Why this book?
This book deals with the entire life of a Holocaust survivor, Dr. Jacob Stupay, whose existence was to be erased. My first book, Memory and Understanding, discusses letters from my mother’s siblings about their lives in Poland, but it is not completely biographical. The second one, Family and Roots, The Poland Connection is a memoir and reflections from a trip to Poland in 2007. In this new volume, I needed to understand the foundations of the Holocaust and the terror of the times that seem unimaginable today. At the same time, I felt an urge to explain why only a few of my relatives left Poland when they could still emigrate. Was Poland always a swamp of anti-Semitism and discrimination? The answer is no. Jews had a culture and some autonomy that is worth remembering.
What is the Gombin connection?
The main subject, Dr. Jacob Stupay, was born in Gombin, in 1889, as were his father and grandfather. There were many Stupay family members in Gombin, but many left before 1900, when they could move to the larger cities in Poland.

Why write a scholarly book rather than focus solely on one person and the family?
While the book has many footnotes, it is not solely meant to be a definitive history of the times. What I confronted at an earlier stage is that there were relatively few books on the lives and conditions of professional Jews in Poland. There were a lot of first person experiences of the Holocaust, but not many that provided some context of their life before the war. Polish life was not one long tale of misery. Families flourished. People enjoyed life in the country, on picnics and sporting events. The local markets were vital economic engines. Polish, German, and Czech universities were among the best in the world. I felt a need to try to understand choices our families made and why so many stayed.

What did you find intriguing about your uncle and your father’s family?
First, my uncle married a sophisticated woman from an important family in a town nearly completely forgotten, Leczyca, near Lodz. Second, I loved getting into what Berlin was like at the beginning of the century, 1910-1920, the earlier glory years and the wartime hardships. After all, most educated people spoke German, as they now speak English. Berlin was the home of legendary scientists, including Helmholtz, Planck and later Einstein. Applied research made German companies leaders in creating a new world of products. Also, I was interested in the family dynamics. They were not rigidly orthodox, keeping solely to themselves and their communities. They were real people with ambitions and an enormous appetite for modern life. Some even intermarried and were fervently Polish, though keeping our main Jewish traditions. I believe that many led satisfying lives, especially Jacob Stupay, the main subject of the book—of course, until the late 1930s and the Nazi invasion.

What about your grandparents and their attitudes about education of both their sons and daughters?
I found this aspect of their lives most satisfying and endearing. For most of their children, they created an environment that engendered loyalty and support. Definitely, all the children, all eight of them including the girls, went to gymnasium and at least one to a major university (for medical studies). My father always planned to go to law school, but his circumstances in Havana and New York prevented him from completing it. He and several of his siblings came of age during World War I, when no one in Poland could attend a university. The daughters also went to school and could function in the Polish economy in the 1930s. The rabbi of their mid-size town (Wloclawek, not far from Gombin), Yehuda- Lieb Kowalski, was a liberal, a Zionist, and encouraged his community to partake in wider European culture and philosophy. He and his predecessor, Rabbi Karo, were quite worldly and gave sermons referring to Europe’s leading philosophers.

Was there diversity of Polish life, even in the shtetls?
Yes, people were people, especially Jews, and when Polish/Russian society opened up, the young Jews, at least in the beginning of the 20th century, readily adopted to Polish life and culture. They and my family dressed in modern style and spoke Polish and Russian. They traveled to and read about other European countries and America. Jewish and Polish newspapers flourished, as did theater, sports and literature. But this did not happen until the beginning of the new century in 1900. There were many pockets of poverty in small towns, and many were stuck there in communities where the Rabbinate and leaders may have benefited from “old time religion.” But when Poland was made independent again after 125 years, in 1919, there was genuine excitement about the future—not for everyone, but for those ready for a secular future.

Thoughts about future projects?
One thing I hope is that this book provides is an example for others to explore their roots especially in Gombin, Gostynin and surrounding towns. Other families also came from wealthy backgrounds and community environments, and we should be vitally interested in and celebrate their lives before the Holocaust. In the process, we will all benefit from new insights and pleasures of knowing more about a forgotten land. Arthur Gertzman, GJH&GS president, did this brilliantly in two previous books on his Gombin family (Rissman’s) as did Minna Packer in her films. I also gained a lot of inspiration from Max Guyer’s priceless family pictures of sports events, including boating, in Gombin (B’nai Gombin, Issue #23, Sept. 2008). Poland then was not as stolidly Christian as pictured today. It was a quilt made up of different sects of Christianity (Eastern Orthodox, Roman, Lutheran and other Protestant groups), Jews, Moslems, Roma etc. We all have a lot to learn.
Regarding future projects… Since I completed the book last year, but only published in July 2014, there have been at least a dozen important new books on the Holocaust, World War I in Poland, Versailles, shtetls, Warsaw Ghetto, etc. In the future, I would like to continue my family research on members who lived in South America, especially Uruguay, about whom I know virtually nothing—their histories and experience. Finally, I have a project on my professional interest, the U.S. economy in the 1980s and my part in it.