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Tracing Relatives

RAYMUND FLANDEZ SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

Local family
goes through
U.S. Holocaust
museum to find
family details.

Lynn Margolis

24

Michael Margolis

April 20 • 2017

T

here are so many unanswered
“It almost moved me to tears that
questions about my past,” says
in 30 seconds he was able to pull all
Lynn Margolis, a daughter of
of that,” says Michael, who also found
Holocaust survivors.
out his grandmother’s maiden name —
So, what exactly happened to her
Helena Applebaum Markowiscz. “We
dad during the Holocaust?
could never put the pieces together.”
For years, Margolis and her two
The Margolis family is just one of the
sons, Michael and Daniel, had little
more than 20,000 families who have
to no idea. Her father had suffered
successfully turned to the museum for
trauma, losing a wife and child as
help in their search for documentation
well as nine brothers and sisters,
about the fates of their loved ones —
along with his extended family. He
victims of the Nazis and their allies.
died before his daughter and grand-
With more Holocaust survivors get-
sons could ask more questions.
ting older and dying, getting accurate
“The Grandpa I knew was closed
and complete information from the
off and anxious,” says Michael
museum’s massive archives to request-
Margolis, a lawyer who lives in
ers as soon as possible is more crucial
Washington, D.C. “We never spoke
and urgent than ever.
about it. He never wanted to talk
With the information they received,
about it.”
Michael was able to trace his grand-
Lynn Margolis, 62, of Farmington
ABOVE: Itzchak and Helena Ernst with their son, Albert, the bar parents’ paths through Google maps.
Hills, a social worker, asked Michael
They were in concentration camps like
mitzvah boy, and their daughter, Lynn. TOP: The International
to visit the U.S. Holocaust Memorial
Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen. He also
Tracing Service archives are a treasure trove of information
about those who died during the Holocaust or survivors.
Museum to see if researchers there
got information about cousins and his
could help them discover more
grandmother’s sister, as well as his half-
about how her family survived the
uncle, the son his grandfather had with
Holocaust.
his wife before the war.
Immediately, a museum researcher
“It just brought it to reality,” Michael
found documents in an archive that provided details on the
says. “It took it from the ethereal — the story in my head that I
exact dates when Lynn’s father, Itzchak Ernst Estreicher, was
knew about. Looking at these papers, it just made it real.”
arrested (September 1939) and which ghetto and concentration
After the museum led the charge in 2007 to open an impor-
camps he went to.
tant archive called the International Tracing Service in Bad

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