The Folkman Family, USA

Alex Folkman was born Chaim Yitzhak Rothenberg on June 10, 1922, to a Hasidic family. They lived in Tylicz, southern Poland, a small town nestled at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains, near the Czechoslovakian border and not far from the resort town of Krynica, where the family enjoyed cultural activities and recreation. The area was known for its rich mineral baths with therapeutic properties.

For seventeen years, Chaim lived a happy and wholesome life with his three younger brothers and his parents and grandparents, who were leaders in the religious, economic, and local political arena. His father, a Bobover Hasid, owned a general store that also specialized in leather goods, and he held the position of Radny in town, equivalent to a modern-day councilman. Chaim Yitzhak learned much about agriculture and nature, local industries, and sports. From a very young age, he was mechanically inclined, inquisitive, and enterprising.

Many Jews at the time had two last names. In Chaim’s case, his grandparents were not married in civil court, so he assumed, the last name of his paternal grandmother, Folkman. In school, he was Folkman-Rothenberg. He attended heder and Polish public school until eighth grade and then was sent to a yeshiva outside of Tylicz until the war broke out in 1939. He had no further formal education after that.

Chaim’s first memories of war were the local Slovak insurgents—the henchmen of Hitler’s regime—entering Tylicz in September 1939. In the first week of the war, Chaim and his family escaped to a nearby town, returning one week later only to find homes and synagogues pillaged. Two weeks later, on Rosh Hashanah, around thirty German border patrol police entered the town and set up headquarters in the local school. They told the youth to pile all the Torah scrolls and books from the synagogue in the yard and to burn them. For years afterward, Chaim said he could still feel the smoke in his nostrils.

The oppression was cruel and relentless. One day, seventeen-year-old Chaim crossed paths with a German officer named Schmeiber, who threw Chaim up against a fence, pointing a gun to his head. Chaim heard the click of the pistol as the officer asked: “Sprichst du Deutsch? (Do you speak German?)” Chaim answered him in clear and proficient German, convincing the officer that he could be of help to him by shining his boots, and he also offered his mechanical skills. The officer agreed, and these tasks afforded Chaim some mobility in and out of town.

Life was treacherous, but the family was still intact and remained in their homes until the fall of 1940, at which point the Jews of Tylicz were ordered to leave and move to the more central town of Florynka in Poland. However, their time in Florynka was brief, and in the summer of 1941, they were sent to a ghetto in Nowy Sacz called Grybow. This was part of the Nazis’ plan to gather Jews more centrally for deportation.

In Grybow, Chaim Yitzhak’s brother Avraham Meir registered with the Judenrat (the Jewish Council in the ghetto) to obtain bread rations. However, by doing so, he was sent to a labor camp where conditions were unbearable. Chaim chose not to register for the half loaf of bread, and instead procured food for his family from local farms at night, by fishing, and other methods.

On Yom Kippur 1941, Avraham Meir escaped from the labor camp and returned home. Afraid of retribution by the Nazis, their parents made the heart-wrenching decision to send Chaim Yitzhak and Avraham Meir away. Their mother sent their two other brothers, Nosson Yehuda and Shimon Nehemia, out the back door and down the path to hand over a small bag to their two older brothers who were waiting in the bushes so as not to be seen leaving. In that bag was some underwear and their tefillin. That was the last time they saw their family.

They traveled on foot to the town of Bardejov, Slovakia. It took them about ten days as they hid during the day and walked through the night. The Jewish population in Slovakia at that time numbered over 85,000, while the city of Bardejov itself had a Jewish population of over 4,000. The Jews of Bardejov still lived in their own homes, caring for over 300 refugees who had escaped from Nazi-occupied Poland. Chaim Yitzhak and Avraham Meir were among these refugees who found shelter among the Jewish population.

Chaim started work as a cook in the Jewish community kitchen in Bardejov where he earned the title of the “cuchar.” This also provided him the opportunity to get more food for both himself and Avraham. However, that ended in the spring and summer of 1942, when mass deportations of Jews took place from Slovakia. In early April 1942, over 650 young Jews were captured and lined up for deportation from Bardejov to Auschwitz. Chaim managed to escape from this transport, but his brother was tragically deported and later murdered at Auschwitz.

The deportation of Jews from Bardejov continued until the end of 1942. Daily searches occurred for those who found refuge in hiding places. If discovered, they were sent to Sered and Nováky, new concentration camps established within Slovakia. In Bardejov, Chaim assumed the name Alex Folkman, hoping it would make him less conspicuous as a Jew.

In 1943, Alex and seven friends (Jozef Fröhlich, Fred Bodner, Baila Meisels, Otto Warman, Abraham Jakuvovicz, Jakob Birnbaum, and Henek Majerovič) tried to organize a resistance group to defend themselves from the local Hlinka Guard, who were still searching for those in hiding. Henry Majerovič obtained a small-caliber pistol with six bullets. It was the only weapon the group had to defend themselves.

One day, when Alex was out of town trying to recruit more Jews to join their cause, his friends met in their hiding place. Abraham grabbed the pistol, which accidentally misfired. As a result, Jakob Birnbaum received a surface wound to the stomach. He walked to the hospital and had the bullet removed. The hospital reported the incident to the police, and they arrested Abraham Jakuvovicz. The national newspaper Gardista carried a front-page article with the headline “Jews in Bardejov Have Guns.” This article not only scared them into hiding in separate locations but also exposed them as a partisan group within Bardejov.

Alex and his friends demonstrated guts and bravery in their efforts to avoid capture by the Hlinka Guard and those locals who would regularly go out to hunt for Jews, especially on Sundays after church. Alex moved from hiding place to hiding place, but once he and three friends were caught and thrown in jail. Still, they managed to pick the lock and escape.

Alex was fortunate to meet several righteous, non-Jewish individuals in Bardejov. In the early months of 1942, he met Federer (Feodor) Kostiszak, a native of the neighboring village of Muszynka in Poland and a fugitive from the Gestapo. Federer had known Alex’s parents in Tylicz and had shopped in their store. On routine visits to see his own family, Federer, who Alex called by the nickname “Fetchko,” visited Alex’s family in the Grybow ghetto. In the spring of 1942, he informed Alex of the terrible news that the ghetto had been liquidated. Alex’s parents and two younger brothers had perished during the liquidation.

In 1943, Alex met another righteous, non-Jewish man in Bardejov named Stefan Dzurus. Stefan was originally from Hertnik, where his family lived in a house on the edge of the forest in the Čergov mountain range, located in the central part of the Prešov region of Slovakia. Stefan simply had a desire to help.

He arranged for Alex to assume the name of his brother, Rudy Dzurus, who was still young and living with his parents. Using Rudy’s name, Stefan provided Alex with documents that allowed him to work at a shoe factory. His job was to travel to different towns, measuring policemen and guards’ shoe sizes for boots. This allowed Alex the mobility to canvas the area and make connections.

Stefan also introduced Alex and Federer to the local forest ranger who had felt threatened by escapees known to be in the forest and was therefore seeking protection. Alex and Federer offered that protection and formed a trust with the ranger, who showed them around the Čergov Forests. In doing so, they met three Russian POWs who had escaped from German prisons. One of them, Mishko Chalidov, was a captain in the Russian Air Force. They joined forces immediately and all moved into the ranger’s home, which became their partisan headquarters.

By day they went into the forest to build bunkers, and at night they returned to the safety of the ranger’s barn. They were all armed with rifles, shotguns, and sidearms owned by the ranger. Within a short time, they grew from just six men (Alex, Federer, Stefan, Mishko and the two other POWs) to a group of around thirty to forty men, some of whom were Jews who had come out of hiding. Always resourceful, Alex figured out a way to make bullets for their weapons by retrofitting pieces of metal rods into discarded training bullet shells that he had collected from a military base located in Bardejov, near the Polish border. Still, the group began to realize that to fight the enemy, they could not grow any larger without support from the major Allied powers.

The  Soviets had an existing partisan group consisting of several divisions that were fully armed. They were located in the Bryansk Forest and wetlands, an area that the Germans were unable to reach due to its terrain. The group was known as the Kovpak Partisan Group under the direction of Sydir Kovpak, the leader of the Soviet Partisans in Ukraine. After the Russian victory over Stalingrad, orders in the high command were to regroup the partisan divisions into battalions and dispatch them to the front lines. In early spring 1944, under the leadership of Colonel V.A. Karasev, one of the groups reached the forests of Čergov. Mishko Chalidov, who was a seasoned soldier, shared Alex’s history of bravery and loyalty with Karasev, and he and members of his group were provisionally absorbed into the battalion in the Čergov Forest. They still had to prove their worth.

Alex was initially assigned to an area that included Bardejov. He was escorted by armed soldiers each time he met with his contacts to obtain intelligence information, such as military movements and police activities. His main contact in Bardejov was Adam Bomba, a police officer in Bardejov and another righteous, non-Jewish man. Adam helped many Jews, and became a good friend to Alex. During one of his visits, Adam informed Alex that a trap was being set by the Hlinka Guard to capture Alex alive and deliver him to the Gestapo. When Alex reported this back to his commander, a decision was made to double their patrol and execute a preemptive strike against the Hlinka Guard.

However, when these plans were shared with Alex’s contacts in town, they felt the decision was too harsh for the city, which had not experienced that type of violence. After reporting back once again to his commander, the group agreed to change the order and instead decided to destroy an important bridge over the Topla River near a military base in Bardejov. This order was executed in early summer 1944.

By blowing up rail tracks and other operations, Alex’s group functioned effectively in hindering the delivery of supplies needed for Germans on the Eastern Front. In the winter of 1944–1945, the Russian army advanced to the Hron River in the forests of Slovakia and faced the Germans on the other side of the river. On the night of February 12, 1945, Alex’s group received orders to cross the Hron River and attack the Germans from the rear. His group was carrying out orders to bring over four Slovak ministers destined to take positions in an interim Democratic Czechoslovakian government. Forty men in his group were killed in this fateful gun battle. Among the fallen was his dear friend and mentor Federer Kostiszak, a loss that affected him greatly.

Alex’s partisan group was renamed the Nitranska Partisanska Brigade, which later joined the Russian army and became part of the military division called the Pierva Guardejska Wowzdúšno Izvunogrodzka Bukaresko Divisia. This division was recognized for their participation in liberating the capital city of Prague. During the last months of the war, Alex served as an interrogator and interpreter of German prisoners of war. Alex received honorary citizenship in Czechoslovakia for his heroic actions during World War II.

After his discharge from the Russian army in 1945, Alex continued to wear his uniform and have a side arm for about a year. He traveled around, trying to find survivors from his family and eventually located a second cousin, a little girl named Berta. Alex took advantage of the benefits awarded to him because of his service. He received a car and a driver as well as a document that gave him preferential treatment to move around. The postwar period was still dangerous, and the fascist presence in the recently reformed Czechoslovakia was still a threat. Once, Alex broke up a brawl where a young man was being assaulted by a group of fascist thugs in an alleyway in Bratislava. It wasn’t until much later that Alex discovered the identity of the individual he had helped: Moshe Chertok (Moshe Sharett) who later became the second prime minister of the State of Israel.

The time had come for Alex to look for ways to support himself financially. He tried different endeavors including gathering and selling materials that the Germans had left behind, such as typewriter ribbons and shoes. As the tides started to shift once again with the 1948 Czechoslovak coup d’état of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, he began to question whether it was safe to stay in Europe altogether and made plans to leave for the United States.

Remarkably, all the aforementioned trials, tribulations, losses, accomplishments, and acts of bravery transpired in Alex’s life by age 27. Alex lost his three brothers, parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins during the Holocaust. In November 1950, he left Europe for the United States aboard the USS General Blatchford, hoping to create a new life for himself.

Alex came to the United States with six dollars in his pocket. He found a room with some distant cousins in America, who fed and took care of him for a while. Alex eventually became an expert scrap dealer and started a recycled plastics manufacturing business. In the early days of his work, Alex met his wife Rebecca (Rickie) at a company where she was the secretary. With Rickie at his side every step of the way, Alex built a successful business that grew, diversified, and branched out to locations across the United States, including New York, New Jersey, South Carolina, and California.

Alex spoke eight languages: English, Yiddish, Polish, Russian, Slovak, Czech, Hungarian, and Hebrew. Together with his wife, he was very involved and committed to his local Jewish community, yeshivot, and institutions in both the United States and Israel. The establishment of the Jewish State of Israel along with its strong army gave Alex a feeling of redemption in his lifetime.

Rickie and Alex had three children, eleven grandchildren, and twenty-eight great-grandchildren, all of whom he was exceedingly proud. Three of his grandchildren became soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces. Alex passed away on April 27, 2023, at the age of 100, a week after Yom Hashoah and the day after Yom Ha’atzmaut. He is buried in Israel.