Periodic
•
Thursday, September 7, 1950
DETROIT JEWISH CHRONICLE
Page 36
His Old Life Broken, Man
Makes Flowers in Israel
By HAROLD TROBE
THERE WILL BE FLOWERS IN Israel blooming this winter. And Simon Stern will
I make—not grow—them. For Simon Stern, artificial flower maker with an artificial hand,
has gone to Israel. Behind the story of Simon Stern, a peace-loving man with a gentle trade,
is a bloody and brutal history of pain and persecution. Today, thanks to the assistance of
American Jewry through the Joint Distribution Committee, a hopeful, useful future awaits
him in the growing Jewish State.
Born 35 years ago in the little
town of Boesing, Czechoslovokia,
Stern was one of a large and
scattered family—a family whose
traces hardly exist today. When
he finished school, young Simon
went into his father's textile
business, but soon left it to open
his own artificial-flower shop in
ROSH HASHONAH
GREETINGS . . .
Bennett Bros.
401 W. JEFFERSON
WO. 2-7446
Bratislava, the capital of Slo-
vakia. The business blossomed
successfully, and Stern looked
forward to a comforable life. But
the iron heel of Nazi armies
crushed that hope.
In 1940, Stern planned to es-
cape German-occupied. Czecho-
slovakia for Israel. But his
dreams were upset one day
when his father, severely beaten
by Nazi troops, died, leaving
young Simon to care for a family
of eight children. A year later,
his business was taken from him,
and destitute, he looked for an
alley of escape.
From then on, Stern's life be-
came a tenuous, uncertain strug-
gle for existance. For months,
the young Czech Jew calculated
an escape across the border into
Hungary, where conditions had
not yet deteriorated to the ex-
NEW YEAR'S
GREETINGS
CITY SCRAP
IRON & METAL
CO.
2715 W. WARREN
TY. 7-3632
Rosh Hashonah
Greetings
Mr. and Mrs.
Joseph Frenkel
and Family
GREETINGS
American Army and Navy Stores
MICHAEL GALSKY, Prop.
13215 Harper, LA. 8-9465
52 Cadillac Square, WO. 4-9449
•
WISHING OUR FRIENDS AND PATRONS
A HAPPY NEW YEAR
tent they had in Czechoslovakia.
In the attempt, however, he
was caught and condemned to a
concentration camp. But on the
way, he eluded his captors, and
wandering across Central Eu-
SIMON STERN
• • •
rope, hiding, fleeing, working as
a carpenter, decorator, or prin-
ter, managed to reach the relative
safety of Hungary.
• • •
BUT WHAT HAVEN Hungary
offered was short-lived. In 1944,
he was arrested in Budapest and
sentenced to death. His sentence
was "commuted," however, and he
was sent for the second time, to
a German concentration camp.
For two days, Stern and his
fellow prisoners walked, carry-
ing all their belongings, almost
100 miles to Germany. There,
Stern was sent to Buchenwald,
then to Flossenburg, and finally
to the extermination camp of
Nordhausen.
In January, 1945, Stern men-
tally prepared himself for death.
Weighing less than 90 pounds,
he was barely able to drag him-
self to work—and inability to
work meant the gas-chambers.
Aware of this, Nazi guards
sadistically assigned Stern to the
most difficult task, laying rail-
road tracks. Unable even fb at-
tempt such labor, Stern protested
to the German overseer. The an-
swer: two revolver shots, and
Stern collapsed, his left arm
shattered.
Regaining consciousness in the
camp hospital, Stern found that
his hand had been amputated and
that he was 'under arrest for
sabotage.' But the doctors—
themselves inmates of the camp
—managed to hide the young
Czech Jew until the British Army
liberated them a month later.
Two months later, SinnonaStern
was home in Bratislava. His
shop, ruined and pillaged, stood
like the empty shell of a mem-
ory. The few remains of his fam-
ily were flung far • across the
corners of Europe.
But conscientiously, Stern be-
gan to rebuild, and within four
years, his artifical-flower shop
was a going affair. Married and
hopeful, Stern looked forward to
the comfort and prosperity that
might brighten some of the
shadows of the past. In 1949,
however, Czech businesses were
nationalized, and Stern, forced to
close his shop, became "econom-
ically displaced."
• • •
AGAIN HE WAS destitute, but
again he retained the optimism,
hope and perseverance that had
carried him through former
years of horror. Stern decided to
go to Israel.
In Vienna, his first stop on the
"road to deliverance," Stern ran
into complications—the kind of
trouble that almost every Jewish
refugee has met in his search for
freedom and security. Stern
needed money. Unable to con-
tinue his trip to Israel because
of his disability, he required a
better artifical hand and new
tools for his artifical-flower pro-
duction.
And like almost every Jewish
Rosh Hashonah Greetings
and Best Wishes . • •
BARILUM
HOTEL
Happy
New Year .
Wm. H. Belter
Tires
1931 E. JEFFERSON
Happy New Year
A. BLACK HARDWARE COMPANY
UN. 4.3436
19185 Livernois
WE DELIVER
Glidden Paints, Hardware, Sporting Goods, and Toys
Everything for the Home
GREETINGS
IfyikeNr
ROSH HASHONAH
GREETINGS
WRIGLEY'S SUPER MARKETS
refugee, Stern's first thought was
the Joint Distribution Commit-
tee—simply "American Joint" to
thousands throughout Europe—
which has aided more than 90
per cent of the more than 400,000
Jews who have emigrated so far
to Israel since the establishment
of the new state.
Stern's request for both the
prostethic device and the mach-
inery to continue his vocation
were carefully studied by JDC's
Vienna staff. Their decision was
not only to provide the Czechosl-
ovakian-Jewish refugee with new
tools, but with a special machine
that would permit him to work
with one hand. The new, spec-
ially-constructed "clicking press"
is designed to cut flower pat-
terns into raw materials.
The same machine is cutting
out for Simon Stern the econom-
ically and morally independent
life that has been denied him for
years.
Now, like hundreds of thous-
ands of Jews before him, Simon
Stern is In Israel. There, after
a decade of war and persecution,
he hopes to build a new life—
making flowers without fragr-
ance, but sweet nevertheless.
NCw 4
CHECKER
BAR & GRILL
ERA
.#4,1I•111iCAtiv
IntOCILIt0
Mr. Rubin
725 Bates
WO. 4-8002
Greetings
Cadillac
Furniture Co.
5801 Grandy
WA. 1-2700
rfloAh dtaihmtah
1255 Broadway
WOodward 2-5900
Mr. and Mrs. Henry Keywell
Mr. and Mrs. Kopel I. Kahn
Mr. and Mrs. J. Phillip Levant
Mr.'and Mrs. Jerome M. Keywell
Joyce N. Keywell
Mr. and Mrs. Isadore Kowal
Mr. and Mrs. Meyer Kowal
Mr. and Mrs. Gerald Kowal.
WO. 1-7397
GREETINGS ...
AUTOMATIC
STOKER SERVICE
CO.
623 EAST EVELYN
Hazel Park
JO. 4-6390
BANK OF
COMMERCE
11300 Jos. Campau
Offices: Hamtramck - Warren - Centerline
RESOURCES OVER $37,000,000
Member of Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
INEDANNI NDOININO.N•Wem.••••
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