Shlomo Shafir photograph collection
Extent and Medium
folder
1
Creator(s)
- Shlomo Shafir
Biographical History
Shlomo Shafir (1924-2013) was born Selimar Frenkel in Berlin, Germany in 1924. During his childhood, his mother, Esther Frenkel (nee Berkmann), was seriously ill with encephalitis. He was educated by his father and grandmother in Eitkoven, a small town in the Lithuanian on the east Prussian border. In 1938 he moved with his father to Kovno, Lithuania (now Kaunas, Lithuania). They eventually moved into the Kovno ghetto where Shlomo began editing and working on the underground newspaper, Nitzotz. He was deported to Dachua concentration through Stutthof in July 1944. He was sent to Kaufering II, where he continued to publish Nitzotz. In November 1944, he was sent to Kaufering I, where he was reunited with his father. There, he continued to publish Nitzotz and participated in other underground activities. On April 29, 1945, Sharif and his father were liberated from Dachua concentration camp. Three weeks after liberation Hermann Frenkel died and was buried in the Woodland Cemetery in Dachau concentration camp. In May 1947, Frenkel married Mina Kaminski, who had been a member of “Irgun Brit Zion” (IBZ). They immigrated to Israel in April 1948. From 1964-1968, Shlomo Shafir served as a US correspondent for the newspaper Davar. From 1974-2005 Shafir served as an editor-in-chief of the journal of the World Jewish Congress, Gesher. He also worked as a research associate of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Israel. Shlomo Shafir died in 2013.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
Funding Note: The cataloging of this collection has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Shlomo Shafir donated the Shlomo Shafir photograph collection to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1994.
Scope and Content
The Shlomo Shafir photograph collection consists of two group photographs of partisans, members of a Zionist underground movement, 1943. Some of the members are seen wearing Star of David patches. One photograph includes (right to left, seated) Esther Gottfarstein, Rivka Rogol and Mina Kaminski (who after the war might have been known as Shapiro) and (right to left, standing) Aharion Rosin, Leah Sokolski, Moshe Nadel, and Miriam Rogol (who after the war was Pfeffer), and Abraham Gurwitz. The second photograph includes (right to left, seated) possibly Chaim Strom, Mordecai Fisher, Moshe Gurwitz, and (right to left, standing) Zembawel Rosenzweig, possibly Sarah Starowolski known after the war as Jody, Seliman Frenkel, Rivka Rogol, and Elichu Kelson. All are members of the United Zion Organization, or "Irgun Berit Tsiyon," was known as the IBZ. It was a secret organization founded in Kovno (Kaunas), Lithuania, in 1940 by Shimon Grau.
System of Arrangement
The Shlomo Shafir photograph colletcion is arranged in a single series.
People
- Gurwitz, Moshe.
- Sokolski, Leah.
- Rosin, Aharion.
- Rosenzweig, Zembawel.
- Gurwitz, Abraham.
- Kelson, Elichu.
- Fisher, Mordecai.
- Starowolski, Sarah.
- Kaminski, Mina.
- Rogol, Rivka.
- Rogol, Miriam.
- Strom, Chaim.
- Gottfarstein, Esther.
- Frenkel, Seliman.
- Nadel, Moshe.
Subjects
- Lithuania.
- World War, 1939-1945--Underground movements--Lithuania--Kaunas.
- Jewish ghettos--Lithuania--Kaunas.
- Zionism--Lithuania--Kaunas.
- Zionists.
- Kaunas (Lithuania)
Genre
- Photographs.
- Document