May 2, 2025 • 45 mins
The Beau Show Podcast on Real America's Voice
92 YR. OLD HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR JACK WIRFL'S STORY OF LOSS AND RESILIENCE
In this episode, my guest is 92 year old Holocaust survivor Jochen "Jack" Wirfl, who had to pretend he wasn't Jewish by joining Hitler's youth. After his mother died in Auschwitz and his father died of malnutrition from his time in a concentration camp, Jack came to America where he learned English, joined the Army, led the color guard in Normandy, and started an insurance company. His story is inspirational and educational at a time when antisemitism is rampant in elite American universities.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, welcome to The Bow Show Podcast, Episode three. Thank
you so much for listening, and for those of you
that can see this visually, thank you for watching. Today's
show is all about survival, resilience, and the pursuit of
success in spite of adversity. Most of us here in
America have no idea what it's like to survive literal persecution,
(00:23):
because here in America we're very blessed to live in
peace that we're not persecuted for our ethnicity, or our
skin color, or our religion. But many people unfortunately did
not have that luxury. Anti Semitism is still very much
a real issue, and sadly it's happening at our elite
universities where we're supposed to be educating the.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Best of the best. It's sad that it's happening there.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
And I want to salute those who survived the Holocaust
today because they're reminders of humanity, but they're also a
reminder of what hatred can do and it's left unfettered.
There's about two hundred and forty five thousand remaining Holocaust
survivors in the world, and about sixty thousand of those
(01:09):
are still in the United States. And we have one
of them on the show today. The days of remembrance
of victims of the Holocaust were from April twentieth through
the twenty seventh, so we're just coming off of that.
In April twenty fourth was Yam HaShoah, which is the
Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Day, which happens in Israel.
But we've got to focus on colleges as hot beds
(01:31):
of anti Semitism. It's become an unexpected place where we're
seeing this type of persecution and students not allowing other
students to go to class, people being sympathetic towards little terrorists,
people who want to see Israel completely wiped off the map.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Harvard agreed to adopt.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
Stricter language to crack down on anti Jewish and anti
Israel behavior on campus after Israelian Jewish students complained of
a hostile environment in the after math of the October seventh,
twenty twenty three Hamas terror attack on.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Israel and Israel's response.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Harvard also adopted a definition of anti Semitism by the
International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
But is that enough? That's the question? Are those just words?
Is it just semantics. Should they do more? I think
they should.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
President Donald Trump is claiming that he will remove Harvard's
tax exempt status. That's a big thing because there are
billions of dollars that are attached in tax dollars to
Harvard that he now can say, wait a minute until
you can prove to us that you're a safe college
for all students to be able to practice their religion
and go to class freely. I'm not so sure that
(02:42):
we should give you this tax money. And there's no
one better to ask about this than a man who
knows anti Semitism all too well by living through its
darkest time. His story is a remarkable one that I
think you're going to want to hear every single word
of and I can't wait to speak to him. Well.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
My guest is Jack Werfol.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Jack is ninety two years young, and at the outbreak
of World War Two, he was seven and his brother
was eight, and they had a Roman Catholic father and
a Jewish mother. They had to hide their Jewish roots
by joining Hitler's Youth to avoid going to concentration camps.
Their mother was seized and taken to Auschwitz, where she died.
Jack eventually came to America and pursued the American dream.
(03:22):
And today's show we'll focus on Jack's incredible story and
all of it is detailed in his autobiography My Two Lives. Well, Jack,
welcome to the Boushow I really appreciate you being with
me today.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Thank you, Thank you Well.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Jack.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I want to go back, first of all to your
earliest days, and I want you to tell me what
it was like growing up with a Catholic father and
a Jewish mother and describe your upbringing if you could.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Yeah. I originally I remember back to six years old.
I was in Austria, living in Niovene Neo Vienna. My
father worked in Vienna for the President of Austria, and
(04:08):
I remember those days very well. For my parents. We
used to go for a nice walks on weekends and
I remember picking my father up from the train every
day he used to go. We lived in a little
place called Gutenstein, and there was a train going from
Vienna to Gutenstein, which he always saw, a very short train,
(04:32):
and we would always pick them up at the train
I remember that. And then they used to turn the train,
the locomotive around for the train to go back to Vienna.
So these are the kind of things I remember in
our walks up in the mountains, and I always remember
these you mongs being snails that were on the way everywhere.
(05:00):
And yeah, that's.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Enna is a lovely place. I love Austria.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
I had the opportunity to go over there and sing
for a wedding over there, and I just unfortunately my
time was so short. I wish I'd spent more time,
and I'd like to go back.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
So I.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
The picture you're describing is a lovely one, and I
feel like I know at least a glint of it.
But when you were seven years old, world War two
breaks out, and how did your family make the decision
for you and your brother to join Hitler's youth Describe that?
Speaker 3 (05:34):
Yeah, well, we you know, we we lived in Vienna,
and my father and my mother decided that especially my father,
because of being in the government, knew that Hitler was
going to come to Austria and take Austria over, so
he didn't want my brother and myself to be there,
(05:57):
so he sent us too of our play to Berlin,
where my grandparents lived, and we lived there and my
mother went to Prague at that time and lived there
for a year or two because she was Jewish and
(06:19):
she was afraid to go back to Berlin and wanted
to go back there.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
So you went to Berlin and your mom went to Prague,
and so your family obviously made the decision that you
had to basically hide this part of your heritage, your
Jewish heritage, from your mother. How hard was it to
hide that part of your lineage? And did you ever
think that you and your brother would.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Get caught and sent to a concentration camp.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Yes, we thought about it many times, but we were very,
very careful. The one thing my parents did when they
took us to Berlin, they had us they took us
to a Catholic church and had us both baptized, so
at any time someone would ask us, well, what's your
religion or fill out paper, we could say that we
were Catholic. So that helped tremendously. And then my grandfather,
(07:10):
who had been in the First World War for Germany
in France, he was also stationed in a place where
he felt it would be safe possibly for the for
US boys to be rather than to be in Berlin.
So he sent us to this little place on the
(07:33):
North Sea called called Dungast and it's on the North
Sea and it was like a little camp for children,
primarily in the summer. And my grandfather sent us there,
and it was going to send us there for maybe
(07:54):
a few months, few weeks, few months, who knows, And
he paid the lady who who ran the place. And
this lady turned out to be just a wonderful woman.
Her name was Irma franzen heinri stav and she had
(08:16):
two children, a boy and a daughter, and they were
a few years older than we were, quite a bit older,
like five eight, ten years older than we were, and
they were in the Hitler Youth. Because this was a
German family, and the lady Irma we called her Tunda
(08:41):
and Irma she decided that we better use joined the
Hitler Youth because her children were in the Hitler Youth.
They had to be, and if we were going to
live with them, we should be in the Hitler youth
also because if not, people would come to them and say,
(09:02):
what are these kid kids doing here? Why aren't they
in the Hitler youth. I mean, every child had to
be in the Hitler youth. If you're not in the
Hitler youth, who are in a concentuation camp.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
You know, so, so did you as part of the
Hitler youth did you have to It sounds like you're
basically forced to kind of in a way and self preservation.
Did you have to adopt any sort of anti Jewish stance?
Was that required at the time? And it must have
been difficult having to hide that part of your heritage?
Did I mean, did they force you to take an
(09:32):
anti Jewish stance at that time?
Speaker 3 (09:35):
Well, they didn't know, you know, no wonder really know.
Tantema was the only one who knew. And we would
go to school in this little village on the North Sea,
and every morning when we went to school, we had
to sing anti Jewish songs. These things were all very
(10:01):
difficult for my brother and myself, but we kept saying
that this is what we're going to have to do
if we want to stay alive, and that's that's what
we did. And eventually it turned out that my teacher,
he taught us till one o'clock in the afternoon and
(10:23):
then he would get on his motorcycle, put on his
black uniform and go to meetings. And these were SS meetings.
He was an SS officer. My teacher and my teacher
happened to be a very very good friend of Tandauma,
the woman who ran the camp where we lived, and
(10:44):
both of them knew that we were Jewish. Even my teacher,
as an SS officer, knew that we were Jewish, so.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And still protected. He protected and then kept let you
keep that secret.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Absolutely well, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And your mother was in Prague. I know it had
been difficult to be separated for her from her. Tell
me about the day that the Nazis came to take
her away.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Yeah, Well, when Hitler walked into Czechoslovakia and took over Czechoslovakia,
there were a lot of Jewish people there, and especially
in Prague. They were immediately being incarcerated and ten sent
to various concentration camps. And my mother somehow got on
(11:31):
a train. It was supposed to be a cold train.
As I understand, we were too small to remember all
of this so to know this well to see it.
But she was on a cold train and came back
to her parents in Berlin. And while she was in
Berlin we went. We left our camp on the North
(11:55):
Sea for a little while and joined our mother, who
had an apartment in to live with her for a
little while as long as we could, and I started
school there and so that my brother. And one day
my mother said, well, I got a little job for you.
(12:19):
I have a letter here in an envelope, and I
would like you to take the subway. And we lived
right around the corner from the subway, and go to
a certain station, change trains, go to another train, and
when you arrive at a certain station again, you go
(12:40):
up the steps and there will be a gentleman and
you give him a code word. And she told us
the code word, and the gentleman will answer and will
give you and you give him the envelope, and he
will give you an envelope for me. So all of
this was done. We were coming back to our home,
(13:02):
to our and this was in Berlin, in the mining castraset.
And as we came to the corner to come around
to go to the mining costratt where we could see
my mother's place. She lived in a large apartment building
(13:23):
at that time. And we saw that building and we
saw that there were a number of SS and Gestapo
cars parked in front of her building, and we thought,
oh my god, we better wait here and see what
this is all about. We were smart enough to do
that in retrospect, you know. And we waited there on
(13:44):
the corner and just watched, and we figured out when
this is all over and the cars are leaving in
the SS and Guestapo, then we could ask our mother
of what was going on in that building. Well, to
our great surprise, all of a sudden, they brought out
my mother and it was her they evidently were coming
(14:05):
to get They put her in a car and left
with her and arrested her, and all the cars left.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Well, Jack, did you did you see her?
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Was there any eye contact between you and her, your
you and your brother and her that in the final
moments of this, is it my mom's going to be
taken away?
Speaker 3 (14:24):
No? Not at that point. No, we were too far away,
you know, half a block away. There was no eye contact.
They just took her away.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Was that the last day that you saw her?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
No. Let me tell you that my mother had given
us the name of an attorney that if anything ever
should happen to me, here is the name of a person.
You call him and he will try to help you
to take care of your if I'm not around. So
(14:57):
we stayed there and it took us three day as
my brother and myself to find out which prison my
mother was taken to and where she was. And Peter
and I as little kids, we went to that prison
and just walked to the prison and we started looking
for her, and we saw her down below in the park,
(15:21):
walking with other people in the prison, and it was
kind of a park down below and in the prison itself,
and we watched her from a hallway and then they
all disappeared and they all had to go back to
their cells, I guess, And we had no idea where
(15:44):
my mother was and what sell. So we walked through
the whole prison. There's little kids, and it were was
asked people there. No one paid any attention to us
because I guess we were so little, you know, so young.
And we finally found the cell and we found my mother,
and my mother was of course terribly surprised, and she said, boys,
(16:05):
she said, you have to leave, because if you don't
leave immediately, the same thing is going to happen to
you that's going to happen to me. So be good,
go to school, learn whatever you can in life, and
be good until I see you again someday hopefully, and leave.
(16:31):
And we left and as we got to the final
gate of the prison. Yeah, there was an SS or
Gestapo officer who who grabbed us and said, what the
heck are you kids doing here? And we wrestled ourselves
loose from this gentleman and started to running through the
bilin through the streets, and he followed us, but at
(16:53):
our age we were a little quicker than he was,
so we finally we finally lost him. Uh. After that,
my mother was taken from that prison to our shirts.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
And how did you learn it? From passing?
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Yes? And later on we found out through the SS
officer who was our teacher in done Gus, in that
little village where we were hiding in the North Sea,
we found out to him that my mother was killed
in our shirts. Now that see to me, that's sound
(17:34):
of all the people.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
But I imagine for for for for young Jack and Petie.
I mean, this is this is a terrible chapter in
your lives because you lost your mother. I mean, this
is this is what Hitler did. And so I want
to know that that had to be devastating for you
any is, especially as we think about coming up on
Mother's Day on May eleventh, how difficult that had to
have been.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Did you did you ever.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
Think that there was a chance you might be reunited
with her or did you boys kind of understand there's
a good possibility I may not see her again.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
Yeah, we knew that there was a possibility because we
knew what Hitler was doing, and we were already informed
as to what happened to some of the people that
left to go east, that they weren't going east to work,
but rather going east to get.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
That care And Jack, where was your father and all this,
Is there anything he could do or did he just
kind of have to stand back and let it happen.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Well, my father who was working for the president of Austria,
they were good friends. They were both arrested when Hitler
came into Austria and they were taken to a German
concentration camp called They was right right north of Berlin,
(18:55):
and they stayed there for a long long time. And
my father was never released out of the concentration camps
until the war was over, and he was then released
by the American troops. But unfortunately he was so sick
(19:16):
and so undernourished that he died two months later and
we never saw him. We never even knew about it
at that time. I went later to Austria to get
all the details and find out what happened. And so
our mother, as I said it, was killed in Auschwitz,
and our father was in the concentration time the entire time. However,
(19:41):
my father escaped twice, and the first time he escaped
was before my mother was when she came back from Czechoslovakia,
before she was arrested by the Germans. She and my
father came to see us as youngist on the beach.
The last time really uh that we saw them together,
(20:06):
that we saw my father and my mother, and then
my father went back, oh, and then people and then
the little village where we lived on the North Sea,
they of course started saying, well, what is this man
doing here? Everybody else that's in the army, why is
(20:27):
he here with the children? You know. So my mother
and father over you know, disappeared overnight and we never
saw them. And again after that, and my father was arrested,
of course when he went back to Berlin, and there
was terribly penn punished by the by the Germans, by
(20:50):
the stuff by the leader of the concentration camp. And
later on after the war, when I went to the camp,
I found information about my father and what happened to
him and so on.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
So you lose, you lose your mother and your father,
which is undoubtedly devastating. And you find out that your
father escaped twice, but yet he was so malnourished after
the war's over in the in the liberation that he dies.
So now are your orphans at this point?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Tell me?
Speaker 1 (21:27):
You know, this is I'm sure where the resilience part
of the story comes in.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
How did you make it to America after the war.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Well, we were very lucky that in nineteen fifty we
got a call from the German army in southern Germany,
the occupation troops that they had found about my father
working for sure Shnaik, the president of Austria, and what
(21:57):
happened to my mother. And they said, a few boys,
I want to go to America. We're giving you the
opportunity through an organization that takes care of Catholic as
well as Jewish, Jewish and as well as Catholic children.
So of course we applied immediately, we said yes, and
(22:19):
that's how and they took us, put us on an airplane,
and a few weeks later and we ended up in
New York.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
What was the organization that that got you over?
Speaker 3 (22:31):
Do you recall, Yeah, the European Organization for Care of
organization for European Children.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Well, so you come to America, which is I'm sure
a dream for you, considering what you've been through. What
was the what was the reception like here in America
when you got here?
Speaker 2 (22:56):
What was that like?
Speaker 3 (22:58):
Wonderful? Wonderful in every way? You know, I was so happy.
I was the happiest man in the world that I
came to America. And I knew about the freedom and
the rules of the laws, a little bit about what
America was all about, and yeah, and that's where I
(23:19):
wanted to go. And here I was in New York
and I was very very happy.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Well, you talk about the fact that you took classes
in Baltimore to learn English, which you speak very well.
You became a citizen, and you served even in the
US Army, which I think is very noble. What made
you join our armed forces? Was it seeing what America
had done in World War Two and liberating.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
The free world? Is I mean? Is that what made
you want to join? What were the reasons you joined?
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Well, I know it wasn't voluntarily. I was in the
United States for three years by then and had learned
English and went to school and had job and all
of that. After I learned English, I had kept into
a job with an insurance company and UH. Then I
was drafted, and this was during the Korean War. I
(24:12):
had no choice. I was drafted to go to go
into the army. And I then when when I applied,
they said, would you like to go to Officers Candidate School?
And I said yes, I would, I would do that,
and then I was supposed to be assigned to that.
And then they came back and said, oh, we just
(24:35):
found out you're another citizen. No, you can't go to
Officers Candidate Candidate School, but you can go to UH
to career, you know, being the regular Army. So I
went to Camp Breckenridge, which is the first airborne division
to take basic training. Took the basic training, and just
(24:57):
plus we were finished and you were all leaving for Korea.
All of a sudden they called me and they said, hey,
we just found out from your Form twenty Form twenties
all your personal information. Did you speak German fluently? I
said yes, Well, the American Army in Germany needs desperately
(25:18):
interpreters who speak German, because at that time we were
training or already the German people again as a German army,
because the Russians were right there, you know, in Germany,
and so we wanted the German army. You know, we
had the American, the French, English, you know, we were
(25:40):
all there and they all had particular zones, and the
Russians had about half of Germany at that time. So
that's how I got into the.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
What a turn of events, Jack, You have Jewish heritage,
you have to hide it to become part of Hitler's youth.
Mother and your father die, so you know. But and
you there was obviously a chance you could even be
sent to a concentration camp as well. America and the
West they liberate, you know, the area, and then you
come to America only to be drafted in the army
(26:15):
and go back to Germany to be an interpreter for US.
I mean, that's about as incredible a cycle is one
can imagine.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yeah, I tell you another incredible story. When I was
ten years old, that's for silvi Uri the war. My
brother and I at night sometimes we would listen to
the British Broadcasting company to find out what the news
really was, because the Germans wouldn't tell us the German news.
So one day, oh my god, we were so happy
(26:44):
we heard that D Day happened, that the American and
the French and other forces were landing in Normandy. And
we said, oh my god, if that happens, you know,
and they're successful, then it's the end of this Hitler's
regime and all of that. So we were extremely happy
(27:08):
that we heard about D Day, and we kind of
celebrated D Day in our own way. And I was
ten years old. Then now we go back to where
I'm in the army in Germany, okay, And in the
army one day I was called by the company commander
and he said, you know, I've been watching you and
(27:30):
you have a very straight walk, and you walk well
and do things well. I would like to ask you
if you would volunteer to be in the Color God
for the first Infantry Division in which I had been
assigned to in Germany. And I said, yeah, it would
(27:51):
be my honor. So now I was in the Color
God and every time there was a major parade, I
had to of course be in the Color Guard. And
one day they called me in and they said, you're
going to Friends. I said, why am I going to France?
He said, you're going to Normandy. There is a ten
(28:13):
year anniversary of D Day, and we want you, with
your Color God to go to Normandy and celebrate, help
celebrate as a color guard.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
How did that make you feel, to be holding up
the American flag and knowing back when you were ten
years old that you were listening to the very broadcast
where D Day was announced.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
I can't tell you how proud I was, how happy
I was. It was one of the most amazing things
that all of a sudden, here I could carry the
American flag, protect the American flag and go to Normandy.
And we went. We had to do things like at
five o'clock in the morning. One morning they woke us
(28:59):
up and they said, Color God has to be down
at the beach. Why because there is the grave for
General Roosevelt, who was a son of President Roosevelt, who
was killed during the Normandy invasion, and he was buried
there and we want you there and Brugler, And at
(29:23):
five o'clock in the morning we were down in the
British Channel where he was buried and held up the
flag and the burglar played and the sun was rising over.
I mean, I can't tell you how proud of I was,
how proud I was, little guy from Austria, and what
(29:46):
I went through and what happened to my entire family
was not just my father, mother, but I lost my
entire family gen parents, uncles, ants, everybody except one person
who into Palestine during the war and he lived. He's
the only one of my family. Well, so yeah, I
(30:08):
mean Normandy was fantastic to me, and I still celebrate
Normandy every year now, you know.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
I think we recently had the eighties anniversary or something,
and my daughter and her husband put the Normandy flag
out in front of my house. And I can't tell
you how proud I was.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
You know, it seems only fitting that you would be
the one carrying the flag for this event, and I
can understand why it would be, why it would fill
you with pride. I think it makes absolute sense. You
mentioned when you came over to America that you started
an insurance company, Diversified Insurance Industries, which is a big,
big company. How did you do that, because that's another
chapter of your life that even extends this idea of
(30:54):
the American dream.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
Yeah. First, when I learned English, I worked in a
necktime factory while I was going to school learning English
because I didn't speak English. And during one year of
working in the necktime factory, I had learned English, and
I looked for another job and found a job in
(31:18):
a large insurance company and worked there for a couple
of years, went further to school, and then I was drafted,
and when I came back from the Army, I went
back to that job. And then I realized that working
for an insurance company you were an employee. I wanted
(31:41):
to be independent. So I worked for a small insurance
company for a while, insurance agency rather where insurance was
being sold, and I sold insurance and I was able
to keep my own business. And a few years later
I left there with my own accounts and started to
(32:03):
versified the insurance with two people, and today we have
closed to I don't think it's ninety or one hundred people.
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
It's amazing.
Speaker 3 (32:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
I got to ask you, when you went to school
here and you were learning English, did you experience any
anti Semitism in your educational experience here?
Speaker 3 (32:23):
No? None, at all, none at all. I tell you
the only time I ever experienced it when I worked
for the insurance company. The guy who was running the
office asked me to take his car I didn't have
a car, and drive around to Chesapeake Bay, around Baltimore
(32:44):
in that area and find a place where we could
have a company business. So I did so. I went
to all these nice beaches along the ocean along the
Chesapeake Bay, and I found out that everywhere away they
had signs no Blacks and Jews allowed. And that was
(33:04):
the only.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Time, the only time you saw it in all.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
My years until recently, that I had felt any other.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
And you said, and you said the proper words. Recently,
you're ninety two years old, You've been through this entire experience.
You know anti Semitism more than anybody because you lived
through the Holocaust and survived it. How do you feel then,
when you see Harvard and Columbia and some of these
places where you've got protests where there's a severe antisemitic
component to it, where people are sympathizing with those who
(33:36):
want to see Jews in Israel wiped off the map,
just as Hitler did.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Horrible, horrible, I never never, expected anything like this, never,
especially not Harvard at schools of that sort. It was
absolutely terrible. And well, there asn't much I personally could do.
But I wrote a book that my daughter, Data asked
(34:04):
me to write about the family and my life, about
my life starting with Austria and ending up today.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Right right the book.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
Many people had asked me to write a book, but
I always said, well, there were thousands of millions of
other people who had the same type of problem in
Germany at that time and ended up pretty much the
way I did, hopefully, And there i'm people who can
(34:40):
write much better than I can. I'm not a guider.
But Data wouldn't let up, and she said that you've
got to write that book. You got to die, and
you've got to do it. And if there is anyone
that I can listen to and not say no to,
is my daughter did.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
So Yeah, well, I'm glad you wrote the book because
it's important to hear stories like this. And so when
you look at Harvard and I read you know, you
applauded the fact that they adopted stronger language.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
But I guess my question to you, Jack, is is
that enough?
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Because I feel like you know adopting stronger language, that's great.
But when you see the fact that some of our
higher institutions of learning still permit this kind of hatred
and would prevent Jewish students from even going to class
and create this climate of fear, do you think it's enough?
Speaker 2 (35:27):
It should Harvard be doing more.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Well. I think Harvard just came out with a special
report that I haven't read, but it's pages pages long.
And I think that's due to our present government, that
they've our present president that they were behind this and
(35:54):
asked the universities in Harvard to make these statements and
changed their mind and protect the people who go to
school there and not be antisemitic all the time. And
this is what happened. How is finally going to end up?
I don't know, but I tell you one thing, I'm
(36:15):
worried about it because what's happening here right now is
what happened in Germany in a different form, in a
different way, you know. But it also started like this.
There was no Hitler and there was no Second World
War at that time. You know. It all started with
(36:37):
something like what this is here? What's going on here?
And it finally became the Hitler regime and the Second
World War, and.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
I don't know, you hit the nail on the head.
You're exactly right.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
It didn't even take Hitler yet to have what happened
in Germany happened here.
Speaker 2 (36:58):
And that's what we're saying. I think that's the part.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
That's got to be rooted out so quickly, because it's
dangerous for you to see that happening here because you
know exactly what happened over there. Well, Jack, I got
to ask you, also in a hopeful way, about this
amazing piece of art that belonged to your family that
the Nazis stole from you, called the hell Erosen and
how you got it back, which is pretty similar to
the plot of the movie Woman and Gold. Tell me
(37:21):
about this piece of art and how you got it back.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
Yeah. You know, my two uncles and my grandfather they
were in business together and they made a lot of money,
and they had several department stores and they bought art,
and my grandfather bought three paintings by Lover's cointh and
(37:44):
these were very valuable paintings. And after the war was over,
you know, we looked for all these various things that
were taken away from my family, and it was very,
very difficult, but we found in one museum in Germany
(38:07):
called brown Schweite Germany. In the museum was one of
the lovers corinth paintings that belonged to us. How it
got that there, we don't know. And we told them
that this was our painting and to give it back
to us. Simply went to the all kinds of trouble
(38:28):
for a couple of years and to the German government
and everything else, that this was our painting and we
wanted to painting back, and they didn't give it back
to us. So I think he's a well, he's a cousin,
(38:50):
I guess, yeah, who went with his He was a
young cousin who a young man who was married and
had two children, and he was the son of one
of my two uncles that I mentioned, idol uncle, and
he decided to go to Palestine during the war and
he did and he was successful. So he also heard
(39:13):
about this painting and our trials to get it back
and we couldn't get it back, so they wrote he
wrote an article to one of the famous American magazines
like Life or Time or whichever Wall Street journal. I
(39:35):
don't really know which one and wrote an article in
there to explain what happened to us and what happened
to the Germans, how they got all the stuff that
we owned, and how now we found this painting in
(39:55):
a German musell yeah, museum, and and that we wanted
it back and we couldn't get it back. After that
article ran, and I guess millions of Germans and government
people had this article. I guess Germany was pretty much
(40:16):
a shame as to what they did by turning this
down because knowing that it was ours, so we had
total proof that it was our painting. And then eventually
they said, okay, you can have you can have the painting.
They didn't have the money, so they went to Volkswagen,
(40:36):
who was the biggest employer in brown Schwike. I don't
know that thousands of employees there, and got the money
together and we bought, uh, we bought the painting. We
could have got it back, but we parted from them
and it's still they gave it to you guys with
(40:59):
the money. Yeah, and the painting is still in the
museum today. It's still there. But we got the money
for it. And at that time, and I made a
copy of close off the painting and have it hanging
in my house.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
Well, that's an incredible story. I wish they had given
it back to you rather than you having to purchase it.
Seems like you went to a lot of trouble to
get it, But just that speaks to a lot of
the theft that the Nazis perpetrated at the time. Well, Jack,
just to kind of close out our time here because
I've enjoyed it so much. Your story, is I mentioned
in the top of the show, is one of tremendous adversity,
(41:36):
but also survival and perseverance and coming into an American dream.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
So to those who have who have had to.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Overcome great obstacles and need to find the sustenance to
dream big and persevere. What is your message to people
out there?
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Don't become anti Semitism of what have the Jews done?
Explained it to me. What have they What have they
ever done that's bad? Have they ever started a war?
Have they ever done what m asked it? That type
of thing? And if they want to wound their own
country and their own reputation here in this country, then
(42:17):
that's a very very sad thing for the entire world.
Because it not only would be here, it would be
properly in other countries too then, and you know that's
this anti Semitism is all over the world right now,
in many countries. So they they should they should remember
what happened during the Third World War and with Ada
(42:40):
Hitdler in Germany, and they should remember that and know
what happened there and how many people were killed. You know,
it was just just impossible to believe that that could happen,
that human beings could do what they did. I mean
they built Cam's death cams. Auschwitz was a death camp.
(43:04):
Did the whole camp was built. How can we kill
as many people as possible? And that's what they did.
Speaker 4 (43:11):
You know, The trains with people came in every day
and the people were killed in gas chambers and as
you know, burnd in ovens and just terrible.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
And we don't want this to happen here, do no.
Speaker 1 (43:26):
We have to remember our history or it will repeat itself.
I think that's what I think, that's what we take
away from this. So Jack Warfle, thank you so very
much for spending your time with me today and telling
me the story of your childhood and your adulthood and
the history of the incredible legacy that you are are
creating as a ninety two year old man. And also
this book, My Two Lives, which I hope people will
go get and read because we just basically summarized it today,
(43:49):
but I know there's some incredible other stories in there,
including how you got this piece of artwork back, which
I think is remarkable too.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
So thank you, sir. I appreciate your time, and God
bless you. I appreciate your time.
Speaker 3 (44:00):
Thank you, Thank you very much. I enjoyed being with you,
and it's important and I can get my word out
and that people hear it.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
Absolutely, that's what that's what the purpose this is for.
So those of you that are listening on iHeart podcast,
make sure you listen to Jack's story, read his book,
and I think, just as importantly get his message out there, because,
as he said so succinctly, if we don't remember the
terrible historic period of World War two and what happened,
it is bound to repeat itself. And unfortunately, we're seeing
(44:29):
semblances of that in America in this country right now,
which is the most unfortunate part of it.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
So Jack, thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (44:36):
Yeah, aren't the sad thing is that most people don't
even know about it. You know, younger people don't even
know what happened during those period of times in what
happened exactly right, you're exactly why does schools here in
this country don't teach that more that people know it,
but they don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
It, right, And that's and you bring up a great point
just to close this out, is with Harvard's supposed to
be some of our greatest minds, how in the world
could they permit anti semitism when every student there should
know what the history of this country is and what
we had to fight against and the freedom that was
(45:17):
created from it. So you would think that at one
of our better institutions of learning that that would not
be the case, But unfortunately, it seems like a lot
of people have forgotten that history.
Speaker 3 (45:26):
Jock, exactly.
Speaker 1 (45:28):
Well, thank you, Jack, appreciate you, thank you, Bo, thank you,
thank you.
Well, welcome to The Bow Show Podcast, Episode three. Thank
you so much for listening, and for those of you
that can see this visually, thank you for watching. Today's
show is all about survival, resilience, and the pursuit of
success in spite of adversity. Most of us here in
America have no idea what it's like to survive literal persecution,
(00:23):
because here in America we're very blessed to live in
peace that we're not persecuted for our ethnicity, or our
skin color, or our religion. But many people unfortunately did
not have that luxury. Anti Semitism is still very much
a real issue, and sadly it's happening at our elite
universities where we're supposed to be educating the.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Best of the best. It's sad that it's happening there.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
And I want to salute those who survived the Holocaust
today because they're reminders of humanity, but they're also a
reminder of what hatred can do and it's left unfettered.
There's about two hundred and forty five thousand remaining Holocaust
survivors in the world, and about sixty thousand of those
(01:09):
are still in the United States. And we have one
of them on the show today. The days of remembrance
of victims of the Holocaust were from April twentieth through
the twenty seventh, so we're just coming off of that.
In April twenty fourth was Yam HaShoah, which is the
Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Day, which happens in Israel.
But we've got to focus on colleges as hot beds
(01:31):
of anti Semitism. It's become an unexpected place where we're
seeing this type of persecution and students not allowing other
students to go to class, people being sympathetic towards little terrorists,
people who want to see Israel completely wiped off the map.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Harvard agreed to adopt.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
Stricter language to crack down on anti Jewish and anti
Israel behavior on campus after Israelian Jewish students complained of
a hostile environment in the after math of the October seventh,
twenty twenty three Hamas terror attack on.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Israel and Israel's response.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Harvard also adopted a definition of anti Semitism by the
International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
But is that enough? That's the question? Are those just words?
Is it just semantics. Should they do more? I think
they should.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
President Donald Trump is claiming that he will remove Harvard's
tax exempt status. That's a big thing because there are
billions of dollars that are attached in tax dollars to
Harvard that he now can say, wait a minute until
you can prove to us that you're a safe college
for all students to be able to practice their religion
and go to class freely. I'm not so sure that
(02:42):
we should give you this tax money. And there's no
one better to ask about this than a man who
knows anti Semitism all too well by living through its
darkest time. His story is a remarkable one that I
think you're going to want to hear every single word
of and I can't wait to speak to him. Well.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
My guest is Jack Werfol.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Jack is ninety two years young, and at the outbreak
of World War Two, he was seven and his brother
was eight, and they had a Roman Catholic father and
a Jewish mother. They had to hide their Jewish roots
by joining Hitler's Youth to avoid going to concentration camps.
Their mother was seized and taken to Auschwitz, where she died.
Jack eventually came to America and pursued the American dream.
(03:22):
And today's show we'll focus on Jack's incredible story and
all of it is detailed in his autobiography My Two Lives. Well, Jack,
welcome to the Boushow I really appreciate you being with
me today.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Thank you, Thank you Well.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Jack.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I want to go back, first of all to your
earliest days, and I want you to tell me what
it was like growing up with a Catholic father and
a Jewish mother and describe your upbringing if you could.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
Yeah. I originally I remember back to six years old.
I was in Austria, living in Niovene Neo Vienna. My
father worked in Vienna for the President of Austria, and
(04:08):
I remember those days very well. For my parents. We
used to go for a nice walks on weekends and
I remember picking my father up from the train every
day he used to go. We lived in a little
place called Gutenstein, and there was a train going from
Vienna to Gutenstein, which he always saw, a very short train,
(04:32):
and we would always pick them up at the train
I remember that. And then they used to turn the train,
the locomotive around for the train to go back to Vienna.
So these are the kind of things I remember in
our walks up in the mountains, and I always remember
these you mongs being snails that were on the way everywhere.
(05:00):
And yeah, that's.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Enna is a lovely place. I love Austria.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
I had the opportunity to go over there and sing
for a wedding over there, and I just unfortunately my
time was so short. I wish I'd spent more time,
and I'd like to go back.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
So I.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
The picture you're describing is a lovely one, and I
feel like I know at least a glint of it.
But when you were seven years old, world War two
breaks out, and how did your family make the decision
for you and your brother to join Hitler's youth Describe that?
Speaker 3 (05:34):
Yeah, well, we you know, we we lived in Vienna,
and my father and my mother decided that especially my father,
because of being in the government, knew that Hitler was
going to come to Austria and take Austria over, so
he didn't want my brother and myself to be there,
(05:57):
so he sent us too of our play to Berlin,
where my grandparents lived, and we lived there and my
mother went to Prague at that time and lived there
for a year or two because she was Jewish and
(06:19):
she was afraid to go back to Berlin and wanted
to go back there.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
So you went to Berlin and your mom went to Prague,
and so your family obviously made the decision that you
had to basically hide this part of your heritage, your
Jewish heritage, from your mother. How hard was it to
hide that part of your lineage? And did you ever
think that you and your brother would.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Get caught and sent to a concentration camp.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
Yes, we thought about it many times, but we were very,
very careful. The one thing my parents did when they
took us to Berlin, they had us they took us
to a Catholic church and had us both baptized, so
at any time someone would ask us, well, what's your
religion or fill out paper, we could say that we
were Catholic. So that helped tremendously. And then my grandfather,
(07:10):
who had been in the First World War for Germany
in France, he was also stationed in a place where
he felt it would be safe possibly for the for
US boys to be rather than to be in Berlin.
So he sent us to this little place on the
(07:33):
North Sea called called Dungast and it's on the North
Sea and it was like a little camp for children,
primarily in the summer. And my grandfather sent us there,
and it was going to send us there for maybe
(07:54):
a few months, few weeks, few months, who knows, And
he paid the lady who who ran the place. And
this lady turned out to be just a wonderful woman.
Her name was Irma franzen heinri stav and she had
(08:16):
two children, a boy and a daughter, and they were
a few years older than we were, quite a bit older,
like five eight, ten years older than we were, and
they were in the Hitler Youth. Because this was a
German family, and the lady Irma we called her Tunda
(08:41):
and Irma she decided that we better use joined the
Hitler Youth because her children were in the Hitler Youth.
They had to be, and if we were going to
live with them, we should be in the Hitler youth
also because if not, people would come to them and say,
(09:02):
what are these kid kids doing here? Why aren't they
in the Hitler youth. I mean, every child had to
be in the Hitler youth. If you're not in the
Hitler youth, who are in a concentuation camp.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
You know, so, so did you as part of the
Hitler youth did you have to It sounds like you're
basically forced to kind of in a way and self preservation.
Did you have to adopt any sort of anti Jewish stance?
Was that required at the time? And it must have
been difficult having to hide that part of your heritage?
Did I mean, did they force you to take an
(09:32):
anti Jewish stance at that time?
Speaker 3 (09:35):
Well, they didn't know, you know, no wonder really know.
Tantema was the only one who knew. And we would
go to school in this little village on the North Sea,
and every morning when we went to school, we had
to sing anti Jewish songs. These things were all very
(10:01):
difficult for my brother and myself, but we kept saying
that this is what we're going to have to do
if we want to stay alive, and that's that's what
we did. And eventually it turned out that my teacher,
he taught us till one o'clock in the afternoon and
(10:23):
then he would get on his motorcycle, put on his
black uniform and go to meetings. And these were SS meetings.
He was an SS officer. My teacher and my teacher
happened to be a very very good friend of Tandauma,
the woman who ran the camp where we lived, and
(10:44):
both of them knew that we were Jewish. Even my teacher,
as an SS officer, knew that we were Jewish, so.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
And still protected. He protected and then kept let you
keep that secret.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Absolutely well, absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And your mother was in Prague. I know it had
been difficult to be separated for her from her. Tell
me about the day that the Nazis came to take
her away.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
Yeah, Well, when Hitler walked into Czechoslovakia and took over Czechoslovakia,
there were a lot of Jewish people there, and especially
in Prague. They were immediately being incarcerated and ten sent
to various concentration camps. And my mother somehow got on
(11:31):
a train. It was supposed to be a cold train.
As I understand, we were too small to remember all
of this so to know this well to see it.
But she was on a cold train and came back
to her parents in Berlin. And while she was in
Berlin we went. We left our camp on the North
(11:55):
Sea for a little while and joined our mother, who
had an apartment in to live with her for a
little while as long as we could, and I started
school there and so that my brother. And one day
my mother said, well, I got a little job for you.
(12:19):
I have a letter here in an envelope, and I
would like you to take the subway. And we lived
right around the corner from the subway, and go to
a certain station, change trains, go to another train, and
when you arrive at a certain station again, you go
(12:40):
up the steps and there will be a gentleman and
you give him a code word. And she told us
the code word, and the gentleman will answer and will
give you and you give him the envelope, and he
will give you an envelope for me. So all of
this was done. We were coming back to our home,
(13:02):
to our and this was in Berlin, in the mining castraset.
And as we came to the corner to come around
to go to the mining costratt where we could see
my mother's place. She lived in a large apartment building
(13:23):
at that time. And we saw that building and we
saw that there were a number of SS and Gestapo
cars parked in front of her building, and we thought,
oh my god, we better wait here and see what
this is all about. We were smart enough to do
that in retrospect, you know. And we waited there on
(13:44):
the corner and just watched, and we figured out when
this is all over and the cars are leaving in
the SS and Guestapo, then we could ask our mother
of what was going on in that building. Well, to
our great surprise, all of a sudden, they brought out
my mother and it was her they evidently were coming
(14:05):
to get They put her in a car and left
with her and arrested her, and all the cars left.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Well, Jack, did you did you see her?
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Was there any eye contact between you and her, your
you and your brother and her that in the final
moments of this, is it my mom's going to be
taken away?
Speaker 3 (14:24):
No? Not at that point. No, we were too far away,
you know, half a block away. There was no eye contact.
They just took her away.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Was that the last day that you saw her?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
No. Let me tell you that my mother had given
us the name of an attorney that if anything ever
should happen to me, here is the name of a person.
You call him and he will try to help you
to take care of your if I'm not around. So
(14:57):
we stayed there and it took us three day as
my brother and myself to find out which prison my
mother was taken to and where she was. And Peter
and I as little kids, we went to that prison
and just walked to the prison and we started looking
for her, and we saw her down below in the park,
(15:21):
walking with other people in the prison, and it was
kind of a park down below and in the prison itself,
and we watched her from a hallway and then they
all disappeared and they all had to go back to
their cells, I guess, And we had no idea where
(15:44):
my mother was and what sell. So we walked through
the whole prison. There's little kids, and it were was
asked people there. No one paid any attention to us
because I guess we were so little, you know, so young.
And we finally found the cell and we found my mother,
and my mother was of course terribly surprised, and she said, boys,
(16:05):
she said, you have to leave, because if you don't
leave immediately, the same thing is going to happen to
you that's going to happen to me. So be good,
go to school, learn whatever you can in life, and
be good until I see you again someday hopefully, and leave.
(16:31):
And we left and as we got to the final
gate of the prison. Yeah, there was an SS or
Gestapo officer who who grabbed us and said, what the
heck are you kids doing here? And we wrestled ourselves
loose from this gentleman and started to running through the
bilin through the streets, and he followed us, but at
(16:53):
our age we were a little quicker than he was,
so we finally we finally lost him. Uh. After that,
my mother was taken from that prison to our shirts.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
And how did you learn it? From passing?
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Yes? And later on we found out through the SS
officer who was our teacher in done Gus, in that
little village where we were hiding in the North Sea,
we found out to him that my mother was killed
in our shirts. Now that see to me, that's sound
(17:34):
of all the people.
Speaker 2 (17:36):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
But I imagine for for for for young Jack and Petie.
I mean, this is this is a terrible chapter in
your lives because you lost your mother. I mean, this
is this is what Hitler did. And so I want
to know that that had to be devastating for you
any is, especially as we think about coming up on
Mother's Day on May eleventh, how difficult that had to
have been.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Did you did you ever.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
Think that there was a chance you might be reunited
with her or did you boys kind of understand there's
a good possibility I may not see her again.
Speaker 3 (18:06):
Yeah, we knew that there was a possibility because we
knew what Hitler was doing, and we were already informed
as to what happened to some of the people that
left to go east, that they weren't going east to work,
but rather going east to get.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
That care And Jack, where was your father and all this,
Is there anything he could do or did he just
kind of have to stand back and let it happen.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Well, my father who was working for the president of Austria,
they were good friends. They were both arrested when Hitler
came into Austria and they were taken to a German
concentration camp called They was right right north of Berlin,
(18:55):
and they stayed there for a long long time. And
my father was never released out of the concentration camps
until the war was over, and he was then released
by the American troops. But unfortunately he was so sick
(19:16):
and so undernourished that he died two months later and
we never saw him. We never even knew about it
at that time. I went later to Austria to get
all the details and find out what happened. And so
our mother, as I said it, was killed in Auschwitz,
and our father was in the concentration time the entire time. However,
(19:41):
my father escaped twice, and the first time he escaped
was before my mother was when she came back from Czechoslovakia,
before she was arrested by the Germans. She and my
father came to see us as youngist on the beach.
The last time really uh that we saw them together,
(20:06):
that we saw my father and my mother, and then
my father went back, oh, and then people and then
the little village where we lived on the North Sea,
they of course started saying, well, what is this man
doing here? Everybody else that's in the army, why is
(20:27):
he here with the children? You know. So my mother
and father over you know, disappeared overnight and we never
saw them. And again after that, and my father was arrested,
of course when he went back to Berlin, and there
was terribly penn punished by the by the Germans, by
(20:50):
the stuff by the leader of the concentration camp. And
later on after the war, when I went to the camp,
I found information about my father and what happened to
him and so on.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
So you lose, you lose your mother and your father,
which is undoubtedly devastating. And you find out that your
father escaped twice, but yet he was so malnourished after
the war's over in the in the liberation that he dies.
So now are your orphans at this point?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Tell me?
Speaker 1 (21:27):
You know, this is I'm sure where the resilience part
of the story comes in.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
How did you make it to America after the war.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Well, we were very lucky that in nineteen fifty we
got a call from the German army in southern Germany,
the occupation troops that they had found about my father
working for sure Shnaik, the president of Austria, and what
(21:57):
happened to my mother. And they said, a few boys,
I want to go to America. We're giving you the
opportunity through an organization that takes care of Catholic as
well as Jewish, Jewish and as well as Catholic children.
So of course we applied immediately, we said yes, and
(22:19):
that's how and they took us, put us on an airplane,
and a few weeks later and we ended up in
New York.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
What was the organization that that got you over?
Speaker 3 (22:31):
Do you recall, Yeah, the European Organization for Care of
organization for European Children.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Well, so you come to America, which is I'm sure
a dream for you, considering what you've been through. What
was the what was the reception like here in America
when you got here?
Speaker 2 (22:56):
What was that like?
Speaker 3 (22:58):
Wonderful? Wonderful in every way? You know, I was so happy.
I was the happiest man in the world that I
came to America. And I knew about the freedom and
the rules of the laws, a little bit about what
America was all about, and yeah, and that's where I
(23:19):
wanted to go. And here I was in New York
and I was very very happy.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Well, you talk about the fact that you took classes
in Baltimore to learn English, which you speak very well.
You became a citizen, and you served even in the
US Army, which I think is very noble. What made
you join our armed forces? Was it seeing what America
had done in World War Two and liberating.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
The free world? Is I mean? Is that what made
you want to join? What were the reasons you joined?
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Well, I know it wasn't voluntarily. I was in the
United States for three years by then and had learned
English and went to school and had job and all
of that. After I learned English, I had kept into
a job with an insurance company and UH. Then I
was drafted, and this was during the Korean War. I
(24:12):
had no choice. I was drafted to go to go
into the army. And I then when when I applied,
they said, would you like to go to Officers Candidate School?
And I said yes, I would, I would do that,
and then I was supposed to be assigned to that.
And then they came back and said, oh, we just
(24:35):
found out you're another citizen. No, you can't go to
Officers Candidate Candidate School, but you can go to UH
to career, you know, being the regular Army. So I
went to Camp Breckenridge, which is the first airborne division
to take basic training. Took the basic training, and just
(24:57):
plus we were finished and you were all leaving for Korea.
All of a sudden they called me and they said, hey,
we just found out from your Form twenty Form twenties
all your personal information. Did you speak German fluently? I
said yes, Well, the American Army in Germany needs desperately
(25:18):
interpreters who speak German, because at that time we were
training or already the German people again as a German army,
because the Russians were right there, you know, in Germany,
and so we wanted the German army. You know, we
had the American, the French, English, you know, we were
(25:40):
all there and they all had particular zones, and the
Russians had about half of Germany at that time. So
that's how I got into the.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
What a turn of events, Jack, You have Jewish heritage,
you have to hide it to become part of Hitler's youth.
Mother and your father die, so you know. But and
you there was obviously a chance you could even be
sent to a concentration camp as well. America and the
West they liberate, you know, the area, and then you
come to America only to be drafted in the army
(26:15):
and go back to Germany to be an interpreter for US.
I mean, that's about as incredible a cycle is one
can imagine.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yeah, I tell you another incredible story. When I was
ten years old, that's for silvi Uri the war. My
brother and I at night sometimes we would listen to
the British Broadcasting company to find out what the news
really was, because the Germans wouldn't tell us the German news.
So one day, oh my god, we were so happy
(26:44):
we heard that D Day happened, that the American and
the French and other forces were landing in Normandy. And
we said, oh my god, if that happens, you know,
and they're successful, then it's the end of this Hitler's
regime and all of that. So we were extremely happy
(27:08):
that we heard about D Day, and we kind of
celebrated D Day in our own way. And I was
ten years old. Then now we go back to where
I'm in the army in Germany, okay, And in the
army one day I was called by the company commander
and he said, you know, I've been watching you and
(27:30):
you have a very straight walk, and you walk well
and do things well. I would like to ask you
if you would volunteer to be in the Color God
for the first Infantry Division in which I had been
assigned to in Germany. And I said, yeah, it would
(27:51):
be my honor. So now I was in the Color
God and every time there was a major parade, I
had to of course be in the Color Guard. And
one day they called me in and they said, you're
going to Friends. I said, why am I going to France?
He said, you're going to Normandy. There is a ten
(28:13):
year anniversary of D Day, and we want you, with
your Color God to go to Normandy and celebrate, help
celebrate as a color guard.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
How did that make you feel, to be holding up
the American flag and knowing back when you were ten
years old that you were listening to the very broadcast
where D Day was announced.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
I can't tell you how proud I was, how happy
I was. It was one of the most amazing things
that all of a sudden, here I could carry the
American flag, protect the American flag and go to Normandy.
And we went. We had to do things like at
five o'clock in the morning. One morning they woke us
(28:59):
up and they said, Color God has to be down
at the beach. Why because there is the grave for
General Roosevelt, who was a son of President Roosevelt, who
was killed during the Normandy invasion, and he was buried
there and we want you there and Brugler, And at
(29:23):
five o'clock in the morning we were down in the
British Channel where he was buried and held up the
flag and the burglar played and the sun was rising over.
I mean, I can't tell you how proud of I was,
how proud I was, little guy from Austria, and what
(29:46):
I went through and what happened to my entire family
was not just my father, mother, but I lost my
entire family gen parents, uncles, ants, everybody except one person
who into Palestine during the war and he lived. He's
the only one of my family. Well, so yeah, I
(30:08):
mean Normandy was fantastic to me, and I still celebrate
Normandy every year now, you know.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
I think we recently had the eighties anniversary or something,
and my daughter and her husband put the Normandy flag
out in front of my house. And I can't tell
you how proud I was.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
You know, it seems only fitting that you would be
the one carrying the flag for this event, and I
can understand why it would be, why it would fill
you with pride. I think it makes absolute sense. You
mentioned when you came over to America that you started
an insurance company, Diversified Insurance Industries, which is a big,
big company. How did you do that, because that's another
chapter of your life that even extends this idea of
(30:54):
the American dream.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
Yeah. First, when I learned English, I worked in a
necktime factory while I was going to school learning English
because I didn't speak English. And during one year of
working in the necktime factory, I had learned English, and
I looked for another job and found a job in
(31:18):
a large insurance company and worked there for a couple
of years, went further to school, and then I was drafted,
and when I came back from the Army, I went
back to that job. And then I realized that working
for an insurance company you were an employee. I wanted
(31:41):
to be independent. So I worked for a small insurance
company for a while, insurance agency rather where insurance was
being sold, and I sold insurance and I was able
to keep my own business. And a few years later
I left there with my own accounts and started to
(32:03):
versified the insurance with two people, and today we have
closed to I don't think it's ninety or one hundred people.
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
It's amazing.
Speaker 3 (32:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
I got to ask you, when you went to school
here and you were learning English, did you experience any
anti Semitism in your educational experience here?
Speaker 3 (32:23):
No? None, at all, none at all. I tell you
the only time I ever experienced it when I worked
for the insurance company. The guy who was running the
office asked me to take his car I didn't have
a car, and drive around to Chesapeake Bay, around Baltimore
(32:44):
in that area and find a place where we could
have a company business. So I did so. I went
to all these nice beaches along the ocean along the
Chesapeake Bay, and I found out that everywhere away they
had signs no Blacks and Jews allowed. And that was
(33:04):
the only.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Time, the only time you saw it in all.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
My years until recently, that I had felt any other.
Speaker 1 (33:13):
And you said, and you said the proper words. Recently,
you're ninety two years old, You've been through this entire experience.
You know anti Semitism more than anybody because you lived
through the Holocaust and survived it. How do you feel then,
when you see Harvard and Columbia and some of these
places where you've got protests where there's a severe antisemitic
component to it, where people are sympathizing with those who
(33:36):
want to see Jews in Israel wiped off the map,
just as Hitler did.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Horrible, horrible, I never never, expected anything like this, never,
especially not Harvard at schools of that sort. It was
absolutely terrible. And well, there asn't much I personally could do.
But I wrote a book that my daughter, Data asked
(34:04):
me to write about the family and my life, about
my life starting with Austria and ending up today.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Right right the book.
Speaker 3 (34:18):
Many people had asked me to write a book, but
I always said, well, there were thousands of millions of
other people who had the same type of problem in
Germany at that time and ended up pretty much the
way I did, hopefully, And there i'm people who can
(34:40):
write much better than I can. I'm not a guider.
But Data wouldn't let up, and she said that you've
got to write that book. You got to die, and
you've got to do it. And if there is anyone
that I can listen to and not say no to,
is my daughter did.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
So Yeah, well, I'm glad you wrote the book because
it's important to hear stories like this. And so when
you look at Harvard and I read you know, you
applauded the fact that they adopted stronger language.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
But I guess my question to you, Jack, is is
that enough?
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Because I feel like you know adopting stronger language, that's great.
But when you see the fact that some of our
higher institutions of learning still permit this kind of hatred
and would prevent Jewish students from even going to class
and create this climate of fear, do you think it's enough?
Speaker 2 (35:27):
It should Harvard be doing more.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Well. I think Harvard just came out with a special
report that I haven't read, but it's pages pages long.
And I think that's due to our present government, that
they've our present president that they were behind this and
(35:54):
asked the universities in Harvard to make these statements and
changed their mind and protect the people who go to
school there and not be antisemitic all the time. And
this is what happened. How is finally going to end up?
I don't know, but I tell you one thing, I'm
(36:15):
worried about it because what's happening here right now is
what happened in Germany in a different form, in a
different way, you know. But it also started like this.
There was no Hitler and there was no Second World
War at that time. You know. It all started with
(36:37):
something like what this is here? What's going on here?
And it finally became the Hitler regime and the Second
World War, and.
Speaker 2 (36:49):
I don't know, you hit the nail on the head.
You're exactly right.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
It didn't even take Hitler yet to have what happened
in Germany happened here.
Speaker 2 (36:58):
And that's what we're saying. I think that's the part.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
That's got to be rooted out so quickly, because it's
dangerous for you to see that happening here because you
know exactly what happened over there. Well, Jack, I got
to ask you, also in a hopeful way, about this
amazing piece of art that belonged to your family that
the Nazis stole from you, called the hell Erosen and
how you got it back, which is pretty similar to
the plot of the movie Woman and Gold. Tell me
(37:21):
about this piece of art and how you got it back.
Speaker 3 (37:24):
Yeah. You know, my two uncles and my grandfather they
were in business together and they made a lot of money,
and they had several department stores and they bought art,
and my grandfather bought three paintings by Lover's cointh and
(37:44):
these were very valuable paintings. And after the war was over,
you know, we looked for all these various things that
were taken away from my family, and it was very,
very difficult, but we found in one museum in Germany
(38:07):
called brown Schweite Germany. In the museum was one of
the lovers corinth paintings that belonged to us. How it
got that there, we don't know. And we told them
that this was our painting and to give it back
to us. Simply went to the all kinds of trouble
(38:28):
for a couple of years and to the German government
and everything else, that this was our painting and we
wanted to painting back, and they didn't give it back
to us. So I think he's a well, he's a cousin,
(38:50):
I guess, yeah, who went with his He was a
young cousin who a young man who was married and
had two children, and he was the son of one
of my two uncles that I mentioned, idol uncle, and
he decided to go to Palestine during the war and
he did and he was successful. So he also heard
(39:13):
about this painting and our trials to get it back
and we couldn't get it back, so they wrote he
wrote an article to one of the famous American magazines
like Life or Time or whichever Wall Street journal. I
(39:35):
don't really know which one and wrote an article in
there to explain what happened to us and what happened
to the Germans, how they got all the stuff that
we owned, and how now we found this painting in
(39:55):
a German musell yeah, museum, and and that we wanted
it back and we couldn't get it back. After that
article ran, and I guess millions of Germans and government
people had this article. I guess Germany was pretty much
(40:16):
a shame as to what they did by turning this
down because knowing that it was ours, so we had
total proof that it was our painting. And then eventually
they said, okay, you can have you can have the painting.
They didn't have the money, so they went to Volkswagen,
(40:36):
who was the biggest employer in brown Schwike. I don't
know that thousands of employees there, and got the money
together and we bought, uh, we bought the painting. We
could have got it back, but we parted from them
and it's still they gave it to you guys with
(40:59):
the money. Yeah, and the painting is still in the
museum today. It's still there. But we got the money
for it. And at that time, and I made a
copy of close off the painting and have it hanging
in my house.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
Well, that's an incredible story. I wish they had given
it back to you rather than you having to purchase it.
Seems like you went to a lot of trouble to
get it, But just that speaks to a lot of
the theft that the Nazis perpetrated at the time. Well, Jack,
just to kind of close out our time here because
I've enjoyed it so much. Your story, is I mentioned
in the top of the show, is one of tremendous adversity,
(41:36):
but also survival and perseverance and coming into an American dream.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
So to those who have who have had to.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
Overcome great obstacles and need to find the sustenance to
dream big and persevere. What is your message to people
out there?
Speaker 3 (41:55):
Don't become anti Semitism of what have the Jews done?
Explained it to me. What have they What have they
ever done that's bad? Have they ever started a war?
Have they ever done what m asked it? That type
of thing? And if they want to wound their own
country and their own reputation here in this country, then
(42:17):
that's a very very sad thing for the entire world.
Because it not only would be here, it would be
properly in other countries too then, and you know that's
this anti Semitism is all over the world right now,
in many countries. So they they should they should remember
what happened during the Third World War and with Ada
(42:40):
Hitdler in Germany, and they should remember that and know
what happened there and how many people were killed. You know,
it was just just impossible to believe that that could happen,
that human beings could do what they did. I mean
they built Cam's death cams. Auschwitz was a death camp.
(43:04):
Did the whole camp was built. How can we kill
as many people as possible? And that's what they did.
Speaker 4 (43:11):
You know, The trains with people came in every day
and the people were killed in gas chambers and as
you know, burnd in ovens and just terrible.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
And we don't want this to happen here, do no.
Speaker 1 (43:26):
We have to remember our history or it will repeat itself.
I think that's what I think, that's what we take
away from this. So Jack Warfle, thank you so very
much for spending your time with me today and telling
me the story of your childhood and your adulthood and
the history of the incredible legacy that you are are
creating as a ninety two year old man. And also
this book, My Two Lives, which I hope people will
go get and read because we just basically summarized it today,
(43:49):
but I know there's some incredible other stories in there,
including how you got this piece of artwork back, which
I think is remarkable too.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
So thank you, sir. I appreciate your time, and God
bless you. I appreciate your time.
Speaker 3 (44:00):
Thank you, Thank you very much. I enjoyed being with you,
and it's important and I can get my word out
and that people hear it.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
Absolutely, that's what that's what the purpose this is for.
So those of you that are listening on iHeart podcast,
make sure you listen to Jack's story, read his book,
and I think, just as importantly get his message out there, because,
as he said so succinctly, if we don't remember the
terrible historic period of World War two and what happened,
it is bound to repeat itself. And unfortunately, we're seeing
(44:29):
semblances of that in America in this country right now,
which is the most unfortunate part of it.
Speaker 2 (44:34):
So Jack, thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (44:36):
Yeah, aren't the sad thing is that most people don't
even know about it. You know, younger people don't even
know what happened during those period of times in what
happened exactly right, you're exactly why does schools here in
this country don't teach that more that people know it,
but they don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:56):
It, right, And that's and you bring up a great point
just to close this out, is with Harvard's supposed to
be some of our greatest minds, how in the world
could they permit anti semitism when every student there should
know what the history of this country is and what
we had to fight against and the freedom that was
(45:17):
created from it. So you would think that at one
of our better institutions of learning that that would not
be the case, But unfortunately, it seems like a lot
of people have forgotten that history.
Speaker 3 (45:26):
Jock, exactly.
Speaker 1 (45:28):
Well, thank you, Jack, appreciate you, thank you, Bo, thank you,
thank you.
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