish as Shavl. Her parents owned a store that sold dairy products. The city was home to a vibrant Jewish community of almost 10,000 people.

Helen Lebowitz Goldkind

Helen Lebowitz Goldkind top

Born July 9, 1928, Volosyanka, Czechoslovakia

Helen was one of seven children born to a Jewish family in Volosyanka, a town in Trans-Carpathian Ruthenia. Nestled in the Carpathian mountains, Volosyanka was a small town with a sizable Jewish Community. Helen grew up in a close-knit family; many relatives lived nearby.

Henry Greenbaum

Henry Greenbaum (Chuna Grynbaum) top

Born April 1, 1928, Starachowice, Poland

Before 1939, Henry enjoyed a typical childhood, attending public and religious school and playing soccer with the other children.

Ruth Elisabeth Greifer

Ruth Elisabeth Greifer (Dahl) top

Born May 30, 1922, Geilenkirchen, Germany

Ruth was born into an orthodox Jewish family in Geilenkirchen, a rural German town near the Dutch border. Her father, Isidor, was a respected cattle dealer in the area and her mother, Sophia, took care of the home.

William Hess

William Hess top

Born August 8, 1921, Stuttgart, Germany

William was born to a large liberal Jewish family in Stuttgart, Germany. His father, a World War I veteran, worked as a textile wholesale businessman and owned his own small store where he sold cotton and linen goods. Stuttgart was a seemingly safe city and became the home for many Jews.

Irving Horn

Irving Horn (Isachar Herszenhorn) top

Born February 25, 1927, Radom, Poland
Died October 6, 2002, Potomac, MD

Isachar was born to a Jewish family in the Polish city of Radom, approximately 75 miles south of Warsaw. The city was the center of Poland’s leather-tanning industry.

Louise Lawrence-Israels

Louise Lawrence-Israels top

Born 1942, Haarlem, the Netherlands

When Louise was only six months old, she went into hiding with her parents and older brother. The family hid on the 4th floor of a rowhouse in Amsterdam for the duration of the war.

Adam Kahane

Adam Kahane top

Born July 6, 1922, Jaslo, Poland

Adam was born to a liberal Jewish family. In Jaslo Adam attended school and spent much time outdoors skiing, playing tennis, and kayaking with his cousin, Reggie.

Inge Katzenstein

Inge Katzenstein (Berg) top

Born March 27, 1929, Cologne, Germany

Inge lived with her parents, grandparents, uncle, and younger sister, Gisella, in Lechenich, a small village outside of Cologne. The Bergs were an observant Jewish family. Her father, Josef was a respected cattle dealer, who had many business and personal contacts with their Jewish and non-Jewish neighbors.

Werner Katzenstein

Werner Katzenstein top

Born April 29, 1922, Wallensen, Germany

Werner was raised in the rural German town of Herleshausen, where his family owned a farming supply business. His father sold seeds to local farmers and purchased their grain, while his mother ran the office. The Katzensteins were one of about two dozen Jewish families living in the area.

Theodora Klayman

Theodora Klayman (Teodora Basch-Vrančić) top

Born January 31, 1938, Zagreb, Yugoslavia

Yugoslav-born Teodora Basch and her younger brother were hidden by their aunt and her non-Jewish husband, with the help of neighbors, for almost four years.

Estelle Laughlin

Estelle Laughlin top

Born July 9, 1929, Warsaw, Poland

Estelle’s father helped to organize the Warsaw ghetto uprising. During the uprising, Estelle and her family hid in a bunker.

Herbert Launer

Herbert Launer top

Born March 28, 1925, Vienna, Austria
Died October 2006

Herbert Launer was born the only child in a middle class Jewish family. Herbert’s father was a fur dealer and a highly decorated soldier of the Austrian army during World War I.

Gerald Liebenau

Gerald Liebenau top

Born November 30, 1925, Berlin, Germany

Gerald was born to a Jewish family in Berlin, Germany. His father worked in the textile business. Gerald was the eldest of two children; he had a younger sister. He attended public school until 1936, when he and other Jewish children were forced to leave public schools.

Frank Liebermann

Frank Liebermann (Franz Liebermann) top

Born January 19, 1929, Gleiwitz, Germany now Poland

Frank was the only child of Hans and Lotte Liebermann. The family lived a comfortable middle class existence. Both of Frank’s parent’s families had lived in the area for several generations.

Catherine Liner

Catherine Liner (Kato Fried) top

Born March 3, 1925, Smolnik, Czechoslovakia

While still a child, Catherine moved with her parents and brother to Sighet, Romania. In 1944, Catherine’s father was arrested and taken to a concentration camp.

Helen Luksenburg

Helen Luksenburg (Hinda Chilewicz) top

Born April 4, 1926, Sosnowiec, Poland

Helen was the eldest of three children in a comfortable middle class Jewish family. Her father owned a textile business in Sosnowiec and her mother attended to the home.

Welek Luksenburg

Welek Luksenburg top

Born February 1, 1923, Dabrowa Gornicza, Poland

Welek grew up in Dabrowa Gornicza, an industrial town in western Poland. His father, Simcha, was a wholesale meat merchant and his mother, Rozalia, served as president of the local chapter of the Women’s International Zionist Organization. The Luksenburgs were among the several thousand Jews who lived in Dabrowa Gornicza.

Emanuel (Manny) Mandel

Emanuel (Manny) Mandel top

Born May 8, 1936, Riga, Latvia

After the war, Manny went to Switzerland with his mother for several months, before emigrating to Palestine in 1945. He moved to the United States in 1949.

Michel Margosis

Michel Margosis top

Born September 2, 1928, Brussels, Belgium

When Belgium was attacked by Germany in May 1940, and Brussels was bombed, the Margosis family fled. Michel’s father had already known pogroms and persecution during the Russian Revolution when he was ‘interned’ in Siberia in the 1920s.

Margit Meissner

Margit Meissner (Morawetz) top

Born February 26, 1922, Innsbruck, Austria

When Margit was a baby, her family moved from Austria to Prague, Czechoslovakia. Her father was a banker from a religious Jewish family in Bohemia and her mother came from a Viennese family of Jewish origin.

Julius Menn

Julius Menn top

Born February 20, 1929, Free City of Danzig now Gdansk, Poland

Julius enrolled in a Polish school in Warsaw where he was taunted by the other students for being Jewish. The Menn family stayed in Poland with the hope of returning to Tel Aviv.

Leon Merrick

Leon Merrick (Lajb Kusmirek) top

Born January 8, 1926, Zgierz, Poland

Leon was the oldest of two boys born to a Jewish family in Zgierz, Poland. In 1939, after Germany invaded Poland, Leon’s family left Zgierz for Lodz. They were forced into the Lodz ghetto in 1940.

Nina Merrick

Nina Merrick (Szuster) top

Born May 18, 1929, Rokiteno, Poland

Nina was born to a Jewish family in the Polish town of Rokiteno. She was the youngest of three siblings. Her father was a builder, and Nina attended the Beth Sefer Tarbut.

Bella (Berger) Mischkinsky

Bella (Berger) Mischkinsky top

Born September 9, 1922, Lodz, Poland

Bella was born in Lodz, Poland. At the age of sixteen, she was separated from her family and ended up in the Oszmiany ghetto, from which she later escaped. Bella made her way to the ghetto in Vilna and eventually was interned in the Kaiserwald concentration camp, where she met and married her husband. She was liberated in April 1945, after surviving a number of other concentration and slave labor camps. In 1946, Bella immigrated to the United States.

Isaac Nehama

Isaac Nehama top

Born April 29, 1927, Athens, Greece

Isaac and his two younger brothers were born and raised in Athens, Greece. The Nehamas were traditional, Sephardic Jews who observed all Jewish holidays. Isaac’s father was an accountant at a Jewish-owned textile firm. Both of Isaac’s parents belong to local Jewish organizations.

Johanna Gerechter Neumann

Johanna Gerechter Neumann top

Born 1930, Hamburg, Germany

Johanna was born into a family of merchants in Hamburg, Germany. Her family tried to get visas to enter the United States, but because Johanna’s father was, officially, a Polish citizen, he was given a higher lottery number than his wife and child. Therefore, they decided to stay in Germany as a family. In 1939, they escaped to Albania along with a few other Jewish-German families. They remained in Albania, fleeing from one town to another throughout the war until they were freed by the Allies in 1945.

Jill Pauly

Jill Pauly (Gisella Renate Berg) top

Born May 1, 1933, Cologne, Germany

Gisella lived with her parents, grandparents, uncle, and older sister, Inge, in Lechenich, a small village outside Cologne. The Bergs were an observant Jewish family. Gisella’s grandfather was the president of the local synagogue association and her uncle was the cantor.

Kurt Pauly

Kurt Pauly top

Born March 26, 1930, Aachen, Germany

Kurt was born to Jewish parents in the city of Aachen, where his mother’s family had resided since the 18th century. His father, though trained as a chef, worked as a butcher and also managed several stores for his father-in-law. Kurt enjoyed large family gatherings, where he would play with his cousins, Anne and Margot Frank.

Halina Yasharoff Peabody

Halina Yasharoff Peabody (Litman) top

Born December 12, 1932, Krakow, Poland

Halina was nine years old when the Germans carried out their first aktion. After two more aktion, Halina’s mother bought identities from a Catholic priest for herself and her two daughters.

Pete Philipps

Pete Philipps top

Born December 5, 1931, Essen, Germany

Pete grew up in Essen, a major industrial city on Germany’s Ruhr River. His father worked as a cattle hide dealer for an international trading company in nearby Mühlheim. His mother was a designer for a fashionable women’s dress shop.

George (György) Pick

George (György) Pick top

Born March 28, 1934, Budapest, Hungary

György was the only child of middle class Jewish parents living in the Hungarian capital of Budapest. His father, Istvan, was an engineer responsible for producing hydraulic grape presses for wineries. His mother, Margit, worked as a legal secretary.

Morris Rosen

Morris Rosen (Moniek Rozen) top

Born November 10, 1922, Czestochowa, Poland

One of 10 children, Moniek grew up in Dabrowa Gornicza, an industrial town in western Poland. His father, Jacob, owned a general store, which he was forced to close in 1938 as the result of a boycott by local antisemites.

Tania Rozmaryn

Tania Rozmaryn (Marcus) top

Born June 16, 1928, Vilna, Poland

Tania grew up in Smorgonie, a Polish town where Jews constituted more than half of the population. Her father was a successful businessman. Her grandfather, an affluent merchant, traveled frequently and brought the first truck to Smorgonie.

Hans (John) Sachs

Hans (John) Sachs top

Born May 8, 1920, Decin, Czechoslovakia

Hans was born to a Jewish family in the Sudetenland, a region of Czechoslovakia that had a large German population. In 1922 the Sachs family moved to Vienna, Austria, where they purchased a dry goods store. Hans attended public school and had many non-Jewish friends.

Sam Schalkowsky

Sam Schalkowsky (Shmuel Shalkovsky) top

Born May 23, 1925, Kovno, Lithuania

Sam Schalkowsky is the son of Yitzhak and Chaya Kupershmidt Shalkovsky. He was born on May 23, 1925 in Kovno (Kaunas) Lithuania where his parents owned a shoe store. Shmuel was the youngest of six siblings, two of whom died at a young age. Three of his older siblings moved to Palestine in the early 1930’s.

Charlene Schiff

Charlene Schiff (Shulamit Perlmutter) top

Born December 16, 1929, Horochow, Poland

Shulamit, known as Musia, was the youngest of two daughters born to a Jewish family in the town of Horochow, 50 miles northeast of Lvov. Her father was a philosophy professor who taught at the university in Lvov, and both of her parents were civic leaders in Horochow.

Lore Schneider

Lore Schneider (Heti Lore Koppel) top

Born October 10, 1924, Bochum, Germany

After Lore’s father was fired, disbarred and beaten in an alleyway for being Jewish, he decided that it was time for the family to leave Germany before conditions became worse.

Gerald Schwab

Gerald Schwab top

Born February 19, 1925, Freiburg, Germany

Gerald was born to a conservative Jewish family in Freiburg, Germany. His father was a businessman. His company was based in Germany and the warehouse was located in Switzerland. His mother helped his father with the business.

Livia Shacter

Livia Shacter top

Born April 2, 1917, Tacovo, Czechoslovakia

In August of 1944, Livia and her family were taken to Auschwitz. After four months in Auschwitz, she was deported and forced into slave labor at Fallersleben. In April of 1945, Livia was liberated and eventually came to the United States in 1947.

Flora Singer

Flora Singer (Mendelowicz) top

Born August 16, 1930, Berchem, Belgium
Died February 25, 2009

Flora’s Romanian-born parents immigrated to Antwerp, Belgium, in the late 1920s to escape antisemitism. Flora’s father owned a furniture workshop. Antwerp had an active Jewish community. Flora was the oldest of three girls, and the family spoke Yiddish at home.

Haim Solomon

Haim Solomon top

Born November 5, 1924, Bivolari, Romania

Haim was the youngest of 5 children. His family lived in a small Jewish community in the village of Bivolari, where there were about 200 Jewish families. Germany and the Soviet Union signed a nonaggression pact in 1939; the Soviets ordered Haim and his family to leave Bivolari. They moved to the town of Iasi, some 50 km southwest of Bivolari.

Regina Spiegel

Regina Spiegel (Gutman) top

Born May 12, 1926, Radom, Poland

Regina was born in Radom, a city with 120,000 inhabitants. Her father worked as a leather cutter for a large shoe manufacturer and her mother took care of their six children. The Gutmans were very religious and Regina attended Hebrew school in the afternoons.

Sam Spiegel

Sam Spiegel top

Born August 23, 1922, Kozienice, Poland

Sam was the eldest of five children born to Jewish parents in Kozienice, a town in east central Poland. His father owned a shoe factory and his mother cared for the children and the home. Kozienice had a thriving Jewish community that made up about half of the town’s population.

Esther Starobin

Esther Starobin (Rosenfeld) top

Born April 3, 1937, Adelsheim, Germany

Esther’s father sold feed and other products for cattle, and occasionally arranged for the sale of cattle in the area. Her mother often helped him. Esther was sent to England on a Kindertransport in June 1939. In Thorpe, England, Esther lived with Dorothy and Harry Harrison and their son Alan from 1939 until November 1947.

Charles Stein

Charles Stein top

Born November 28, 1919, Vienna, Austria

Charles was born to a Jewish family in Vienna, Austria. His father was a printer. When the Germans marched onto Austria and arrived in Vienna on March 13, 1938, Charles fled to Luxembourg. Soon he received the required Affidavit of Support which he immediately presented to the nearest American Consulate in Antwerp, Belgium. Charles got his visa on October 7, 1939 and arrived in New York on December 18, 1939.

Rene Stolbach

Rene Stolbach top

Born June 15, 1934, Geneva, Switzerland

When Hitler rose to power, Rene’s father, Henri, tried to arrange visas so that members of their family living in Poland could come to Switzerland. However, the Swiss government did not grant visas to Jewish families. Henri’s mother and sister were among the Jews rounded up and murdered in Yaslow, Poland by the Nazis in 1942.

Elzbieta Strassburger

Elzbieta Strassburger (Lusthaus) top

Born May 15, 1938, Cracow, Poland

Elzbieta grew up in Iwonicz, a resort town in southwestern Poland noted for its mineral water. Her father, Edmund, was a respected physician and Helena, her mother, had studied pharmacology. At home, they spoke Polish and were among the few Jewish families who lived in Iwonicz.

Herman Taube

Herman Taube top

Born February 2, 1918, Lodz, Poland

Herman Taube was born to Jewish parents in Lodz, Poland in 1918. Orphaned at an early age, he was brought up by his religious grandfather. In prewar Lodz, Herman became a yeshiva student. During the war, Herman lived as an exile in Uzbekestan. He also served as a medic in the Second Polish Army and was stationed with them in Majdanek.

Susan Taube

Susan Taube (Strauss) top

Born January 9, 1926, Vacha, Germany

Susan grew up in Vacha, a small Thuringian town where her family had lived for more than 400 years. Her father, Herman, owned a general store and her mother, Bertha, took care of the home and children. The Strausses were one of about 25–30 Jewish families living in Vacha.

Alfred Traum

Alfred Traum top

Born March 22, 1929, Vienna, Austria

Freddie and his father spent many afternoons together where Freddie learned from his positive outlook on life and determination to overcome life’s hardships.

Josiane Traum

Josiane Traum (Aizenberg) top

Born March 21, 1939, Brussels, Belgium

Josy’s father left for England with his brother after the German invasion of Belgium in May 1940. Josy’s mother took part in the Belgian Resistance movement by hiding refugees in her attic.

Eve Kristine Vetulani

Eve Kristine Vetulani (Belfoure) top

Born October 1, 1924, Cracow, Poland
Died March 25, 2004, Baltimore, Maryland

Eve Kristine Vetulani was born to a Catholic family in Cracow, Poland. Her father was a professor at Jagiellonian University. Her mother took care of Kristine.

Susan Warsinger

Susan Warsinger (Hilsenrath) top

Born May 27, 1929, Bad Kreuznach, Germany

The Hilsenraths lived in Bad Kreuznach, a city in western Germany with a Jewish community that dated back to the 13th century. Susan was the eldest of three children. Her father owned a thriving linen store, and her mother took care of Susan and her two brothers.

Martin Weiss

Martin Weiss top

Born January 28, 1929, Polana, Czechoslovakia

Martin was one of nine children born to orthodox Jewish parents in Polana, a rural village in the Carpathian Mountains. His father owned a farm and a meat business, and his mother attended to the children and the home.

Rabbi Jacob G. Wiener

Rabbi Jacob G. Wiener (Gerd Zwienicki) top

Born March 25, 1917, Bremen, Germany

Rabbi Wiener was the eldest of four children. His father, Josef, had left Ukraine in 1913 and opened a bicycle sales and repair shop in Bremen. His mother, Selma, was descended from a distinguished Jewish family and had been a kindergarten teacher and a bookkeeper for a large firm.

Norbert Yasharoff

Norbert Yasharoff top

Born February 18, 1930, Sofia, Bulgaria

Norbert was born to a Jewish family in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia. His father, a prominent lawyer, was also active in the Jewish community. Sofia was home to approximately half of Bulgaria’s estimated 50,000 Jews during the mid-1930s.