September 8, 2010 Th e Ca n a d i a n Je w i s h Ne w s cjnews.com T Page B39 Rosh Hashanah Greetings 5771 Historian whose task is remembrance of the Holocaust
Rachel Kostanian
hen Rachel Kostanian speaks, the words come In Rachel’s voice, the stones themselves cry out. “I feel westward, the children were put on trains to return to tumbling out so quickly one wonders how she the shadows of those who perished,” she notes. Through Lithuania. Rachel got off in Gorky and was reunited with has time to breathe. And what this 80-some- her, they come to life. her mother. Wthing, fiery-haired historian lives and breathes is remem- An only child in a loving and educated Bundist family, With liberation, Vilnius again became the capital of brance of the Holocaust. Her field is Lithuania, her focal Rachel first experienced anti-Semitism when the son of her Lithuania, having been part of Poland since shortly after point Vilnius – Vilna or Vilne to the Jews, and Rachel brings family’s Lithuanian housekeeper greeted her each day with the end of the First World War. the story to life as she describes each alleyway, doorway and taunts and stones. She was filled with shame, but finally got The murder of Vilna’s Jews in the Soviet-dug fuel pits window that mask the fate of Vilna’s Jews. the courage to shout back at him. in the forest of Ponar, the murder of the Jews of Kaunas Rachel chronicles each step along the journey. After the June 1940 Soviet occupation, (Kovno) in the 19th century fortresses that ring the city, Here is the doorway where the Jews of Vilna Rachel’s father Yosif Zivelchinski, a lawyer, most notably the Ninth Fort and the 245 mass murder gathered to beseech Jacob Gens, the elder of the became chief judge for their town of Siauliai sites throughout Lithuania, were the remains of Lithuania’s Ghetto Jewish Council, for the lifesaving slips of (Shavli) and the surrounding areas. With the 600-year-old, devout and enlightened Jewish community. paper that qualified the bearer for work, as the German advance into Lithuania in June 1941, With Lithuania’s postwar incorporation into the Soviet colour of the paper changed and the quantity Rachel and her mother, Bluma, were sent with the Union, the murdered Jews of Lithuania were included in was reduced. families of other officials into the Soviet Union, wara & memorialsb plastic as coSoviet 2x20 Citizens, 7/27/01 not Jews.2:22 PM Page 1 There is the alleyway leading to the prison settling in Gorky. Yosif returned to Shavli. Rachel Continiued on page B40 where Vilna’s resistance commander, 36-year-old and Bluma learned later that he was killed by Yizhak Wittenberg, spent his last night, having German paratroopers. A & B PLASTIC CO. LTD. given himself up to the Germans in the deceptive By Esther Goldberg In Gorky, Bluma and Rachel survived amid the belief that doing so would save the ghetto. deprivations of Soviet wartime existence. Rachel Mr. & Mrs. Andrew Adler Nearby are the windows of the Mefitze Haskole was sent to a kinderheim in the Ural Mountains, and Family on Strashun Street, where Herman Kruk created a lending where 200 Lithuanian children, some of whom were Jewish, library and led the celebration on Dec. 13, 1942, when book found refuge. WISH THEIR RELATIVES AND FRIENDS number 100,000 was taken out. There, with the help of the Jewish director, the children A HAPPY & HEALTHY NEW YEAR Rachel Kostanian has investigated each event and every followed on a large map the advance of the Red Army and place. History and geography are woven together as a escaped into music to forget their hunger, lice and the worry doorway or a hidden corner inspire a torrent of words in about their families. Russian, Yiddish, Lithuanian or English. At the end of 1944, with the Red Army advancing Happy New Year to all my clients & friends Happy & Healthy Please come visit me and New Year pursue your passion for luxury uc,f, vcuy vbak Lexus on the Park located at Haskell Beale 1075 Leslie St. (Leslie & Eglinton) (formerly THE INN ON THE PARK site)
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Continued from page B39 was never able to work in law, except as an aid to the dean of The exhibition had its origins with Emanuelis Zingeris and Reunited with her daughter in Gorky, Bluma was prepared the criminal law faculty. his brother Markas, children of survivors from Kovno. Emanu- to stay in Russia. It was Rachel who persuaded her that they She spent evenings studying English and qualified to study elis was active in the Lithuanian independence movement, and must return home to Lithuania. Eventually Bluma found work English at the State Pedagogical Institute, when she met her later served for 18 years in the Lithuanian parliament. in Vilna as the director of a library and she and Rachel were husband Genrich, an electrical engineer. Like others, he had At Vilnius University, Emanuelis had written his disserta- given a small room in the library corridor. Rachel not only been sent from the Soviet Republic of Armenia to Lithuania, tion on Lithuania’s Jewish cultural heritage, a courageous act lived in the library, she lived with the library. It was there, she where there was a shortage of professional engineers. in those dangerous times. Discovering and promoting that remembers, “the greatest writers in the world became acces- Genrich had promised his mother to bring his bride cultural heritage became his life’s work. sible and enriched my mind and formed me.” to Armenia, so the couple spent four years in Kirovakan. In 1989, as part of the Perestroika plans for the new Rachel finished school and graduated from Vilnius State During this time their son was born. Rachel returned to Lithuania, the Lithuanian Soviet government asked each University having studied Soviet law. She began her lectur- Lithuania for the birth and brought her mother back to minority to set up a cultural foundation and provide a list ing career speaking in barbershops on the Soviet constitu- Armenia, where Rachel taught English in a music school. of its needs. Emanuelis, with other Jewish intellectuals, tion, while working as a cleaner in the library and later as “I would dance and sing with the children in English.” established a Jewish Cultural Society and asked for the a junior librarian. Rachel’s homesickness for Lithuania won out in the end. recreation of the Jewish Museum, commemoration of the Despite her law degree, due to anti-Semitic attitudes she In 1960, the family returned to Vilna. Still unable to get Shoah, streets named after known Jews, plaques to be put work in law, she got a job as a translator in her husband’s up on former Jewish historic sites and the Jewish cemeteries factory. From 1969, she translated technical journals at a to be put in order. All these were accepted by the govern- Brooklyn Furniture welding institute. ment. Having volunteered to help Emanuelis, Rachel left In 1987, everything changed. One day while walking in her translating job and became the full-time scientific Importers Vilna Rachel saw a large Magen David on an advertising secretary of the Lithuanian State Jewish Museum. Where Low Prices And High Quality Meet pole. Her first thought was: “My God, they are taking us to Abraham Sutzkever and Shmerl Kaczerginsky, poets in nd concentration camps again!” It was a horrific moment. prewar Vilna, had hidden valuable documents and archives Celebrating our 52 year in business “In a couple of seconds during which I saw trains packed in the ghetto and outside it. Having survived with the par- with people, barbed wire on the windows, and so on, I tisans, in 1944 to 1945, they recovered these archives and May the New Year usher in saw — it is a Jewish exhibition! In Kaunas!” On opening set up a Jewish Museum. Within four years the museum day, “the train from Vilna to Kovno was packed with our was closed by the KGB. Some of the material Sutzkever health, happiness and peace people rushing to the miracle.” The miracle that Rachel and Kaczerginsky collected went to YIVO in New York; found was that she was no longer alone: “All of a sudden some was taken over by the Soviet authorities, but still I found my roots. Like everyone else, I have a people, a carriescoopers a Jewish iron Museum& metal stamp.inc 2x30 8/10/01 4:06 PM Page 1 language,klausz dentala culture.” labs 2x30 7/30/02 3:03 PM Page 1 Continued on page B41
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The Experts in Mechanical Systems since 1956 The locals must know We wish our Customers and Friends a Happy, Healthy and Peaceful New Year Continued from page B40 copied as much as they could, fearing that – BERNIE LITTLE • MEL LITTLE • ROBBIE LITTLE • BEV LITTLE like the Jewish Museum after the war – the 20 DENSLEY AVENUE • TORONTO In 1989, Emanuelis Zingeris secured a openness would soon end. bbr_cjnews 9/11/05 6:10 PM Page 1 premises for the new Jewish Museum in a With this archive-based documentation, small wooden building that had formerly the seven rooms of the Green House were belonged to the Museum of the Russian filled and the museum opened in 1991, 50 October Revolution of 1917. years since the German invasion. Rachel’s husband Genrich designed the Its character shines through in the sur- new year displays, which were assembled by Genrikh vivors who accompany visitors. At first, May your be filled Agranovski, and with help from survivors Rachel Margolis did this, then she suggested Rachel Margolis, Dimitrij Gelpernas, that Rachel Konstanian take over. with the promise of peace Eugenija Biber and Rachel Kostanian, the Four thousand to 6,000 people visit the Green House on Pamenkalnio Street was Green House every year; many are moved and the magic of music. established. by Rachel’s descriptions of what they are The force behind the Holocaust Museum seeing. Some visitors are Lithuanian school- was the survivors. As Rachel says, “we all children, some are overseas scholars, some burnt with a desire to establish an exhibi- are South African, Israeli, British and North there’s only one tion so the world would know, in particular American Jews looking for their roots and the locals would know what it was, what the fate of their families. was done and what was the result.” Today One woman came to Rachel and said: BayBloor Radio it is known as the Holocaust Exhibit or “Let us go to the forests. I have to find the MANULIFE CENTRE, BAY STREET SOUTH OF BLOOR, TORONTO, TEL: 416-967-1122 Catastrophe (Hurban). place where we were shot.” As well as the www.baybloorradio.com mon.– wed. 10–7, thur., fri. 10 – 8, sat. 10 – 6 The Lithuanian government returned mass murder sites, Rachel and her staff two further buildings to the Jewish com- found Jewish tombstones and lobbied for munity: the former Tarbut Gymnasium the municipalities to clear and maintain on Pylimo Street, which today houses the cemeteries. This was done and monu- the Jewish community offices, museum, ments were put up at each mass murder archives and a Gallery of the Righteous and site showing the numbers of people killed the former Jewish Theatre on Naugarduko there. Street, which today houses the Tolerance Great Britain’s Lord Janner organized Centre. Together with the Green House funding to put markers along the highways Holocaust Exhibit, the three make up the with arrows pointing to the sites in the Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum. forests. With their research and their col- Material was collected for the Green league Joseph Levinson’s travels through- House displays from three main sources, all out Lithuania, the museum published From the Partners, Management & Staff of which Rachel and her colleagues pored The Valley of Sorrows on the mass murder over and which she absorbed as she had sites. of The Pickle Barrel Restaurants absorbed the library in her youth. Among the discoveries in the forest was They studied Leyzer Ran’s three volume a small medal, inscribed in Yiddish to Noah history of centuries of Jewish life in Vilna, Shneidman to honour his 20th boxing fight, Jerusalem of Lithuania, based on the photo- with the date of the fight, May 18, 1943 graphs he took of several thousand Jewish and the Vilna Ghetto symbol. places and objects after the war. Leaving his boxing medal with his family, They collected the memoirs and the Shneidman escaped from the ghetto two memories of survivors “who started to glue weeks before its final liquidation, joined to us,” who returned to the museum daily the partisans in the forests, and survived. to talk of their experiences. Also, the Lithu- Sixty-seven years later, Norman Shneidman anian State Archives opened their treasures is professor emeritus of Russian Literature – documentation hidden up to 1988 – from at the University of Toronto. His medal German, Lithuanian and Polish sources, has been returned to him. along with the remains of the Sutzkever/ Kaczerginsky collection. The museum staff Continued on page B42 We would like to wish our clients and friends & A Happy & Healthy New Year “Perfection in Reflection” Since 1975 Extends to our friends & clients, Best Wishes for a Happy & Healthy New Year 905-475-2400 marlinmirror.com showerdoorstore.ca Page B42 T cjnews.com Th e Ca n a d i a n Je w i s h Ne w s September 8, 2010 Rosh Hashanah Greetings 5771 Teaches with a clear and passionate voice Continued from page B41 Campaign, which kept the Jews alive while their food and and passionate voice that resistance to evil, to silence medicine was scarce and families and friends were being and to falsehood is what marks out a hero. In 2000, Rachel gave a paper at the Remembering taken away and shot. Twenty-five years ago, we in Canada would never have for the Future Conference in Oxford. Organized by For those in the west, the Holocaust took place far away; believed we would walk the cobblestone streets of Vilna Dr. Elisabeth Maxwell, it brought together scholars, in Europe, the locations are still there. In Lithuania, a site and Kovno, attend Shabbat services in shul there or visit survivors and teachers, among them Fumiko Ishioka, of the mass murder of Jews may be only a few kilometres a Jewish museum. Just as the prewar Yung Vilne writers en route to Theresienstadt to discover the owner and from a local school or church. were the apex of their literary world, Rachel and her team family of Hana Brady and her suitcase and Judy Cohen, Lithuania lost as large a percentage of its Jewish com- are the alte vilne, whose research into Lithuania’s Jewish who came from Toronto, and was interested in women munity as any country in Europe, yet having been subjected history and heritage, and the teaching of it, will benefit in the Shoah. to Soviet rule for 40 years, it is that Soviet-era trauma that not only the present but those generations who follow. Two years later, Rachel’s paper was published as the is fresh in their minds. They view the Jews as those who Nitza Spiro of the British Spiro Ark cultural centre, book Spiritual Resistance in the Vilna Ghetto. It describes met the Soviet occupier with flowers – not unlike the who took Rachel’s tour of Vilna and the Green House 20 the areas of health care, culture, art, science, music, sport Jewish perception that the Lithuanians met the German years ago, wrote: “Rachel, petite in size, has become a real and religion that helped the Jews of the ghetto overcome occupier with bread and salt. History is still fresh and vivid giant with her personality, encyclopedic knowledge, deep and survive the physical and psychological terror. in that part of the world. emotional contact with the subject and her passion for the A discovery by the museum’s staff in the Vilna archives As well as being the story of Jewish death and suffer- long story of her people in Lithuania and for education. of posters of cultural and artistic events in the ghetto led ing, the Holocaust is a story of resistance to evil, living in A proverb in Hebrew says, “Dvarim hayotzim min halev, to searches for where the events were held and the fate of dignity, maintaining civilization amidst chaos and uber- nichnasim el halev” – “words that come from the depth of those mentioned on the posters. leben – survival. one’s consciousness, penetrate to those who hear them.” Rachel’s book, Vilna Ghetto Posters, as well as the exhibit Historians such as Rachel Kostanian put a human This has been Rachel’s gift to those who know her, at the Green House, show the range of cultural activities face on the facts, making the lesson universal. She has have heard her lecture, read her books and have seen her — including a lottery to raise money for the Winter-Help twice returned to live in her beloved Lithuania when museum. It has become her gift to us all. she was living elsewhere. A Lithuanian patriot and Esther Goldberg has created and edited the three-volume a Jew, she has been behind many of the museum’s Holocaust Memoir Digest, published by Vallentine Mitchell, important works, a historian who teaches with a clear www.holocaustmemoirdigest.org TRUSTER ZWEIG LLP TZ CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTS Complete Interior Best wishes to our clients and Kiddiesworld Design & Window friends for a Happy and Healthy COMPLETE LINE OF TOT TO TEEN FURNITURE Covering Services Best wishes to our customers, friends New Year and relatives for a WISHING ALL OUR CLIENTS Happy & Healthy New Year 500 Highway 7 E, Suite 200 a very happy, healthy and Richmond Hill, Ontario L4B 1J1 1911 Dundas St. E., Mississauga peaceful New Year. 905.624.9092 416.621.9483 Tel: 416-222-5555 Fax: 905-707-1322 www.kiddiesworld.ca www.lernerinteriors.com 905-475-1302
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