Stolzman and Cala families papers

Aaron Stolzman (1925-1995) was born Aron Adolf Sztolcman on 22 December 1925 to Chiel and Sara (née Lichtenstein, b.1896) Sztolcman in Golub-Dobrzyń, Poland. Aaron had an older sister and a younger brother, Menasze (b. 1928). Aaron’s father Chiel (1892-1939) was a grocer and a veteran of the First World War. In September 1939 Chiel joined Polish forces to defend against the German invasion and was killed. Following the German invasion the Sztolcman family home was seized by an ethnic German neighbor and Aaron, his siblings, and mother fled to an uncle in Mława. In Mława the family was forced to live in the ghetto. As a consequence of the deprivation and brutality the family experienced Aaron decided to flee the ghetto and pose as a non-Jewish Pole. Soon Aaron found work with a farmer. Aron later left to join with partisans in the surrounding forest. In 1942 Aaron’s partisan group was discovered and their bunkers destroyed. Those who were not killed were deported to Auschwitz. Aaron was interned in Auschwitz for 3 years where he was forced to carry out forced labor on construction commandos. In early 1945 Aaron was transported to Dachau. His mother, sister, and brother all likely perished at Auschwitz. After liberation Aaron lived for a time in the Feldafing displaced persons camp. While attending classes Aaron met fellow survivor Malka Cała, originally from Łódź. The couple immigrated separately to the United States, Malka to relatives in Ohio and Aaron to maternal uncles in Connecticut, but were reunited and married in 1947. Aaron went on to become the proprietor of a bakery in Waterbury, Connecticut, where the couple raised a family.

Malka (later Molly, 1929-1980) Cała was born in 1929 to Abraham and Golda Sura Fuchs Cala in Łódź, Poland. Malka was the youngest of 10 siblings. Her brothers were Aron, Chil, Fiszel, Icek, Leon, and her sisters were Elka, Estera, Rachel, and Regina. In 1944 Malka was deported to Auschwitz at age 15 with her mother, and her siblings Leon and Estera. By this time Malka's father and several of her siblings had perished in the Holocaust. Malka survived Auschwitz, Flossenburg, and was liberated at Bergen-Belsen in 1945. After the war Malka re-established contact with her surviving siblings, Aron, Leon, Rachel, and Regina. While living as a displaced person in Germany after the war Malka met Aaron Stolzman. After immigrating separately to the United States the couple married and settled in Connecticut where they welcomed a son and daughter.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Sandy Stolzman Rosen

Donated in April 2019 by Sandy Stolzman Rosen, the daughter of Aaron Stolzman and Molly Cala Stolzman.