Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday

Subject: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 02:45 AM

Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday in the northwestern Polish town of Debno ...

So who the &^%#@$^ was Antoni Dobrowski??????

The oldest known survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp -- ... -- has died at the age of 108, an official said Monday.

'nuff said??

The whole story:

World's oldest survivor of Auschwitz dies at 108

Teacher was interned for giving lessons in defiance of Nazi decrees in Poland

Associated Press
10/22/2012

WARSAW, Poland — The oldest known survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp -- a teacher who gave lessons in defiance of his native Poland's Nazi occupiers -- has died at the age of 108, an official said Monday.

Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday in the northwestern Polish town of Debno, according to Jaroslaw Mensfelt, a spokesman at the Auschwitz-Birkenau state museum.

After invading Poland in 1939, sparking World War II, the Germans banned anything beyond four years of elementary education in a bid to crush Polish culture and the country's intelligentsia. The Germans considered the Poles an inferior race and the education policy was part of a plan to use Poles as a "slave race."

Underground effort

An underground effort by Poles to continue to teach children immediately emerged, with those caught punished by being sent to concentration camps or prisons. Dobrowolski was among the Poles engaged in the underground effort, and he arrested by the Gestapo and sent to Auschwitz in 1942.

Dobrowolski, who was born Oct. 8, 1904 in Wolborz, a town in central Poland, was later moved to the concentration camps of Gross-Rosen and then Sachsenhausen, where he was liberated in the spring of 1945 at the war's end, according to information provided by the Auschwitz memorial museum in southern Poland.

At least 1.1 million people were killed by the Germans at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Most of the victims were Jews, but many non-Jewish Poles, Roma and others were also killed there.

© 2012 The Associated Press.


Just so we may remember.

John

Subject: RE: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: fat B****rd
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 03:59 AM

Thank you for posting this, John.
An amazing man. May he Rest In Peace.

Subject: RE: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: Banjo-Flower
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 06:35 PM

Hats off to another unsung hero RIP

Gerry

Subject: RE: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 23 Oct 12 - 09:40 PM

Now that's a survivor! Amazing.

Subject: RE: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: michaelr
Date: 24 Oct 12 - 09:32 PM

And he invented the Dobro.

Subject: RE: Obit: Antoni Dobrowolski died Sunday
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 25 Oct 12 - 03:57 AM

Coincidentally(?) a recent dedication of a memorial for some others who also suffered in Germany was reported recently. It's difficult for most of us to realize the extent of how powerful racial, ethnic, religious and other hatreds can be when enlisted for political purposes. Dobrowolski was one victim in a less recognized group. There were many others, in other groups, some of which are the same as those frequently targeted in some places, and by some "almost respectable" political parties today.

Reference: Germany's Merkel opens Roma Holocaust memorial in Berlin

John