Katz family papers
Extent and Medium
folder
1
Creator(s)
- Dita Sperling
Biographical History
Yehudit (Dita) Katz Zupovitz (later Dita Sperling) was the daughter of Itzhak and Liola Katz. She was born in Kovno on April 15, 1922, where her father worked as an economist and her mother as a dentist. Dita had one younger brother, Zvi. She married Yehuda Zupovitz during her last year of high school, five months before the start of the war. In the ghetto she and Yehuda lived with her mother, grandfather, brother and aunt. Dita smuggled food while on work details outside of the ghetto in order to keep the family fed. She also smuggled her niece Rina Zupovitz out of the ghetto. Yehuda, deputy chief of the ghetto Jewish police, kept much of his underground activity a secret from Dita, but he did teach her how to shoot a rifle. Shortly after Yehuda's arrest in March 1944 and subsequent murder at Fort IX, Dita was sent to the Sanciai labor camp. From there, she was deported to Stutthof in July. Dita survived along with her mother and brother. Her father was killed in the June 1941 pogroms in Kovno; and her grandmother, Basia, was killed during the March 1944 action that targeted the children and the elderly. Her cousin (the baby) died on a death march to Stutthof.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Dita Sperling
The papers were donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2006 by Dita Sperling.
Scope and Content
Papers consisting of material relating to the experiences of the Katz family before, during, and after the Holocaust. Included in the papers are photographs of Yehudit Katz [donor] before World War II, photographs of Liola Katz [donor's mother] before the war, and photographs, documents, letters, and a notebook relating to Honan Katz [donor's uncle].
People
- Dita Sperling
Genre
- Photographs.
- Notebooks.
- Document
- Letters.