The Multicultural Gostynin initiative and the Municipal Cultural Center in Gostynin invite you to this year’s European Heritage Days, which should be interesting to everyone interested in the history of the Jews who once lived in the city. We especially recommend a walk in the […]
World War II brought the extermination of the Jews of Płock. In February and March 1941, the Nazi occupants deported about 10,000 Jews from Płock and nearby towns to German concentration camps. From around 9,000 of Jewish people living in Płock before the outbreak of […]
In 1841, property with the mortgage number 37 at Grodzka Street was purchased from Anna Kłobuszewska nee Zawidzka and Teofila Białkowska née Kłobuszewska by Samuel Majeran. In the years 1841-1842 Majeran erected a brick tenement house on the square. Since 1873, the owner of the property was a merchant from Lipno, Lewin Zeman (born in 1849), son of Jakub and Cyrla née Majeran. From 1876, a store operated here with local, Viennese, Hamburg and Berlin furniture, mirrors in gilded, mahogany and nut frames as well as living room and bedroom furniture. Zeman also opened a sewing machine store with American and German equipment and a workshop where upholsterers brought by the owner from Warsaw and abroad performed all upholstery works for the needs of the store and customer orders. The tenement also housed a jewellery store by F. Grünbaum, offering diamond, gold and silver products from French and English factories.
In the building, together with his family, lived Mieczysław Goldberg (1868-1907) – son of Szlama Lejb and Enta Julia née Dancygier, journalist, playwright, poet, art critic, essayist, and socialist activist. From 1894, Goldberg was active in the French workers’ movement. He founded the magazines “Le Courrier Social” and “Sur le Trimard”. He was the author of “Lettres à Alexis. Histoire sentimentale d’une pensée” (1904), “Prométhée repentant, tragédie en trois actes” (1905), “Fleurs et Cendres. Impressions d’Italie” (1906), “L’Esprit dialectique” (1907). His friends included Antoine Bourdelle, Camille Claudel, Henri Matisse and Auguste Rodin.
In 1885, the property was purchased by a trader from Dobrzyń – Lesser Byszofswerder (born in 1834). In 1911 the property was bought by Syne Praszkier, and in 1923 Józef Praszkier as well as Icek and Gitla Lidzbarscy. At 11 Grodzka Street, the seat of the Association of Jewish Evening Courses in Płock, co-founded by Becalel Okolica – co-organizer of the Płock department of the “Poalej Syjon-Lewica” party, chairman of the Trade Union of Tailors and Transporters in Płock. Alfred Blay’s cotton shop and Salomon Epsztajn’s shoe shop operated here as well.
My grandfather, Izydor Wajcman (born 1867), came from a large Jewish family associated with Wyszogród. He was the son of Szmul Jochim (1841-1892), son of Zelik Lewek (born 1794) and Ryfka née Eben (born 1796), and Estera Sura née Albert (1837-1901), daughter of Mosiek Albert […]
On August 18, 1920, the Bolshevik army attacked Płock. Until August 19, the city’s civilian population, including women and children, heroically defended themselves on the barricades along with the army, preventing soldiers of Bolshevik Russia from gaining the bridgehead and crossing the Vistula. In the […]
Hechaluc began its activity in Płock in 1923. Its founders were A. Kowalski, F. Fliderblum and M. Kenigsberg. Szymon Margulin, Mojżesz Zander and A. Lejbgot were also part of the board of the organization. The organization’s goal was to emigrate its members to Eretz Israel. Despite the fact that orthodox communities in Płock opposed the newly formed group, the number of its members increased from year to year, and the local branch of Hechaluc became a center of various Zionist activities.
While the Hechaluc organization consisted of young people over the age of 18 who were preparing to travel to Eretz Israel, younger boys and girls were members of its sister organization Hechaluc Hatzair. The organization prepared young people for their future lives as pioneers and focused on cultural activities. In the 1930s, many young boys and girls left the city for Eretz Israel, where most of them lived as pioneers, often in kibbutzim.
Young pioneers from Płock who never reached Israel were murdered, like many others, by the Nazis during World War II.
Bibliography: Plotzk. A History of an Ancient Jewish Community in Poland, ed. E. Eisenberg, Tel-Aviv 1967
The branch of the Jewish Social Democratic Labour Party Poale Zion was founded in Płock in 1904. After the Russian Revolution in 1905, the activity of Poale Zion was banned by tsarist police, and the members of the organization went underground. It was only after […]
Alfred Jesion was born in Płock on January 4, 1919 as the son of the sculptor Hersz Lejzor (Herman) (1886-1933) and Chawa nee Szechtman. The Jesion family lived in a tenement house at 4 Nowy Rynek (New Market Square). Alfred Jesion was interested in sculpture […]
Symcha Guterman was born in Warsaw in 1903 as the third child of Mendel, a Talmudist scholar from Radzymin, and Bajla Gitla nee Fiszman, who came from the village of Kozienice near Radom. Her father was the owner of a mill. During World War I, the Guterman family moved to Płock, where Mendel’s brother Rachmil lived. During the interwar period, Symcha Guterman established his own knitting workshop. He was also one of the co-founders of the Frajhajt organization in Płock. In 1933 he married Chawa Alterowicz (born 1902), daughter of Jakub and Nycha, who was a dressmaker by profession. In 1935 their son Jakub was born. The Guterman family lived at 64 Sienkiewicza Street. During the occupation, Symcha Guterman together with his wife and son stayed in the Płock ghetto. On March 1, 1941, they were transported to the camp in Działdowo, then to the Radom District. The last place of their journey during the occupation was Warsaw.
Within a few months before the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising he was a soldier of the Home Army. He took part in the Warsaw Uprising, which broke out on August 1, 1944. He was killed in the battle for the Pawiak in the first days of August 1944. He left a valuable diary, in which he wrote down the history of Płock Jews from the period of occupation. The diary entitled “Kartki z pożogi” (“Leaves from Fire”) was published in Poland in 2004 by the Scientific Society of Płock.
Bibliography:
S. Guterman, Kartki z pożogi, Płock 2004
G. Nowak, Żydzi płoccy. Album pamięci, Płock 2015
J. Przedpełski, J. Stefański, Żydzi płoccy w dziejach miasta, Płock 2012
On March 19, 1860, in Płock, the marriage was concluded between Sura Łaja Koryto (born 1840), the daughter of Beniamin from Sochaczew (1802-1877) and Tyla nee Sierota (1804-1874), and Josek Chaim Fuks (1836-1891), the son of residents of the town of Kutno – Lejb and […]
