The beautiful white beard on Grandpa's face signified his dignity and his deep religious conviction. Now the nakedness of his face, exposed and injured, was not only a painful physical attack but also an assault on his sense of self, and by extension the entire family felt his pain. To quote from Holocaust scholar Daniel Landes, "This was a purposeful shaming. The Nazis knew how to assault one's self-dignity. To jeeringly pull the hair from the 'glory of a man's face,' the hadrat panim of his beard, was to serve notice, painfully, that this man no longer had a God to serve."⁴ Some men covered their beards with scarves around the face, as if they had a toothache, to evade the enemy's wrath and avoid becoming victims.

More restrictions on Tomaszow's Jews soon followed. The Nazis imposed rations on food, limited the bakery's hours, and prevented the butcher from receiving deliveries of meat. Funerals for Jews were forbidden.

"My grandfather, Elimelech Samelson, died. We couldn't have a funeral," said Fishel Samelson. "We had to carry his casket through the side streets to the cemetery. We were looking for a space. We couldn't find a space. And, right in back of my uncle's monument there was a space. And we buried my grandfather there."

In October of 1939, the Gestapo declared a curfew. Posters across town announced that from 7 p.m. until 7 a.m. all Jews were to be indoors. Since Jews had to wait in line for bread in the morning that provided German forces with easy enforcement targets—people who got onto the bread lines early. Those who came before 7 a.m. would be shot.

Still, Tomaszowers were able to violate the curfew by traveling through each other's backyards, avoiding the main streets.

"You could walk from one end to the other," recalled Zlacia Warzecha. "You couldn't go across the street."

Boleslaw Szeps, president of the Gemina, urged people to save themselves by leaving Tomaszow as random terror became increasingly widespread.

Our family, like so many others, had the misfortune to suffer some of those fatal attacks. One day a Gestapo officer demanded that Cousin Hershel Tenenbaum hand over gold that he had been hiding. Hershel complied, but the officer killed him anyway.

In response, Hershel's older brother, Cousin Chemja Tenenbaum, who worked in my father's tailor shop, decided to leave Tomaszow with the intention to return as soon as the situation improved. Chemja drank a glass of wine with his parents and closest family, his father wished him good luck, and he took flight on November 12, 1939. As the German army advanced east, Chemja kept on the run, maintaining distance from the military. He was able to save himself, spending the war years in Russia. Afterwards he returned to Tomaszow where we met again.

That November a transport of Jews from Lodz came to Tomaszow, arriving with only the belongings they carried on their backs. This was one of the methods the Germans used to isolate and disorient Poland's Jews. People who had homes and extended families suddenly became homeless beggars in a strange town. It had a disquieting impact on Tomaszow's Jewish community, which was obliged to absorb, feed, and house them, as well as empathize with their traumatic experiences.

Then, on December 22, 1939, the Nazis made it compulsory for all Jews over six years old to wear a white armband with a blue Magen David (Star of David) on the right upper arm, a so-called "Juden Zeichen" (German for "Jewish sign"). Jews caught without their armbands could be beaten or even shot on the spot.

This latest order impelled more young people to escape to Russia (most of whom survived the war). Binem Grossman, another of Papa's workers, was among those who left. Eventually he made aliya to Israel and settled in Haifa. Others wanted to leave Tomaszow, but ties to their families or businesses convinced them to stay.

The First Ghetto

The distinction between iber der brik and in der gas began to end in late 1940, when authorities mandated that all Jews living iber der brik had to move into town—by doubling up with those who lived in der gas. To compound crowding, the Nazis also required Jews who lived in surrounding, smaller towns to move in with Tomaszower households.

Yet another decree forbade Jews from living on the main streets of town and in the nicest sections, which forced us to move from Antoniego Street. Father found a small apartment on the second floor of number 3 Ulica Jerozolimska, apartment 5, where we moved on December 7, 1940, and would stay for a year.

It was a considerable inconvenience to move. We used a wagon and slowly transported most of the belongings, making multiple trips to bring as much as we could to the new apartment. My brother and I walked alongside the wagon, carrying the few toys that held the greatest importance to us. I carried the boat with the sailors, and Romek filled his arms with several balls.