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April 16, 2004/Nisan 25 5764, Vol. 56, No. 30
Exhibit tells Jewish history of Polish town
CAROLYN SLUTSKY
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
KRAKOW, Poland - Czestochowa is known around the world as the site of the Jasna Gora monastery, a pilgrimage place for Poles and other Catholics who flock there to see a famous painting of the Black Madonna.
Soon, residents also will be able to learn about local Jewish history. An exhibition on the subject, based on materials from the town archives, prepares to open for a three-month run later this month in Czestochowa before traveling to several larger Polish cities.
Behind the newfound interest in Czestochowa's Jews is a long story of cooperation.
Two years ago, Jerzy Mizgalski, historian and dean of the local Pedagogical Institute, was doing research in the city archives when he found thousands of documents and photographs dating back to 1618 connected to Czestochowa's Jewish history.
He elicited the help of Elizabeth Mundlak, a professor of thermodynamics living in Venezuela, who was born to Jewish parents in Czestochowa and rescued by Christians during the Holocaust.
Together they conceived of an exhibition to display the archives and tell the story of the Jewish history of Czestochowa, which before World War II was home to 30,000 Jews, about one-third of the city's population. Today there are 37 Jews living in the city.
After his find in the municipal archives, Mizgalski decided to teach a course on Jewish history, expecting about 35 students - but 400 signed up.
Mizgalski and Mundlak moved forward with their plans for the exhibition, and Mundlak approached two American businessmen and cousins, Sigmund Rolat and Alan Silberstein, to under-write the project. The exhibi-tion is co-sponsored by the city of Czestochowa and the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw.
Three days after the Germans invaded Poland on Sept. 1, 1939, launching World War II, they were in Czestochowa, Silberstein said.
During the war, the city was a centralized concentration point where Jews living in smaller towns were sent. A large ghetto was established, and then a smaller one which eventually was liquidated. Jews were deported mostly to Treblinka and to the HASAG forced labor camp located in Czestochowa.
Rolat was born in Czestochowa and was a young teenager when he was sent to HASAG. His parents and brother were killed by the Nazis.
He is quick to point out that not all Jews went to their deaths quietly: Many, like his father - who took part in the Treblinka uprising - and his brother, the youngest member of a partisan group, died fighting.
Rolat survived with the help of his uncle and aunt, Leon - an underground leader - and Rose Silberstein, Alan's parents.
Alan Silberstein was born after the war, and the two branches of the family made their separate ways to America.
Once the cousins got involved, the project rolled ahead. With no precedent for an event that encompasses such a long history in Czestochowa, the group was free to be creative.
The team obtained the help of Czestochowa's mayor, Tadeusz Wrona.
"It's important for the younger generation to look at the past and future, a future that should be created together," Wrona told JTA in an interview in his office. "We should look not to a future concentrating on prejudice and stereotypes, but creating a future free of this."
The exhibition opens April 21 for three months and then is to travel to Warsaw, Krakow and Wroclaw. The exhibition and accompanying academic symposium are entitled "Coexistence, Holocaust, Memory."
Members of the Czestochowa Diaspora community are invited to attend the exhibition and symposium. For more information, contact Stan Steinreich at (212) 786-6077 or (201) 982-2373.
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