High Synagogue, Cracow

This synagogue on Jozefa street #38 in Kazimierz district was the 3rd oldest synagogue in Cracow. It followed the building of the Old Synagogue and the Remuh Synagogue. It comes from the 2nd half of the 16th century. The name "High Synagogue" refers to the prayer hall on the 2nd floor. The ground floor had shops. This is the same today. There is a nice bookstore with books about Jewish life in Cracow on the bottom floor.

I went to the exhibit on the 2nd floor. I think these exhibits change occasionally. There is only one large room. On the walls you can see writings in Hebrew that have been uncovered.  This exhibit was about Jewish families of inter-war Cracow. It highlighted around 8 different families and their stories and family pictures before, during and after WWII. Most of these families were merchants of some sort (cloth, pork). It is interesting that some of their shops were located in central Cracow and not in Kazimierz. As a result the families lived close to central Cracow and were integrated into Polish neighborhoods. That became handy for some of the Jewish families during WWII when those Polish neighbors sometimes helped to hide their Jewish neighbors (especially children). There was one story about a Polish couple (childless) that hid their Jewish neighbor's children because they were orphans. The parents had been killed in Belzec concentration camp. It was particularly risky because the couple suddenly had children and they had rented out a room to a German officer. In several cases parents had been killed, leaving children behind. Sometimes the Germans caught up with those children and killed them too. If a Polish family was caught hiding Jews, they would be killed (and other relatives too). 

Of the people featured in this exhibit, a few survived the war and live in Israel and a few in the US. I am not sure if they are all still alive. The families in the US are Cecilia and Edward Mosberg from NY ( who funded the restoration of the ghetto wall on Limanowskiego street in Podgorze), Alexander Lauterbach from Los Angeles, and Dianne and Tad Taube from San Francisco. Mr. Taube came to the US in 1939 at the age of 8 on a boat. His parents had already come over to the US for business reasons. He was one of the lucky ones who did not go through war time in Poland.