Tag #140705 - Interview #96750 (Sabat Pilosof)

There were Zionist organizations in Dupnitsa but I wasn’t a member of any. The youth were members of Maccabi [World Union] [6]. The Jews in our town had their cultural-educational organization at the ‘Saznanie’ [Conscience] [7] and Chitalishte [8]. It was a Jewish community club, supervised by the Jewish community and was entirely at the disposal of the Jews in town. It had a big and rich library. We borrowed books from there. [The interviewee doesn’t remember what kind of books.] There we received all kinds of periodicals and newly published books. The richer Jews used to support it financially. The premises of the Jewish community club were close to the building which sheltered the Jewish community. There was a very nice choir at the ‘Saznanie’ community club, which had no name. The songs were Bulgarian. There was also a theater, in which many plays were performed. There was a big hall in the community club, where the library was situated and the theater and choir rehearsals were held. The plays were mainly by Jewish authors. I remember, for example, a play, ‘Tevye, the Milkman’ by a Russian author [Sholem Aleichem] [9].

I used to be an assistant librarian when I was a schoolboy at secondary school. There were two chief librarians: Zhosko Ideal and Adela Chilibonova. They were senior class students at the high school in Dupnitsa and I used to help them. I had a key from the community club and I used to go there with friends in order to read books. In fascist times a barber, Paunov, was appointed commissar for Jewish affairs [in Dupnitsa] [see Commissariat for Jewish Affairs] [10]. He squatted in the building of the Jewish community. He was in charge of everything. It was then when all the books disappeared from the community club. Unfortunately, all written testimonies of history concerning Jews in Dupnitsa as well as all documents were destroyed in fascist times by the commissar for Jewish affairs.