Jakub G. Holocaust testimony

Videotape testimony of Jakub G., who was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1929. He describes his assimilated family; German invasion in 1939; his father fleeing east (he never saw him again); ghettoization; crowding and starvation; working as an errand boy for the Judenrat; hiding with his mother and brother in an attic overlooking the Umschlagplatz during round-ups; moving when they were seen; hiding in a bunker during the ghetto uprising; deportation to Majdenek after they were discovered; separation from his mother and brother during selection (he never saw them again); hiding to avoid useless slave labor moving stones; contemplating suicide; changing his mind when an aunt's tenant gave him extra food; fatal beatings of failed escapees; volunteering for transfer; slave labor in a munitions factory in Skarz?ysko-Kamienna; a non-Jewish woman prisoner giving him extra food; his Hasidic bunkmate praying and observing Passover; hospitalization for typhus; a prisoner-dentist hiding him during selection; escaping from a group selected for death; transfer to Buchenwald, Schlieben, then Theresienstadt; liberation by Soviet troops; observing prisoners killing local Germans; traveling to Liberec, Prague, Warsaw, then ?o?dz?; assignment to an orphanage in Heleno?wek; briefly visiting relatives in Belgium; studying in Moscow; and his academic career. Mr. G. discusses reluctance to share his experiences, even with his wife; the importance of Polish culture to his identity; continuing contact with the dentist who saved him and staff from the orphanage; and recently participating in survivor organizations.

9 videocassettes