Andrew, all of them now in their
30s.
While Debbie went west as a
teen-ager, her brothers stayed in
the Detroit area, eventually start-
ing a law practice with their fa-
ther. The Findling Law Firm
occupies a charming downtown
Royal
Oak Cape Cod.
–Joe Findling
"My family has three brothers
who are in some way committed
to family. They're in the same law
firm,
they work together, they're
described the passengers who
best
friends,
they have a very pro-
were on the train that day.
found
and
immediate
sense of
The story almost had an end-
family.
Then
there's
me,
who left
ing. The Findlings' existence in
Detroit
when
I
was
17
and
went
Europe had been crippled like a
to
school
in
Colorado.
On
a
geo-
tree whose roots were upheaved.
The children guessed that David graphic level, I stayed far away. I
Findling had been among the mil- think the way I stay connected is
to keep the memory of the past
lions murdered.
Nearly a generation later, alive," Ms. Findling said.
In 1992, she made her second
Fred Findling and his wife
pilgrimage
to Poland and Israel
had raised their own family, in-
with
March
of the Living, This
cluding Debbie, 32; David, 34;
time
she
was
prepared.
Daniel, 29; and Darren, 27. Joe
She arranged for a driver and
and Elaine Findling raised their
own — Timothy, Keith, Scott and an interpreter and set out into the

`Tor over 50 years,

PHOTO BY DAN IEL LI PPITT

I put o mourning."

Fred and Joe
Findling
learned of their
father's fate
through Fred's
daughter,
Debbie
Findling.

Polish countryside. Her only in- to show them the town's Jewish
tention was to take pictures of cemetery, an overgrown field
Frysztak, a bucolic village tucked scarred with upturned and dese-
into soft green hills, about two crated stones inscribed with bare-
hours east of Krakow by car. The ly legible Hebrew. They could make
air quivered with the plaintive out the name of only one long-ago
squawking of chickens and birds inhabitant: Frysztak's rabbi.
Turning back to the village, they
and the lonely creaking of well
came
face to face with Mr. Godek,
handles.
"We drove up into this village at 82 the town's oldest resident.
and my interpreter pulled over at The tiny man stepped back war-
the first house on the edge of the ily. The translator, Deruich, ex-
village and asked the people if plained the reason for their visit.
they knew of any Jews in Frysz- Ms. Finding's heart pounded hard
tak. They were very nice, invited as she watched Mr. Godek's crag-
us in, offered us coffee and cook- gy face for a sign of recognition.
ies and tried to think of who they Yes, he slowly said, he remem-
knew who might know the Jews bered her grandfather, and his
of Frysztak. They directed us to family, too. David Findling, he
somebody who knew somebody said, was his "best friend."
"It was all being translated. I
else," she recalled.
felt
this complete sense of dis-
They ended up • at Roman
trust,"
Ms. Findling recalled.
Godek's home, a three-story, green
As Win a waking dream, she lis-
cottage with shingled roof set into
a slope off the main road. A girl who tened to Deruich's words and forced
identified herself as Mr. Godek's herself to grasp that she had found
granddaughter said her grandfa- what she was looking for. A yearn-
ther wasn't home, but she offered ing of which she had barely been