Self portrait of Holocaust survivor Hilary Laks

Hilary Laks (1898-1991) was born on 30 January 1898 in Warsaw, Poland to Henryk Laks (d. 1942) and Roza Dessau (d. 1936). He had at least 3 sisters: Stefa (d. 1939), Flora, Francia (d. 1942). Hilary married Janina Tauba Szamir in 1932. Janina (1907-1995) was born on 28 February 1907 to Jakub and Thekla Rochman. She had several sisters. Hilary and Janina’s daughter Romana (later Romana Laks Kaplan) was born on 22 August 1934 in Warsaw. Hilary worked as a chemical engineer at Adamczewski & Co. soap factory. After the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, the Laks family fled east to Baranowicze, Poland (Baranavichy, Belarus). They returned to Warsaw in June 1940, and were forced into the Warsaw ghetto in November 1940. In 1942 they smuggled Romana out of the ghetto with the assistance of Bronisław and Katarzyna Miśkiewicz, and she was hidden in a convent. Bronisław was a coworker of Hilary’s from Adamczewski & Co., and hid Hilary in his family apartment until liberation. Janina went into hiding with Hilary’s stepmother Halina with the assistance of Leszek Grzywaczewski, a Polish firefighter. In January 1945 Romana was found in a convent in Stanislawow. The reunited family moved to Sweden in August 1946 as they waited for U.S. visas. In August 1951 the Laks family immigrated to the United States via Oslo, Norway aboard the M.S. Oslo Fjord. Romana later married Howard Kaplan (1932-2020) and they had two children. Bronisław and Katarzyna Miśkiewicz were recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem in 1984.

The drawing was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2015 by Roma Laks Kaplan.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Roma Laks Kaplan in memory of her parents Janina Tauba and Hilary Laks