Lazowski, Ruth Rabinowitz_2009/11/09, Oral History, 2009

Oral History – Ruth Rabinowitz Lazowski November 9, 2009

Estelle Kafer: Today is November 9th, 2009. We are interviewing Ruth Rabinowitz Lazowski at the home of Faith Helene in West Hartford, Connecticut.

RL: Good evening, everyone. I think most of you now the story of my husband, what he went through and I guess tonight are my turn to tell you about my life. I was born in a town in Poland, which is now Belarus, and the town was called the Yiddish we called it “shtetl” (sp?), in Polish it was called Dziento (sp?) and now in Russian it’s called Diatlavah (Sp?). In a way we were lucky where we were situated in Poland because, as you know, in 1939, when the Germans started occupying Poland, Hitler and Stalin made a pact and they separate Poland in half and our part of Poland was under the Russians from 1939-1941. So when people were already killed, or in Warsaw, we were under the Russians. Now, under the Russians, we weren’t worried about being killed. But my background was such as, my mother was a pharmacist and our pharmacy was in front of the house and we lived in the back of the house. And as you know, the Russians confiscate everything so they confiscated my mother’s drug store and we had to move out of the house, and we lived some place with non-Jews, we really, there was no place, so we moved into somebody’s house. Don’t exactly remember when. I know I was four years old so I know that we moved. And my father was in lumber business with my grandfather and also his business was confiscated. And so from ’39-’41, uh, I remember my mother drying bread because she was afraid we were going to be sent to Siberia and if we were going to go on a train it would take a long time to go, bread would, you know, like rot but if it ‘s dried out, it could last longer. But we were never sent to Siberia. Then, in 1941 the Germans came in and we were put in a ghetto. And, uh, at the beginning, I don’t remember. To me as a child I was, I thought we were in the ghetto a year or two but it was merely a matter of months. So we were put in the ghetto and then all of a sudden the ghetto was surrounded by many Nazis. During the time when there was no selection, as they called, we called it scrita (sp?) the, it was guard, there weren’t that many people guarding. But then when they had a selection a lot of soldiers came, or Nazis or whatever you want to call them and they surrounded the ghetto. So the first selection came and my father felt that we all should go to the marketplace. Everybody was supposed to go to the marketplace.

Now, let me tell you something else. Before, when they started the ghetto they made a Judenrat. Did you ever hear of the word Judenrat? Judenrat, they selected about twelve people from town, including my grandfather was in the first Judenrat and what happened, if the Germans wanted something from the Jews, if they wanted people for work, if they wanted jewelry, if they wanted money, they didn’t go directly to the Jews but they went to the Judenrat and the Judenrat had to provide them with whatever they needed. And so, the first selection came and before even this selection came, the Judenrat didn’t give them what they wanted and they killed all the members including my grandfather, my father’s father. So that was the first thing. The next thing was they took people to work and they took about two hundred men and my uncle was one of them that they took to work and we never saw him again. So maybe they worked for a while and then they were killed. And now comes the first scrita (sp?) and my father said we should all go to the marketplace. And by the way everyone when we started the ghetto, almost everyone had a hiding place, they built a hiding place because they knew sooner or later they would come after us. But somehow my father decided it was better to go to the marketplace. So we come to the marketplace and my mother because she was a pharmacist, she was not a nurse, in my husband’s book it says there she was a nurse, but she knew medication so she had a certificate that she was a nurse. And my father he was like, you know, 5’ 11, a tall man and he was strong and he also had a certificate that he could work. So we come to the marketplace and there was a lot of pushing and shoving and, you know, people being killed, children being beaten and somehow my father was separated from us. So my mother and my sister and I (my sister was two years younger than I am so I was six and my mother was four) and we’re standing, we’re standing holding on to my mother and there’s a German not far away going with his finger right, left, right, left, and on one side he’s sending children and elderly on one side and on the other side young people and even people with families, but like the parents are able to work, you know, they needed people for work. So, at that point they let the children and everyone else live. And my mother’s alone, and we don’t know what happened to my father, and we’re going on and holding on. I remember my sister held on to my mother. I held on to my sister and my mother was holding her schein (sp?), her certificate that she is a nurse. And a boy comes over to us and asked my mother would she say that he is her son. Now, this boy went to other people to ask, but people were afraid, you know, I mean, here’s another child and some people who didn’t have any children that would have them, didn’t want to have a child, they didn’t know didn’t know what would happen. He went to about three or four people and everyone said sorry. But he comes to my mother and he says “would you tell, I’m all alone here, would you tell the German I’m your son”. And my mother my mother said “you know if they let me live with two small children, they’ll let me live with three”.

EK: Hmm.

RL: And I also remember, and my sister remembers it too, when you were ten years old and older you had to wear a yellow star; under ten, like my sister and I didn’t have a yellow star. So my, there was a star here and there was a star in the back. And the boy’s star was torn off partially and my mother realized if the German would see him with that star torn off he would be beaten. Somehow she found a safety pin and she pinned up the star. And as we were approaching the German, uh, my father was already on the side to live, and my father noticed us and he started yelling in German “my frau, my frau” and my mother said “my mann”, you know, or something like that. It was a Yiddish German, but anyway, the words were, and he looked at my mother and he looked at my father and they let us on the side to live. And the boy ran, you know, with us and we stayed probably in the marketplace maybe another twenty minutes or half an hour. And then they told us to go back to our homes.

EK: Hmm.

RL: So we ran back, and at that point, they killed half of the Jews of the town. By the way, in our ghetto, because ours was a larger town and there were smaller towns around so the Jews from the smaller towns were brought to the larger town, in the ghetto. So we didn’t know everybody there because usually in our town my parents probably knew everybody but the new people that came from other towns we didn’t know. So we ran back to our homes and also I remember, because they made the ghetto smaller, we had to move. We had to move from the house where we were in to move to another house. A couple of weeks later my sister was ill and there was a doctor in the ghetto and my mother took my sister to the doctor. And on the way, the boy was looking out the window. It happened to be on the street, you know, I mean, on the street, you know, the street that the boy lived, the doctor lived, it was on the same street, and he was looking out the window and he sees my mother. So he waited. On the way back from the doctor he said to his mother “this is the lady that saved my life.” So she came out and she thanked my mother and she blessed my mother, and at that point he found out my mother’s name was Miriam Rabinowitz and we found out that he came from the town Belitza Now, it could be we knew the name too but my mother never remembered the name, she only remembered that he came from Belitza.

Okay, a couple months passed. I’m thinking things we did in the ghetto. I remember it was Passover we went to someone’s house and we baked matzah (sp?) You know, I remember actually going with my mother to baking some kind of matzah. And then there was another selection, a few moths later. And this was in August of 1942, in August. And at that point my father said “no way are we going to the marketplace”. And he decided we should in this hiding place that we had. And where we moved, we moved into a home, the people, and I remember their name, it was the Coopermans. Cooperman was the last name. They were very well-to-do people. They had a car, which in our town, not too many people had cars. I know my father had a bicycle but I know we didn’t have a car. No, but the Coopermans had a car and they had a garage. It wasn’t attached to the house, it was separate and in that garage we built a hiding place.

And the Coopermans were, one was a dentist, one was a doctor and the dentist, the woman, had a very small boy, who must have been maybe two years old. Okay, we all decided to go in the hiding place but my father said “I’m not gonna go” because my aunt, whose husband was taken away to work, was alone and with a little boy, and my grandmother was still alive, because my grandfather was killed, you know, in the Judenrat and he said “maybe I can at least save my sister” saying that she is his wife. So he camouflaged the hiding place and he left to the marketplace. Um, we were there, and this was oh, and how it came about, the Germans did the following: they had Jewish guards inside the Ghetto, Jewish guards were guarding the ghetto and outside were the Nazis but then when came a selection, you know, or a schrita (sp?), they brought in a lot more soldiers to surround the ghetto. So, one of the Jewish guards of the ghetto was a cousin, my mother’s cousin and he came very early in the morning to say “the ghetto is surrounded, we better hide”. And I remember my mother made us, you know, get dressed real fast. And it was August, it was hot, so we didn’t have that much but we went into the hiding place. And this cousin of ours also went into the hiding place, and my aunt, my mother’s sister who lived with us, also went in and there must have been thirty five people in the hiding place. So we were there a whole day, a night and another day. Now, let me describe to you where the hiding place was. It was in the garage and we went down on some kind of stairs and there was one room. And there were benches all around the room, and underneath one bench was like a trap door, and then we had to go under the bench, the trap door and then there was a bigger hiding place. So, the first hiding place was like it had, like, we had to go to the bathroom was there, there was some food, there was some clothing. The Germans found the first hiding place.

EK: Um, hmm.

RL: And we heard them saying “Oh! The Jews were here but they probably were discovered already”. And in the meantime the sad part, and I always cry about that, um, I’m sorry, this Coopermans, the dentist that had the two year old child started crying

EK and others: Oh.

RL: And someone in the hiding place, put his hand, or her, I don’t know who did it, and choked the baby to death.

EK and others: Ohhhh.

RL: And I remember saying to my sister, I used to say “Tanya, we better be quiet because we’re going to be next” because I think we were the next as far as children. There were a few older ones than we were. And um, so we kept, we were very, very quiet. But this is something. But if they wouldn’t choked that baby, we wouldn’t be here because they found the first hiding place. So we’re there a whole day and night and another day. And then you could hear everything, somehow you could hear what’s going on, and we heard that a lot of Poles went to rob the houses and we heard them saying “oh, it’s getting dark and there were rich Jews lived here, so we should come back tomorrow morning and start digging because I’m sure they buried things. You know, they heard all that saying. So the adults in the group, and there must have been around thirty, who said, and all those people lived in that one house, they said “we’d better get out”.

So they opened up the, you know, the door. My aunt went out first and this cousin that told us the ghetto was surrounded. And one more person went out. And it was a very dark night and was very quiet., and my aunt says to my mother “Manya”, her name was Miriam but they called her Manya, “Manya, lift up the kids and we’re gonna go”. So my sister was lifted up. I was lifted up. And all of a sudden there was some kind of noise and I said, and somebody said, “Deutshen”(sp?), Germans. So I got scared and jumped back into the hiding place. And it got quiet and there I am, a couple more people remained, I’m all alone without my mother. And what happened was, as it turned out it was like a dog or a cat passing by, there weren’t any. My mother was holding on to my sister and my mother was sure that my aunt was holding me and as they crossed the barbed wire they met on the other side and my mother says to my aunt “where’s Rohelleh” (sp?), you know where’s Ruth and my aunt says “I thought she was with you”.

EK: Hmm, mmm.

RL: And my mother said “I am not going without Ruth”, or Rohelleh, as I was called. So she says to them “wait for me”, you know, “wait here for fifteen or twenty minutes. I’m gonna go back to the ghetto and see if I can get”, you know, “take her out, and if I don’t come back in fifteen minutes leave without me”. So they left my sister with my aunt and my mother went herself. And it was dangerous to go back to the ghetto. She crossed the barbed wire again and she went into the ghetto and I heard her yelling “Rohelleh, Rohelleh!”, and I remember something else. There were a couple of people left with us, you know, with me in the hiding place, and he said to me “oh, your mother left you and she left without you”. And I said “my mother would never leave me” (chuckle). I remember saying that. Okay, and so my mother came and we went into, you know, we ran again across the barbed wire. We didn’t know where we were going. So we were going for a whole night. Very early in the morning we saw a farmhouse. And everyone stayed on the side and this cousin of ours, my mother, my aunt went in to ask where we were. And we were only maybe two miles away from our town because we were just going in circles, we didn’t know where to go. So, and the woman, there was an elderly woman. My mother said they were very nice. And they gave us some bread. Don’t forget we were already, it was like two or three days that we didn’t eat anything. And so she gave some bread and some sour milk, you know, like buttermilk. And she told, they told, my mother and my aunt which way to go to the woods.

Now the reason we were going to the woods, because I told you my father and my grandfather were in lumber business. So they knew a lot of farmers. Now I have to tell you something that it’s almost not, sometimes I think that you can’t believe it that really happened. My father was very friendly with the forester of the, forester that takes care of, he was very good friends with him. My mother never, my father said never said to each other “if we ever separate let’s go to the forest to find out where each one is.” Okay? So, but my mother said “we have to go to the forester”. And she found out from these people, the elderly couple, how to go there. So we walked, we stayed at night, during the day we stayed, and at again night we walked to the forester. And we come to the forester. Again my mother leaves us and my aunt and my cousin, and my mother going to the forester, and they said and she said “I came because I would like to have find out what happened to Morris”. So the forester says to her “your husband was here a few hours before and he said ‘if my wife comes tell her I’m going this way to the woods.’”

EK: Mmm.

RL: Now what happened to my father was, he went to get my grandmother and my aunt and the little boy, and they took him, at this time they took him to the Jewish cemetery. They made everyone lie down, you know, and they start, all of a sudden the Germans started yelling “tischler”. Tischler in German is a carpenter. And my father couldn’t hear what they were saying but they were looking for carpenters. So he lifted his head and maybe three or four more people lifted their heads, just to hear, or maybe they knew what a tischler was, and he didn’t want to go so my aunt, my father’s sister, said “Morris, go, go, okay”. So they went and a lot of people realized that they looking for carpenters and at that point everybody lifted their head to go, and at that point they started checking their certificate if they’re really carpenters. My father’s, because he was, there were four or five people, they never checked his certificate if he was a carpenter, which he wasn’t, but, okay. So they take him. So then he couldn’t save my aunt, he couldn’t save my cousin, he couldn’t save my grandmother. But they take the people they want to work, they take them to the movie theater.

Now, in my husband’s book, it talks about he jumped out the window of the movie theater. That was, he jumped out eight days later ‘cause he was in the hiding place. This was exactly the night of the day of the massacre, of the schchite. And he’s there and already they were going to take him to another town called “Novabruduk” (sp?) to work. And the theater, let me tell you, it used to be a movie theater but during the German time it was an office building. And some Jewish people worked in that building. And so one woman comes over to him and she says “Morris,” she says, “I have a key to the top floor and we can go up and hide in that top floor”. And she asked maybe four or five more people. She couldn’t tell everyone, you know. So they climbed up the stairs and then everyone else was sent, put on trucks, and sent to another camp to work. And my father, and another either four or five people, at night climbed down, and that same night that we escaped from our hiding place, he escaped from that theater. So that movie theater, the only one that I know that escaped from that theater were my father and the few people and my husband, that boy that escaped.

Okay, so we come to the forester and the forester tells my mother that “your husband was here and he went this way to a town, a place what’s called a pechanska pushka (sp?) it’s like a wilderness and the name of it was Lupichanska (sp?). And at that point we weren’t afraid anymore because we were in the woods and we started walking and then it started sort of raining. I’ll never forget that, and we were all so, so very tired. So my mother said “let’s go on the side, you know, and just let the kids rest for a little while”. And we went to the side and my mother had some kind of a coat that she covered us. And all of a sudden she sits up and she starts yelling “Meshka! (sp?)”, my father’s name, and my aunt outs her hand on her mouth, she says “Miriam, what’s the matter, are you going crazy?” She says “I can hear my husband’s name, I can hear Morris talking.” It turned out he was walking, but you know how, you know when I tell this I almost don’t believe it. And what happened was the echo, you know, and it was at night and he was already in the woods. He was with the fix or six people that he ran away from that movie theater. He was walking with them and that’s how we met.

EK and others: Hmm, wow.

RL: So that’s how we met. We were in the woods for two and a half years. My father used to say all the time, he said “if you would tell me that I have to be in the woods with thirty or fifty below zero, with two small kids, I would never bother going because I would never think that I would survive”. But, when you got there, you know, each day you worked and you hoped and you tried your very best to survive. My mother had typhoid fever, she had very high temperature. My sister and I had typhoid fever. My father was okay. My aunt had typhoid fever. We survived that. In our town around two thousand people ran to the woods and about two hundred or three hundred came out of the woods. The rest either froze to death or the Germans caught them or typhoid fever. So we were, even the two thousand people that ran away to the woods did not survive.

We were liberated in 1944 by the Russians. Now my father, because from 1939 to ’41 he sort of worked for the Russians and so my father said “I will never stay under the Russians”. And the Russians said if you’re a Polish citizen you can leave Russia and go further to Poland”. So we signed up and I remember we took a train and we ended up in Lublin which, you know, further in Poland. And there we, uh, there was a group of Israeli people, or “schlikim (sp?)” they were called who organized, looked for refugees and tried to organize them. And my father said that “the only place for Jews to go to is Palestine”. He never thought of going anyplace else. So how do you get to Palestine to Poland, right? So, there were two things. First of all, in Salonika (sp?), in Greece, they’re allowed, the Greek government said anybody who used to live in Salonika can go to Greece, and they allowed them to travel. So we had to be Greeks, and we couldn’t speak. So we had to destroy anything that we had that had any identification that we came from Poland. And I brought a few things so I have to show you my first thing. This is a picture of me, my sister and a friend of mine. And this was taken in front of my mother’s pharmacy. And on this side was written in Polish, see there’s like a little cut, was written “Abteka ”, Abteka (sp?), Poland. So my father at that point had a scissor and he cut it off. Now, it’s also a miracle, he had about, I have a couple more, he had four pictures somehow saved in his pocket or in his wallet. So that was one of them. But as they were looking through everything we had there was something else written here in Polish, something to do with a pharmacy and they said “you can’t take this picture”. So my father at that point did not have a scissor and as you can see

EK: You can just pass it around.

RL: He just tore out whatever was written in Polish. So we ended up going from Poland, we ended up to Hungary and then we went to Austria and then we crossed the Alps to Italy illegally at night, with a guide, with a guide. And we weren’t the only ones, there were quite a group. In fact, when I was talking to Avi, you know, the one that teaches at the University of Hartford, and when I told him this he says I know this story because everybody tells me there were groups who went at night we crossed the border.

And I have to tell you a story. When we moved here I found four silver spoons, old silver spoons. And that reminded me of a story. What happened was after we got out from the woods we buried, I guess my parents and my grandparents buried some things. And part of the things that they buried was a little bit of jewelry and some silver that they had. And we found it. And so my father is, everything was put in a knapsack, and we’re crossing the Alps and my father is carrying the knapsack with the silver, whatever it was – some spoons, some forks, whatever, and holding on to us. And I remember my father yelling “Manya, vavye sevect (sp?), throw it out!

EK: It’s heavy. RL: “It’s too heavy.” And my mother said “oh, no, that’s all I have left.” So, as, I forgot all about it, but as we were moving here, as I was going through some of my things, I found four tablespoons. I guess my sister and I divided, she has some and I have some.

EK: Mmm.

RL: And so these are things, okay, so we crossed the Alps and we come to Italy, okay, and my father said “at this point the only place for Jews is in Palestine and we’re not going anyplace else.” So we ended up in Santa Maria de Lebka (sp?) which is the very tip of the heel, not the toe but the heel of Italy. And there we were waiting to go to Palestine. It was illegal immigration.

EK: What year is this?

RL: What year is this? 1948. So, no, no, I’m sorry, it was 1945, what am I saying, 1945, okay, and we’re ready to go, we’re supposed to go to Palestine but it was “allia beit”, illegal immigration, and at that point they didn’t take people with children ‘cause almost everyone ended up on Cyprus. They did take younger people and they were able to smuggle through but a lot of ‘em were caught. So we’re there for six months and we can’t go to Palestine. That’s one thing, I’ll show the other ones later. And so they decided that we shouldn’t be in Santa Maria but go back to Rome and, and we lived in Rome for two and-a-half years. Again we couldn’t get it. So my father puts an ad in the newspaper, and I don’t know which newspaper, I don’t know, I wish I had. Now I think about all the things I should’ve asked. And he puts an ad, that Morris Rabinowitz, the son of B (sp?) Rabinowitz of this town,. Ludzlow, is looking for Mittie Berman. He knew that his father’s sister lived in the United States. And Mittie Berman happened to live in Elizabeth, New Jersey. She read, and I don’t know what newspaper, may be the Forwards, I don’t know, I really don’t know. And they started writing to us “what are you going to do with two small children in Palestine. We want you to come to the United States.” And then Mittie Berman, who wasn’t well off, but I had a cousin in Hartford, Connecticut, the Chrechevskys, I don’t know if you knew, you know? Okay, so the Chrechevskys had money enough to pay for us to come to the United States.

Now going back to Italy. When I came to Italy I was nine years old and I couldn’t read or write in any language because I was never able to go to school who used to tell the kids in Hebrew School “oh, Mrs. Lazowski, I’m so tired,” you know, “I went to school the whole day and then in the afternoon ” and I said “don’t tell me about working hard and I made up when I came here I went into the eighth grade according to my age, and so, I wasn’t the only one, you know, we all studied and we all had to do whatever you know we could. And then we came to the United States here in 1948. But there’s another thing I must tell you. When we studied in Italy, in Rome, when we studied Ancient History, we used to go, actually we studied about it, and we used to go to the places to see it. And one place that, and I went to, it was a Hebrew School. Everything was Hebrew and Hebrew was organized again by teachers from Palestine, and even I had Latin and Hebrew, I had Italian and Hebrew. The main language was Hebrew. Now I don’t know how I learned Hebrew because at home we spoke Yiddish but somehow it just came naturally, whatever. And so we never went to one place, Titus Arch which you know, I mean I’m sure some of you have been to Rome, and you know over, so that was like almost forbidden for us to go. In 1948, when the State of Israel became a state, all the Jews of Rome came around Titus Gate and we walked the other way like we’re coming back to Palestine. And then I was teaching, you know, I used to teach Hebrew School and for Yomatz Maout (Sp?)… I open up a book and there is a picture of the Jews of Rome around the Titus Gate.

EK: Um.

RL: And I said to the kids “I was there!” but the only thing is you couldn’t see me but the next day I brought in my own picture to show them that I was actually there.

EK: Mmm.

RL: So, uh, this was, you know, this is my story. And oh, so I’m not finished, right!

EK and others: (Laughing)

RL: So now I’m a senior in high school and in Italy I had a very good friend who came to the United States but she ended up living in New York. She comes to visit us in Hartford and she, I asked her to stay her to stay for the weekend she says “I can’t stay for the weekend I have a wedding from people from Belitza”. So my mother hears the word Belitza she says “Oh” she says “I once saved a boy from the town of Belitza. I don’t know his name but I know he comes from Belitza.” So what happens, at the wedding how they put young people at the same table, they put the boy

EK and others: (Laughing), the boy!

RL: And my friend at the same table and they started talking and she said, uh, he said he comes from Belitza, she says you know I have a friend whose mother saved a boy from Belitza and he was in the ghetto shtetl and on an on and Philip says “I’m the boy! Where are they?”

EK and others: Aww, oh my!

RL: So, you know, and that’s how, and of course the next day, so he goes that same night and he wrote about it. He goes downstairs and he uses the public phone and he calls Hartford the information and he asked for Morris Rabinowitz. And there were more than one. As a matter of fact my father’s uncle was also called Morris Rabinowitz who lived here. And the operator said “what number?” and he says “give me the first number” and it turned out to be our number.

EK and others: Wow!

RL: And then he couldn’t, he didn’t have a car so he called and he said as soon as his cousin can take him they’re gonna come to visit. So that’s

EK: How old was he then? He was a few years older than you?

RL: He’s five years older than I am

EK: Five years

RL: Right, and I was a senior in high school so I was seventeen and he was like twenty two.

EK: Hmm.

RL: He was at Yeshiva University, I know that. And I was, but then it was, I was off to college and he was there. But then how we got to know each other really was I had an aunt in South Fallsburg, New York, this aunt that was saved and she lived in South Fallsburg and every year, no since I was sixteen, I used to go to Fallsburg there to South Fallsburg, New York and work during the summer and earn some money for school and all this. And he was a waiter at Pioneer Country Club.

EK and others: Um, hmm.

RL: So that’s how we got to know each other better. The truth was that although I had a very good Jewish background, and we had a kosher home, but I wasn’t observant like he was. So now I had to get used to (laughing) I had to get used to, you know. But I felt so comfortable with him, you know. It wasn’t anything like, I was myself, I didn’t have to pretend, I didn’t have to, anyway, so that was it. But I have to show you, I brought a few more things which I have to show you.

I told you my father had about four pictures. One of the pictures he had was, I think it was my kindergarten class.

EK: Mmm.

RL: Which I blew and the reason it’s like this is because I when I was teaching the kids I used that for, you know, for my show, I showed it to them. I am right over here, over here a little, that’s me. And I remember this girl who lived next door and I was very jealous of her all the time because she was very pretty and she always had these beautiful clothes. And I remember, I don’t remember the other one, but her name was Kienke. And but I want you to know I’m the only one that survived.

EK and others: Ohhhhh.

RL: From that whole school with the two teachers.

EK and others: Hmm, Ohhhhh.

RL: I’m the only one. Many times I think about it

EK: He had plans for you.

RL: So there was one thing I wanted to show you. And then the next thing I want to show you, okay, it’s my father, I still have the original picture but I thought, you know, for the kids to see, to blow it up. And then the next thing is, I said my childhood came back in Italy. In Italy we went to school and we also used to go to camp. And this is the kids from all different ages. I remember we went, have you been to Rome, people have been to Rome? Do you know where Tivoli is? Tivoli with those

EK and others: With the gardens?

RL: With the gardens? Not very far from Tivoli was our camp. In fact we used to go, and this was a very, so here I am, that’s me over here, my sister is right over here, and these are friends, you know, that I, some of them, and oh, this is, this is the girl my friend that told my husband that I live in Hartford, Connecticut.

EK and others: Mmm.

RL: So that’s another thing. And now to finish my story I must tell you something.

EK: Hmm.

RL: I, as I was teaching Yomha’shoah I used to tell them stories but then I tried to tell them some, I used to teach the fourth grade so I couldn’t, you know, tell ‘em morbid stories, but here’s one story I told the kids. Um, our, in the ghetto, our house was very close to the barbed wire. And during, when there was no selection, it wasn’t, it was l loosely guarded and you were able to go in and out, sort of. But I knew that I could never go on the other side of the barbed wire. And I was in the back yard playing with some of my friends and I had, all I had in the ghetto was a doll, one doll. It was made of the hard, you know, those old-fashioned dolls that that had the

Other speaker: Porcelain?

RL: Porcelain head and it was, uh, and the

Others: Leather?

RL: The material, the rest, and I was playing with this doll, and I think I had put it on the side for a minute and a little girl, a Polish girl, went through the barbed wire and grabbed my doll and walked out.

EK and others: Uhhh! RL: And I knew that I couldn’t go on the other side to get the doll. And I remember crying, and my sister, I cried because there was no way that my mother could replace the doll, there were no stores and there was no way. So I’m telling this to the fourth graders. The end of school year, a little girl comes over to me, she says “Mrs. Lazowski, I have a present for you”.

EK and others: Ohhh.

RL: So I open up the present and here she makes for me this doll.

EK and others: Aww.

RL: She says this is the doll that was stolen from you in the ghetto. And I want you to know this was, she’s now, her name is Allie Wallace, and she’s graduated college already. And this doll I put away so my grandchildren couldn’t find it (laughing)

EK and others: (Laughing)

RL: But this is the doll, I thought it was, you know, I thought it was such a thoughtful thing of her. In fact, when she was Bat Mitvahed this girl, and I presented some presents to her I told everyone about this doll.

EK and others: Awwww.

RL: So I had to show you the doll that she made for me.

EK and others: What a story! Mmm.

RL: Now if you have any questions.

EK: Well, I think

Other speaker: How did you live in the words?

EK: Yeah, we want to hear more about, about your life in the woods.

RL: Okay. What we were lucky is, ‘cause I told you my father was in lumber business so he knew, he knew a lot of farmers who were actual friends. Uh, like for example, in the wintertime, we had felt boots, just, you know, like the boot, like the felt you put inside of a boot? We didn’t have the outside, okay. So by walking all day in the, in the snow it used to get wet. My father used to take off the boots. I remember he used to say to us “sleep one on top of the other so your feet won’t freeze”. He used to take it to this, uh, in fact I remember the name of the people, the Wallachs (sp?). He used to take it to them, to this farmer, dry it in the hearth and then early in the morning and bring us dry, uh, if it wouldn’t be for my father, we would not survive. They also shared food, whatever we could. You know what did we do? I had an uncle he was a very, very good storyteller. In fact, he came, he lived in Hartford, too. They lived on Haynes Road. No, no, on another road. My parents lived on Haynes, on another road. Anyways, uh, we used to sit around the fire and he used to tell us Bible stories, he was a good. There’s another thing, my husband, I had some friends we used to play different kind of games and one of the things I remember, this is a little bit, we used to think of what would we do if we find a German. I mean, these are kids thinking. We would hang him on a tree and not kill him right away but cut pieces and throw salt on him.

EK and others: Ohhh.

RL: That’s the way of thinking. I never forget that. This is the way we were saying, ‘cause we knew, you know that, and um, and that’s how, we spent, you know, the time. And we moved many times. In the wintertime we had, uh, we had like a zimlanke, it was called, a basket in the dirt. Did you see

EK and others: Defiance? Yeah

RL: Okay, Defiance. That’s how we lived. Defiance was, we knew about the, uh, about the basket. As a matter of fact, my girlfriend, the one that told my husband that I, she survived with her whole family in those, in th basket (sp?), in that group.