The Alter family

This is a picture of my maternal grandparents, my grandma Kamila and my grandpa Max Alter. The one holding the baby carriage is my aunt's husband, Karel Kraus, and in the carriage is likely their oldest daughter - Milena Krausova. The photo was taken in Luze in the 1910s. In Luze our family had been living for generations in an old family home at 202 Jeronymova Street; alas today our house is no longer there. We had five rooms and two kitchens ? one large and one smaller one. The street was named Jeronymova, but people used to call it Zidovna [from ?Zid? the Czech word for Jew], as earlier there had been a Jewish ghetto there. At the time I lived there, Luze was a relatively small town ? there were only about 1360 people living there. But located in Luze was the center of the Jewish religious community for surrounding towns as well. All Jews from the area belonged to the Jewish religious community in Luze. My grandpa, Max Alter, was the president of the Jewish religious community. After my grandpa's death some Mr. Cervinka was president, and after he died my father, Emil Polak, became president of the Community. My father became president when the war hadn't started yet, and remained so up until the transport, so all organization of handing over of property was done by my father.