At home grandmother spoke Russian. She knew several foreign languages. She spoke fluent English because she had a chance to live in the United States.
- Traditions 11756
- Language spoken 3019
- Identity 7808
- Description of town 2440
- Education, school 8506
- Economics 8772
- Work 11672
- Love & romance 4929
- Leisure/Social life 4159
- Antisemitism 4822
-
Major events (political and historical)
4256
- Armenian genocide 2
- Doctor's Plot (1953) 178
- Soviet invasion of Poland 31
- Siege of Leningrad 86
- The Six Day War 4
- Yom Kippur War 2
- Ataturk's death 5
- Balkan Wars (1912-1913) 35
- First Soviet-Finnish War 37
- Occupation of Czechoslovakia 1938 83
- Invasion of France 9
- Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact 65
- Varlik Vergisi (Wealth Tax) 36
- First World War (1914-1918) 216
- Spanish flu (1918-1920) 14
- Latvian War of Independence (1918-1920) 4
- The Great Depression (1929-1933) 20
- Hitler comes to power (1933) 127
- 151 Hospital 1
- Fire of Thessaloniki (1917) 9
- Greek Civil War (1946-49) 12
- Thessaloniki International Trade Fair 5
- Annexation of Bukovina to Romania (1918) 7
- Annexation of Northern Bukovina to the Soviet Union (1940) 19
- The German invasion of Poland (1939) 94
- Kishinev Pogrom (1903) 7
- Romanian Annexation of Bessarabia (1918) 25
- Returning of the Hungarian rule in Transylvania (1940-1944) 43
- Soviet Occupation of Bessarabia (1940) 59
- Second Vienna Dictate 27
- Estonian war of independence 3
- Warsaw Uprising 2
- Soviet occupation of the Balitc states (1940) 147
- Austrian Civil War (1934) 9
- Anschluss (1938) 71
- Collapse of Habsburg empire 3
- Dollfuß Regime 3
- Emigration to Vienna before WWII 36
- Kolkhoz 131
- KuK - Königlich und Kaiserlich 40
- Mineriade 1
- Post War Allied occupation 7
- Waldheim affair 5
- Trianon Peace Treaty 12
- NEP 56
- Russian Revolution 351
- Ukrainian Famine 199
- The Great Terror 283
- Perestroika 233
- 22nd June 1941 468
- Molotov's radio speech 115
- Victory Day 147
- Stalin's death 365
- Khrushchev's speech at 20th Congress 148
- KGB 62
- NKVD 153
- German occupation of Hungary (18-19 March 1944) 45
- Józef Pilsudski (until 1935) 33
- 1956 revolution 84
- Prague Spring (1968) 73
- 1989 change of regime 174
- Gomulka campaign (1968) 81
-
Holocaust
9685
- Holocaust (in general) 2789
- Concentration camp / Work camp 1235
- Mass shooting operations 337
- Ghetto 1183
- Death / extermination camp 647
- Deportation 1063
- Forced labor 791
- Flight 1410
- Hiding 594
- Resistance 121
- 1941 evacuations 866
- Novemberpogrom / Kristallnacht 34
- Eleftherias Square 10
- Kasztner group 1
- Pogrom in Iasi and the Death Train 21
- Sammelwohnungen 9
- Strohmann system 11
- Struma ship 17
- Life under occupation 803
- Yellow star house 72
- Protected house 15
- Arrow Cross ("nyilasok") 42
- Danube bank shots 6
- Kindertransport 26
- Schutzpass / false papers 95
- Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (1943) 24
- Warsaw Uprising (1944) 23
- Helpers 521
- Righteous Gentiles 269
- Returning home 1090
- Holocaust compensation 112
- Restitution 109
- Property (loss of property) 595
- Loss of loved ones 1724
- Trauma 1029
- Talking about what happened 1807
- Liberation 558
- Military 3322
- Politics 2640
-
Communism
4468
- Life in the Soviet Union/under Communism (in general) 2592
- Anti-communist resistance in general 63
- Nationalization under Communism 221
- Illegal communist movements 98
- Systematic demolitions under communism 45
- Communist holidays 311
- Sentiments about the communist rule 930
- Collectivization 94
- Experiences with state police 349
- Prison/Forced labor under communist/socialist rule 449
- Lack or violation of human and citizen rights 483
- Life after the change of the regime (1989) 493
- Israel / Palestine 2190
- Zionism 847
- Jewish Organizations 1200
Displaying 37501 - 37530 of 50826 results
Anna Iosifovna Ulik
![](/themes/custom/centro/flags/ua.svg)
My parents did not talk much about revolution in the family. Every time they mentioned something, they asked us not to talk about it, which was absolutely natural then. The Revolution of 1905 enabled the Jews settle where they wanted to, so my grandparents welcomed that revolution. They could certainly not understand what happened in 1917. Sometimes we heard some talk about Lenin at our house, about Gorky, about some other serious matters, but we, children, did not pay much attention to these things. I think my parents understood a lot of what was going on at that time.
There they began to work as musicians. They worked at a drama theater; my mother also acted in films when she was asked, and taught. She worked 45 years at the Franko Theater, starting from 1926, as a concertmaster of the theater.
,
Before WW2
See text in interview
Prior to that, in 1994, she and I went to Israel, when her son Alexander lived there. We spent three months in Israel. I went to Jerusalem and saw everything there. I went to the Wailing Wall and to David’s tomb. I visited Yad-Vashem and left information on my grandparents there. I saw how the memory of the Holocaust was preserved there. It was interesting and impressed me very much.
The main influence my Jewish identity had affected at the device on work, when moving on the service etc. We were not raised as Jews. The nationality was not important to us, but people.
,
After WW2
See text in interview
But I cannot believe those who were communists yesterday, and today they are standing with candles in the orthodox churches or putting on a kipa. However, I try to celebrate Jewish holidays, I buy matsa at Pesah, observe the fast at Yom-Kipur. I do what I couldn’t do during the years of the Soviet power.
However, I try to celebrate Jewish holidays, I buy matsa at Pesah, observe the fast at Yom-Kipur. I do what I couldn’t do during the years of the Soviet power.
Strange as it may seem, I identify myself more Jewish than I did when I was young. I feel drawn to my history and my ancestors. I read Jewish newspapers, watch the Jewish program “Yahad” on TV. But I don’t know whether God exists in this world. It seems to me that if he did exist he wouldn’t have allowed extermination of over 6 million Jews during the war. Perhaps, I am not a believer. After Perestroika many religious and Jewish communities appeared in Ukraine. But I cannot believe those who were communists yesterday, and today they are standing with candles in the orthodox churches or putting on a kipa.
And in 1952 I was given a job at the Foreign Languages Courses. I found myself among very talented Jewish teachers. I realized that these courses were like a refuge for these people. These people were not just highly educated, but also wonderful humans.
At these Courses we could speak practically of anything. We could not be too open, of course, but we could say things in such a way that both teachers and students would understand you, that nobody would betray you to the authorities. Betrayals were very popular at that time, including among students.
Thus I was left without any job at all. For other people it was not hard to find a job in Kiev, because specialists were always needed. But as soon as I filled in the line “nationality” I saw strange expressions on the face of commissions and I was denied every work. I could not get any permanent job, only part-time jobs. So, I was very happy when I was given another part-time job at the Economic Institute.
In Zhitomir I first lived with my aunt, my father’s sister Olga, in a damp terrible basement. Then I rented a flat with Tera Samoilovna, who was sent the same way to teach at a music college.
I was sent to a village near Zhitomir that allegedly needed an English teacher. My father took me there. As it turned out, no English teacher and no English language was needed there. But I could not return to Kiev. So, I was sent to a school in Zhitomir where I worked for one month. Every time I entered classroom my students would throw hats, inkpots, pens, paper into the air. I sat down and laughed together with my students. I could not say a word to them. In Zhitomir I first lived with my aunt, my father’s sister Olga, in a damp terrible basement. Then I rented a flat with Tera Samoilovna, who was sent the same way to teach at a music college. I could not bear it any longer and I went to the city executive committee. They sent me to teach at the Zhitomir military college where I worked for some time It was in 1950.
Soon, persecution of outstanding teachers began. Great meetings were organized, with hundreds of people present, to rebuke and put to shame these people. All of it resembled the medieval witch-hunting and was terrible. But nobody could stand up and defend those people. Then the same thing was directed against some students, who were close to graduation. Graduates were needed in many cities of Ukraine, especially teachers of English, French, and German languages. And that’s where problems began for me personally. Three graduates from our group were singled out because they were Jewish. It was strange. A special commission was set up to examine the case of just three students concerning the place where they should be sent [in the Soviet Union all graduates had to go to work in places they were sent to by their university].
I decided to go to university because I knew English pretty well (I studied it before war outside school as well). I was certainly not admitted to the university despite my diploma with honors from school. Gnat Petrovich Yura, the chief director of the Ivan Franko Theater, played a great role in my life. My mother asked him to help me, and he did. According to his request I was admitted to university at the very end, when the reception of students was over. Thus, in September 1944, I entered the Kiev State University, the Roman-German Department.
I played accordion at the Ivan Franko Theater. I had to play accordion in the wings when an actor pretended he played it at the stage. I also worked with the jazz band of women in the “Caucasus” restaurant. That restaurant was quite elegant for those times and there many rich people dining in it. They came there with their ladies. I went there with my accordion. Our jazz band was combined of girls who studied at the conservatory. One of them played drums, another blew trumpet and I played accordion. Visitors of the restaurant gave money to the players, but on agreement with our leader we could not touch this money. It was counted afterwards and shared justly between all the members of the band.
We had no place to stay; we had no food to eat.
A long time passed before my mother and us were given a room in a big communal flat. We were given this room by the theater. It had 13 rooms. It had a stove that had to be heated with woods. The total number of people that lived in that flat was 36. There was one bathroom for the whole flat with long lines to it; there was no shower, just a sink in front of that bathroom. The kitchen was so small that it was very hard to stand and cook something there. That is why there were so many quarrels at the time.
There I was the first-year student of the Teachers’ Institute. I majored in mathematics. I remember I had to walk a long distance, several kilometers, in order to get to that institute. But I lost two years of studies anyway, and when I went to university in Kiev I was already 19, and even though I studied there for two years, it was all in vain.
Then we went with the theater to Tashkent, where the Kiev Polytechnic Institute was located at the time, and I again became a first-year student of the physics and mathematics department. I spent one semester there. So, on the one hand, I studied mathematics all that time, but on the other hand I lost 2 years of studies, because my major in Kiev was absolutely different.
Then we went with the theater to Tashkent, where the Kiev Polytechnic Institute was located at the time, and I again became a first-year student of the physics and mathematics department. I spent one semester there. So, on the one hand, I studied mathematics all that time, but on the other hand I lost 2 years of studies, because my major in Kiev was absolutely different.
,
1942
See text in interview
The Germans were attacking; they were already in the Northern Caucuses. There was danger that they could capture those territories.
,
1942
See text in interview
Yefim Volodarskiy
![](/themes/custom/centro/flags/ua.svg)
During the Great Patriotic War Horatsiy and his older brother Semyon evacuated to Nizhniaya Salda in Sverdlovsk region. There were very hard life conditions. He may have starved to death. He was an old man. Horatsiy’s wife died probably in 1940.
He finished a cheder and grammar school and worked in the transportation office of his father’s. My father inherited his father’s office. It still existed in the 1920s and was called ‘Ukrvozdukhput’. Its staff consisted of three employees. Belaya Tserkov is on the way to Kiev. There is a railway station in the town. My father’s office arranged delivery of shipments to the railroad for further transportation. He hired horse-drawn wagons to support this deliveries. He arranged for load and passenger transportations to other villages on horse-driven wagons, they didn’t even know about vehicles at that time in Belaya Tserkov. During the Soviet regime my father’s office merged with a bigger transportation office. My father was responsible for railroad transportations.
My mother’s father Aizek Livshitz owned a transportation office in Proskurovo village [about 100 km from Kiev, present Ukraine]. He had some business relationships with my grandfather Volodarskiy and they decided to acquaint my father and mother, their children. Unfortunately, I don’t know any details.
After pogroms in the 1910s Mariam and Rivka decided to move to Palestine. Their father Aizek went there with them. The mother and daughter Malka stayed in Russia, I don’t know why. My grandfather Aizek Livshitz didn’t like it in Palestine. He thought this was the wrong Jewish movement and returned to Russia.
Mariam Hertzberg, nee Livshitz, was a friend of Golda Meir [7]. Mariam was actively involved in public and political activities in Palestine and then in Israel. She was ambassador of Israel in England for a long time.
Israel
Another sister Rivka Savon, nee Livshitz, worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Israel. She lived in Jerusalem.
In 1906 my mother got married. There were no affairs of the kind they have now wearing these short skirts. My parents settled down in my father’s pise-walled house in Belaya Tserkov. This house seemed grand to me when I was a child. There were 6 or 7 rooms and a big brick basement.
During the Civil War [8] there were some refugees accommodated in our house. I don’t know where they came from. They were cooking and frying something in the oven and were rather careless about it. In one word this caused fire. The middle part of the house got burnt. Later we restored four rooms and lived there. My father sold one part of the house.
When my three years were over my management didn’t want to let me go. I never regretted going to Uman. I enjoyed working there. There were many engineers in Kiev, but in provinces they valued engineering professions. Secretary of the district party committee gave his word to let me go three years later. He kept his word. I returned to the motor cycle plant in Kiev where I worked till retirement.
All those troubles of the 1950s, ‘the doctors’ plot’ [19] they didn’t have any impact on me. It was clear that this story with doctors poisoners was a mere fiction.