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Despite the fact that we had never hidden our Jewish origins, by our name and the way we looked people mostly didn't recognize it. In Nitra our whole family also attended synagogue, yet we didn't belong to that part of the population against whom others would have some sort of objections to. Somehow they considered our family to be good Slovaks and one of them. So in the pre-war period we never felt any anti-Semitism. We also had friends and acquaintances from mixed society, both Jews and non-Jews. So it was actually this kind of assimilation, in the good sense of the word. Certain religious customs were preserved, the Jewish identity remained. But it never came across as repellent for the surrounding population. So they accepted our family without any problems. I can say that this time was without any expressions of anti-Semitism whatsoever. The breaking point didn't come until later, at school.
The principal of the people's school [27] was Feher. An exceptionally intelligent man, who kept the school at a very high standard. Unfortunately that school building is also a sad symbol for me, because Jews were concentrated in this school in Parovce before transports from in and around Nitra. From there and the through the train station began the road to the gas. So that school actually has two faces for me. One in the fact that I attended it and had very good adventures and experiences. A few years later it was a collection point for Jews.
The first time I traveled by train it was under these peculiar circumstances. It was in people's school. President Masaryk [28] was passing through Zbehy, probably to Topolcany [Kastiel in Topolcany was the summer home of president Tomas Garrigue Masaryk - Editor's note]. Principal Feher took our class to Zbehy by train. At the trains station in Zbehy we were waving to Masaryk, and at the time Bechyne [Bechyne, Rudolf (1881 - 1948): Czech journalist and publicist, Czechoslovak socially democratic politician - Editor's note] was the minister of transport, and we were waving to him as well. It was this agitprop trip. Nitra wasn't on the main railway track. Zbehy were a railway nodal point and so we went to greet Masaryk from Nitra to Zbehy. That was my first train experience. amplified by Masaryk in the train that we were waving at. In my days people's school had five grades. I did four of them, and from fourth grade of people's school I went into high school. The building of the high school was multi- story with a large courtyard.
Before the war the Nitra Jewish community might have had several thousand people [official sources state that in the period before World War II, the Jewish community in Nita was composed of 4,363 people. According to many contemporaries of the time, the number of Jewish inhabitants in the city was higher - Editor's note]. Nitra Jews were mostly concentrated in the city quarter of Parovce, which was the former ghetto. Here there was also the famous Nitra yeshiva [The Nitra yeshiva led by a rabbi named Michael Dov Weissmandl and students that had survived the Holocaust moved in 1946 to the USA, where it exists to this day under the name Yeshiva of Nitra Rabbinical College - Editor's note]. Basically it was poor people living in Parovce. The higher and middle class lived in the center of town. Parovce was mainly very neglected old buildings, the old ghetto. There was also a mikveh [ritual bath - Editor's note] in Nitra. But we didn't go there. I don't even know where exactly it was.
When I reminisce about school days, I can't say much about high school. It doesn't have so much to do with school subjects as that at that time the nationalists were beginning to show their teeth. Those were the main experiences from high school. There were about six Jews in our class, and already there you could feel this certain, you couldn't yet call it anti- Semitism, but this certain tension. Anti-Semitism didn't rear its head until one Sudeten German [29] began teaching us, in 'tercie' [third year], I think. He came to teach Slovak, but he was a German. He was explicitly against us. He asked me: "What do you speak at home?" I said: "Slovak". "You don't speak Slovak, you definitely speak Hungarian!" and he began whacking me over the head with a newspaper. It was already obvious.
But it was in 'kvinta' [fifth year] that the main turning point came. That was in 1939. When the Slovak State already existed. Back then the following happened. We were six Jews in the class, two girls and four boys. In the morning we came to class, and written on the blackboard was the title: Jews! Then followed a long litany of all that we'd caused the Slovak nation and the conclusion "and thus we've designated the following places for you." Originally we'd each been sitting somewhere else, and suddenly they designated that we all sit together. Mendlik, our homeroom teacher, arrived. He was a Czech, and when he saw what was on the blackboard, he became extremely upset. He went to see the principal. He told him that he'd no longer be the home room teach for that class. He protested against it. Most of our high school professors were Czechs. This Mendlik taught us geography. So that's more or less how it started with that school in 1939.
The principal of the people's school [27] was Feher. An exceptionally intelligent man, who kept the school at a very high standard. Unfortunately that school building is also a sad symbol for me, because Jews were concentrated in this school in Parovce before transports from in and around Nitra. From there and the through the train station began the road to the gas. So that school actually has two faces for me. One in the fact that I attended it and had very good adventures and experiences. A few years later it was a collection point for Jews.
The first time I traveled by train it was under these peculiar circumstances. It was in people's school. President Masaryk [28] was passing through Zbehy, probably to Topolcany [Kastiel in Topolcany was the summer home of president Tomas Garrigue Masaryk - Editor's note]. Principal Feher took our class to Zbehy by train. At the trains station in Zbehy we were waving to Masaryk, and at the time Bechyne [Bechyne, Rudolf (1881 - 1948): Czech journalist and publicist, Czechoslovak socially democratic politician - Editor's note] was the minister of transport, and we were waving to him as well. It was this agitprop trip. Nitra wasn't on the main railway track. Zbehy were a railway nodal point and so we went to greet Masaryk from Nitra to Zbehy. That was my first train experience. amplified by Masaryk in the train that we were waving at. In my days people's school had five grades. I did four of them, and from fourth grade of people's school I went into high school. The building of the high school was multi- story with a large courtyard.
Before the war the Nitra Jewish community might have had several thousand people [official sources state that in the period before World War II, the Jewish community in Nita was composed of 4,363 people. According to many contemporaries of the time, the number of Jewish inhabitants in the city was higher - Editor's note]. Nitra Jews were mostly concentrated in the city quarter of Parovce, which was the former ghetto. Here there was also the famous Nitra yeshiva [The Nitra yeshiva led by a rabbi named Michael Dov Weissmandl and students that had survived the Holocaust moved in 1946 to the USA, where it exists to this day under the name Yeshiva of Nitra Rabbinical College - Editor's note]. Basically it was poor people living in Parovce. The higher and middle class lived in the center of town. Parovce was mainly very neglected old buildings, the old ghetto. There was also a mikveh [ritual bath - Editor's note] in Nitra. But we didn't go there. I don't even know where exactly it was.
When I reminisce about school days, I can't say much about high school. It doesn't have so much to do with school subjects as that at that time the nationalists were beginning to show their teeth. Those were the main experiences from high school. There were about six Jews in our class, and already there you could feel this certain, you couldn't yet call it anti- Semitism, but this certain tension. Anti-Semitism didn't rear its head until one Sudeten German [29] began teaching us, in 'tercie' [third year], I think. He came to teach Slovak, but he was a German. He was explicitly against us. He asked me: "What do you speak at home?" I said: "Slovak". "You don't speak Slovak, you definitely speak Hungarian!" and he began whacking me over the head with a newspaper. It was already obvious.
But it was in 'kvinta' [fifth year] that the main turning point came. That was in 1939. When the Slovak State already existed. Back then the following happened. We were six Jews in the class, two girls and four boys. In the morning we came to class, and written on the blackboard was the title: Jews! Then followed a long litany of all that we'd caused the Slovak nation and the conclusion "and thus we've designated the following places for you." Originally we'd each been sitting somewhere else, and suddenly they designated that we all sit together. Mendlik, our homeroom teacher, arrived. He was a Czech, and when he saw what was on the blackboard, he became extremely upset. He went to see the principal. He told him that he'd no longer be the home room teach for that class. He protested against it. Most of our high school professors were Czechs. This Mendlik taught us geography. So that's more or less how it started with that school in 1939.
Location
Slovakia
Interview
otto simko