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Kraków Ghetto

Amon GöthJewish ghettos in Nazi-occupied PolandJewish resistance during the HolocaustKraków GhettoOskar Schindler
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Jews forced to shovel snow from the street in Kraków
Jews forced to shovel snow from the street in Kraków

The Kraków Ghetto was one of five major metropolitan Nazi ghettos created by Germany in the new General Government territory during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It was established for the purpose of exploitation, terror, and persecution of local Polish Jews. The ghetto was later used as a staging area for separating the "able workers" from those to be deported to extermination camps in Operation Reinhard. The Ghetto was liquidated between June 1942 and March 1943, with most of its inhabitants deported to the Belzec extermination camp as well as to Płaszów slave-labor camp, and Auschwitz concentration camp, 60 kilometres (37 mi) rail distance.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Kraków Ghetto (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Kraków Ghetto
Józefińska, Krakow Podgórze

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Wikipedia: Kraków GhettoContinue reading on Wikipedia

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N 50.045277777778 ° E 19.954722222222 °
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Józefińska 33
30-530 Krakow, Podgórze
Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Poland
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Jews forced to shovel snow from the street in Kraków
Jews forced to shovel snow from the street in Kraków
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Kraków-Podgórze Detention Centre
Kraków-Podgórze Detention Centre

The Kraków-Podgórze Detention Centre (Polish: Areszt Śledczy Kraków Podgórze) is a correctional facility located at ul. Stefana Czarnieckiego 3 in Kraków, Poland, in the municipal district of Podgórze. Originally, it was a turn-of-the-century county court and revenue service, built in 1905, from design by Ferdynand Liebling. At present, it is a community branch of Detention Centre Kraków, with main building located at ul. Montelupich 7 street. The Kraków-Podgórze Detention Centre specializes in drug-and-alcohol-addiction therapy and serves also as a temporary arrest facility. It was created in 1971 as a prison for men with the holding capacity of 207. It was made into a detention facility in 1990. There's a medical clinic and a dentist on-site. Prisoners who completed the recovery program work with mentally and physically disabled clients.During World War II, it was a Nazi German prison, a place of secret detention and torture of Polish members of the Resistance, Armia Krajowa. It is memorialized as a notorious site of martyrdom during the German occupation of Poland. The prison facility had a Gestapo station attached to it.The prison was initially incorporated within the borders of the Kraków Ghetto when that district was created by the Nazis in March 1941; however, in the redistricting of June 1942 (following mass deportations of the Ghetto population) the whole street was placed outside the confines of the Ghetto.

Eagle Pharmacy
Eagle Pharmacy

The Eagle Pharmacy Museum is located on the southwest edge of the Bohaterów Getta Square, under number 18 (formerly Maly Rynek, then Plac Zgody) in Kraków, Poland. Since 1910, its proprietor was Jozef Pankiewicz and after him Tadeusz Pankiewicz (21 November 1908 – 5 November 1993), his son who ran it since 1933. Before World War II, it was one of the four pharmacies in Podgórze district. Its clients were both Polish and Jewish residents of the district. A frequent customer was, e.g., "Bikkur Cholim" charity.In March 1941, the Germans established a ghetto in Podgórze for Kraków's Jews, Pankiewicz's pharmacy was the only one within its borders and its proprietor was the only Pole with rights to stay in it.The Jews that lived in the ghetto chose the pharmacy as the place for conspiratorial meetings. Among them were: writer Mordechai Gebirtig, painter Abraham Neumann, Dr Julian Aleksandrowicz, neurologist Dr Bernhard Bornstein, Dr Leon Steinberg and pharmacists: Emanuel Herman, Roman Imerglück. Soon it also became a source of various resources and medicaments, which helped in avoiding deportation: hair dyes used for rejuvenating the appearance, luminal (fenobarbital) used to calm children while hidden, smuggled in luggage beyond ghetto.During the bloody displacement at the Plac Zgody in 1942, Pharmacy personnel issued free medicines and dressings while its recesses areas were used as shelters for saving Jews from deportation to extermination camps.Pankiewicz and his assistants Irena Drozdzikowska, Aurelia Danek and Helena Krywaniuk were liaisons between Jews in the ghetto and beyond it, passing the information and smuggling food. They also were depositaries of valuables entrusted to them by deported Jews in the last moments before leaving the ghetto.

Old Synagogue (Kraków)
Old Synagogue (Kraków)

The Old Synagogue (Polish: Synagoga Stara) was an Orthodox Jewish synagogue situated in the Kazimierz district of Kraków, Poland. In Yiddish it was referred to as the Alta Shul. It is the oldest synagogue building still standing in Poland, and one of the most precious landmarks of Jewish architecture in Europe. Until the beginning of the Second World War in 1939, it was one of the city's most important synagogues as well as the main religious, social, and organizational centre of the Kraków Jewish community.The Synagogue was built in 1407 or 1492; the date of building varies with several sources. The original building was rebuilt in 1570 under the watchful eye of an Italian architect Mateo Gucci. The rebuilding included the attic wall with loopholes, windows placed far above ground level, and thick, masonry walls with heavy buttressing to withstand siege, all features borrowed from military architecture. There was further reconstruction work in 1904 and in 1913. The Old Synagogue is a rare, surviving example of a Polish fortress synagogue. In 1794 General Tadeusz Kościuszko spoke from the synagogue to gain the Jewish support in the Kościuszko Uprising. A plaque in the entrance hall commemorates this event: "The Jews proved to the world that whenever humanity can gain, they would not spare themselves." – General Tadeusz Kościuszko The synagogue was completely devastated and ransacked by the Germans during World War II. Its artwork and Jewish relics, looted. During the occupation, the synagogue was used as a warehouse. In 1943, 30 Polish hostages were executed at its wall. The Old Synagogue was renovated from 1956 to 1959 and currently operates as a museum. It is a Division of the Historical Museum of Kraków, with particular focus on Kraków's Jews. The exhibits are divided into themes dealing with birth, prayer rituals, diet, divorce and death. The women's prayer room (mechitza), dating back to the 17th century, is often used to hold temporary exhibitions.

Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków
Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków

The Jewish Culture Festival in Kraków (Polish: Festiwal Kultury Żydowskiej w Krakowie, Yiddish: ייִדישער קולטור־פֿעסטיוואַל אין קראָקע) is an annual cultural event organized since 1988 in the once Jewish district of Kazimierz (part of Kraków) by the Jewish Culture Festival Society headed by Janusz Makuch, a self-described meshugeneh ("crazy person"), fascinated with all things Jewish. The main goal of the festival is to educate people about Jewish culture, history and faith (Judaism), which flourished in Poland before the Holocaust, as well as to familiarize them with modern Jewish culture developing mostly in the United States and Israel, and finally, to provide entertainment. Each festival is held in late June or early July and takes nine days, from Saturday to Sunday. During that time concerts, exhibitions, plays, lectures, workshops, tours, etc. are organized. The two most important concerts are: the inaugural concert on the first Sunday, and the final concert on the last Saturday of the festival. The former usually takes place in one of seven synagogues of Kazimierz and features cantoral music; the latter is always held outdoors, in Ulica Szeroka, the main street of the Jewish part of Kazimierz, and features klezmer music. In between there are many more concerts, usually with some variations of klezmer music. The workshops provide an occasion to learn about traditional Jewish cuisine, dance, music, calligraphy and other aspects of Jewish culture. More about Jewish culture, as well as about topics related to the Holocaust, is taught at numerous lectures. Exhibitions of Jewish art, particularly paper-cut, are also organized. The program of the festival also includes tours of the synagogues and cemeteries of Kazimierz as well as the former Nazi-era Kraków Ghetto in the nearby district of Podgórze. During the festival Gentiles are also invited to watch or participate in Jewish prayers at the synagogue. Jewish Culture Festival brings together artists of Jewish culture from all over the world - music bands, soloists, choirs, jazz musicians and dance teachers. The festival promotes a whole variety of different styles of Jewish music: synagogue song, hasidic, classical, Jewish folk and – very popular in Krakow nowadays – klezmer. For the Poles this event is a way of promotion of Jewish culture and paying a homage to the community that used to live in Poland, although many Jews were reportedly offended by the commercialization of Polish Jewish culture. "Others argue that there is something deeper taking place in Poland as the country heals from the double wounds of Nazi and Communist domination."It is one of Poland's major annual cultural events and one of the biggest festivals of Jewish culture in the world. Artists and entertainers usually associated with the festival include: Benzion Miller, Yaakov Stark, David Krakauer, Frank London, Leopold Kozłowski, Michael Alpert, Theodore Bikel, Paul Brody and many others. Jewish dances are led by Steven Weintraub.