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He comforts the living by honoring their dead
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By Cynthia Dettelbach
Editor
Jerzy Obniski, 51, speaks no English, and I, no Polish. Yet I feel I know this fine Polish Catholic thanks to the handful of grateful Clevelanders who sing his praises and to his cousin Basia
Nurczewska, who accompanied him here from her home in Chicago.
Obniski is an engineer who lives in Lodj, Poland, not far from the city’s Jewish cemetery. When he’s not at work, he enjoys photographing different sites, especially Jewish sites. And that’s how he made his first Cleveland contact about ten years ago, Clevelander Herman Frank, a Holocaust survivor, was visiting his father’s grave at the Lodj cemetery.
Frank found that grave in 1990, explains his widow Esther, and he had gone back every year since to say kaddish.
In 1991, Frank returned to Poland with his two sons and a grandson and brought a matsevah (marker) to place on the grave. After that, says Esther, “he never rested easy until he also found his mother’s grave.” (His father died in 1938; his mother died of starvation in the ghetto, and he had buried her.)
Enter Jerzy Obniski. According to Esther, Obniski was at the cemetery the day in 1998 that her husband was there, and both men, being friendly and open, started to talk. Frank explained his quest for his mother’s grave, and Obniski offered to help. (According to his cousin, Obniski loves Jewish history and culture and often does related research in the public library.)
By checking the archives and other sources and determinedly walking and searching every centimeter of the cemetery, Obniski helped Frank find the grave he was seeking.
But the story doesn’t stop there. To this day, “Jerzy takes care of the graves, lights yahrzeit (memorial) candles and brings flowers,” explains Esther. Then “he sends pictures to us of what he does.” Last year, she adds, he found her mother’s grave.
Another Clevelander who yearned to find her loved ones’ final resting sites and have them properly cared for is survivor Gita Frankel. She learned about Obniski through Frank and wrote asking if he would look after her brother’s grave. (He died of starvation in the Lodj ghetto at age 21 and is buried in the Jewish cemetery there.) In addition, Obniski brings flowers to the mass grave in a small Polish town where Frankel’s father is buried and to the memorial site in Chelm, Poland, where the rest of her family was brutally killed. Just this week, she adds, he found the burial site in the Lodj cemetery of her 19-year-old cousin.
Going beyond the simple ritual of placing a commemorative stone on the grave during each visit, “Jerzy makes a menorah or a Star of David from the stones,” marvels Frankel.
A third Clevelander, Rose Gelbart, has similar stories to tell. She and her husband Arthur met Obniski two years ago in Lodj and, taking them all around the cemetery, he helped Gelbart find the graves of her paternal grandparents.
After doing preliminary research, he then accompanied the Gelbarts to Arthur’s hometown, to the ghetto where they were forced to live, and to the mass grave where his mother is buried. “Jerzy was unbelievable,” Gelbart enthuses.
Not content to confine his efforts to Poland, Obniski also keeps in touch with his Cleveland friends with phone calls, letters, DVDs and above all, the photographs.
But his closest connection was always with Herman Frank. When Frank was diagnosed with a fatal illness over five years ago, he wrote Obniski saying, “Pray for me.” Taking that request to heart, Obniski traveled to Israel (albeit after Frank died)
and prayed for him at the Western Wall.
And this past October, he came to Cleveland specifically to visit Frank’s grave at Mt. Zion Memorial Park. While here, he and his cousin also enjoyed the warm hospitality of his other Cleveland friends, some of whom he met in person for the first time.
I’m not sure what motivates a man like Jerzy Obniski to do what he does. Guilt for the cruelty so many of his fellow countrymen inflicted on Jews for centuries? A chance meeting with a Holocaust survivor with whom he had instant rapport? A fascination with Jews and Judaism? An openness to connecting with people he is able to help?
The reason(s) do not matter. What matters and is worth recording is the story of this righteous gentile, whose efforts on behalf of the dead have eased the heartache of their loved ones still alive.
cdettelbach@cjn.org
What: “Beyond the Fence” documentary in commemoration of Kristallnacht
When: Sunday, Nov. 9, at 10:30 p.m.
Where: WVIZ-TV
This program is preceded at 9 p.m. by
“God on Trial”.
Nurczewska, who accompanied him here from her home in Chicago.
Obniski is an engineer who lives in Lodj, Poland, not far from the city’s Jewish cemetery. When he’s not at work, he enjoys photographing different sites, especially Jewish sites. And that’s how he made his first Cleveland contact about ten years ago, Clevelander Herman Frank, a Holocaust survivor, was visiting his father’s grave at the Lodj cemetery.
Frank found that grave in 1990, explains his widow Esther, and he had gone back every year since to say kaddish.
In 1991, Frank returned to Poland with his two sons and a grandson and brought a matsevah (marker) to place on the grave. After that, says Esther, “he never rested easy until he also found his mother’s grave.” (His father died in 1938; his mother died of starvation in the ghetto, and he had buried her.)
Enter Jerzy Obniski. According to Esther, Obniski was at the cemetery the day in 1998 that her husband was there, and both men, being friendly and open, started to talk. Frank explained his quest for his mother’s grave, and Obniski offered to help. (According to his cousin, Obniski loves Jewish history and culture and often does related research in the public library.)
By checking the archives and other sources and determinedly walking and searching every centimeter of the cemetery, Obniski helped Frank find the grave he was seeking.
But the story doesn’t stop there. To this day, “Jerzy takes care of the graves, lights yahrzeit (memorial) candles and brings flowers,” explains Esther. Then “he sends pictures to us of what he does.” Last year, she adds, he found her mother’s grave.
Another Clevelander who yearned to find her loved ones’ final resting sites and have them properly cared for is survivor Gita Frankel. She learned about Obniski through Frank and wrote asking if he would look after her brother’s grave. (He died of starvation in the Lodj ghetto at age 21 and is buried in the Jewish cemetery there.) In addition, Obniski brings flowers to the mass grave in a small Polish town where Frankel’s father is buried and to the memorial site in Chelm, Poland, where the rest of her family was brutally killed. Just this week, she adds, he found the burial site in the Lodj cemetery of her 19-year-old cousin.
Going beyond the simple ritual of placing a commemorative stone on the grave during each visit, “Jerzy makes a menorah or a Star of David from the stones,” marvels Frankel.
A third Clevelander, Rose Gelbart, has similar stories to tell. She and her husband Arthur met Obniski two years ago in Lodj and, taking them all around the cemetery, he helped Gelbart find the graves of her paternal grandparents.
After doing preliminary research, he then accompanied the Gelbarts to Arthur’s hometown, to the ghetto where they were forced to live, and to the mass grave where his mother is buried. “Jerzy was unbelievable,” Gelbart enthuses.
Not content to confine his efforts to Poland, Obniski also keeps in touch with his Cleveland friends with phone calls, letters, DVDs and above all, the photographs.
But his closest connection was always with Herman Frank. When Frank was diagnosed with a fatal illness over five years ago, he wrote Obniski saying, “Pray for me.” Taking that request to heart, Obniski traveled to Israel (albeit after Frank died)
and prayed for him at the Western Wall.
And this past October, he came to Cleveland specifically to visit Frank’s grave at Mt. Zion Memorial Park. While here, he and his cousin also enjoyed the warm hospitality of his other Cleveland friends, some of whom he met in person for the first time.
I’m not sure what motivates a man like Jerzy Obniski to do what he does. Guilt for the cruelty so many of his fellow countrymen inflicted on Jews for centuries? A chance meeting with a Holocaust survivor with whom he had instant rapport? A fascination with Jews and Judaism? An openness to connecting with people he is able to help?
The reason(s) do not matter. What matters and is worth recording is the story of this righteous gentile, whose efforts on behalf of the dead have eased the heartache of their loved ones still alive.
cdettelbach@cjn.org
What: “Beyond the Fence” documentary in commemoration of Kristallnacht
When: Sunday, Nov. 9, at 10:30 p.m.
Where: WVIZ-TV
This program is preceded at 9 p.m. by
“God on Trial”.
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