Przodownikom Pracy [Socialist Hero of Labor] lapel medal issued to a Jewish official postwar

Kalman Barakan was born in Bialystok, Poland, on November 2, 1913. He obtained a law degree from University Jozef Pilsudski in Warsaw on October 11, 1937. Kalman was living in Bialystok when the Germans occupied it in June 1941. His home was destroyed. By late summer, he, and all the Jews of Bialystok, were forced to wear the yellow star and were imprisoned in the ghetto, working for the Gestapo doing hard manual labor. Conditions were inhumane with ten family members sharing one room of about 30 square feet. In July 1943, he managed to escape. The ghetto was liquidated in August 1943. Kalman’s entire family was transported to a death camp. He lived in hiding in the area, constantly changing places and on the run, feeling like a hunted animal. He went for long periods of time without any food, close to starvation. He was liberated at the end of July 1944 when the German Army retreated as the Soviets advanced. From July 1944, until the end of the war in May 1945, Kalman served in the Red Army. He was mobilized, despite his Polish citizenship, when the Soviet occupied the eastern part of Poland where he had been living. Kalman married Pauline Pajes in 1949. She had survived the war in hiding in Grodno. Her family was killled in Treblinka. Kalman worked for the Polish National Enterprise for Foreign Trade in Łódź, Poland. However, he never accepted the ideology of the Communist regime. In 1968, at the age of 55, Kalman was fired for lack of Party activity. He and his wife were forced to leave their apartment and deprived of citizenship. On September 25, 1968, Kalman and Paulina left Poland, and arrived in Italy on October 10, and lived, stateless, in Rome. They were admitted as refugees to the United States on January 21, 1969. They settled in Chicago, Illinois, where Kalman died, age 79, in 1992.

Paulina Pajes was born in Grodno, Poland, on February 18, 1918, to Josel and Szejna Serenska Pajes. She had two brothers, Chaim (Enrico) and Chajkiel. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded western Poland, prompting Britain and France to declare war on Germany. Around the same time, the Soviet Union invaded eastern Poland, under a nonaggression pact (the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact) with Germany. The city of Grodno came under Soviet occupation. When the Germans occupied Grodno in June 1941, authorities required all Polish Jews to identify themselves by wearing the Star of David, and 21 year old Pauline was forced into hard labor. The following November, the Germans established two closed ghettos in Grodno, where Pauline was confined to and lived in one room with four families. Liquidation of the ghettos began in November 1942, and continued through February 1943. Pauline’s mother and father were murdered at Treblinka killing center. Pauline escaped and was hidden by Michal Sawoszczyk, a Polish acquaintance of the family. For a short time, she hid in the cellar of his workshop, then in the attic, in horrible conditions, under a roof of iron sheets with the sides shielded by planks with holes. There was no water, light, or heating, no sheets or blankets, no change of clothes or underwear, no medicine when needed. The sandy floor served for a bed. She lived this way through two bitterly cold winters, motionless to avoid detection and on minimal food rations. She was in constant dread of violent death to her benefactor, to her brother, Chajkiel, who was also in hiding, and to herself. She was liberated on July 24, 1944. Paulina married Kalman Barakan in 1949. Kalman had escaped the Bialystok ghetto and lived in hiding until the region was liberated in 1944. His family was killed in the death camps. He then was forced to join the Soviet Army. Kalman worked for the Polish National Enterprise for Foreign Trade in Łódź, Poland. He never accepted the ideology of the Communist regime, and in 1968, at the age of 55, Kalman was fired for lack of Party activity. He and Pauline were forced to leave their apartment and deprived of citizenship. On September 25, 1968, Kalman and Paulina left Poland, arrived in Italy on October 10, and lived, stateless, in Rome. They were admitted as refugees to the United States on January 21, 1969. They settled in Chicago, Illinois, where Kalman died, age 79, in 1992. Pauline, age 90, passed away on February 29, 2008.

The Socialist Hero of Labor medal was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2009 by Linda Anselmo on behalf of the Estate of Kalman and Pauline Barakan.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Estate of Kalman Barakan and Pauline Pajes Barakan