Page 147 - Centrum Dialogu im. Marka Edelmana w Łodzi. Jesteśmy drzewami wiecznymi.

tailoring department, in Leon Glazer’s factory, where the so-called school
operated. Apart from work (for example, sewing clothes for dolls) children had
lessons and could join a literature and drama club there. “It was an escape
for us. A place where we could laugh and play. We learned to sing, recite,
draw under the guidance of the best pre-war teachers. We performed in
the ghetto in front of the audience”, she recalled. Meanwhile, the situation
in the ghetto was getting more and more difficult.
On 24 August 1944, Rutka was transported to Auschwitz with her brother and
her parents. Her parents were immediately sent to the gas chamber. Salek
was in other camps, but he did not survive the war. Rutka was the only survivor
from her entire family. In 1945, she returned to Łódź, where she found her
grandmother, uncle and aunt. She lived at 5, Zielona Street (then Legionów
Street), graduated from the middle school and worked at the Makabi Club.
In 1946, together with a group of Zionist youth, she left for Paris. Two years
later she married Józef Englender (Eldar) who came from a family of mu-
sicians from Warsaw. In Paris, she graduated from a fashion design school.
In 1950, the couple left for Israel to build a new state. First, they settled in
Jaffa and then Tel Aviv. Initially, Józef did manual work, then, he worked as
an educational officer in a veteran hospital and he organized concerts. In
1958, their only daughter was born. She was named Anath, in memory of
Józef’s mother, who died during the war in Warsaw. They spent five years
in Brussels. After their return, they lived in Jerusalem. Ruth opened a fashion
house. “I dressed all the first ladies and Prime Minister Begin’s wife”, she said
with pride. Her husband died suddenly of a heart attack. After his death, she
sold her house in Jerusalem and settled in Tel Aviv.
From 1989 onwards, Ruth often returned to her home town of Łódź. Here,
she had an apartment and friends. She was a beautiful woman. She was
always elegantly dressed, wearing make-up, she spoke beautiful Polish, and
she knew Polish poetry by heart. She made her debut in Polish as the author
of a collection of memoirs entitled, Wstrząsnąć filarami świątyni (To Shake
the Temple Pillars). By describing the people she knew and who had played
an important role in her life, she wanted to show that the tragedy was not
nameless. “This is the only way to deal with the anonymity of the mass death
of World War II”, she confessed in the introduction.
Ruth Eldar came to Łódź for the last time to celebrate the anniversary of the
Litzmannstadt ghetto with her daughter, Anna and granddaughter, Lee. It
was her farewell to Łódź. She died in June 2019.

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