Pages 1-5

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Grisza (Gersz) Priszkulnik started this 80-page leather-bound scrapbook in Poland and finished it in France, where he was arrested by the Gestapo on Aug. 8, 1942, and where he returned three years later after surviving Auschwitz and Buchenwald.

Grisza was born in Rovno, Russia (soon it was Równe, Poland): Top left, 1 year old in 1915 with his mother, Sonia (Sura) Szojmer Priszkulnik; bottom right, 1938.

Rovno: Housekeeper Vera with baby Grisza

Równe: Younger brother, Jascha, skates with hockey stick on ice-covered pond; Jascha with cousin Chaim (Misha) Boyarsky; Grisza with Jascha; Grisza plays mandolin; father, Dovid Leyb Priszkulnik, reads a newspaper at home.

Równe, 1929: Grisza, 15, dressed as Charlie Chaplin for a Purim ball.

Równe: Grisza with Oświata School classmates: in chemistry lab; on Lag B'Omer and Purim in the Sosenki forest.

Nowostaw, 1929: The family vacationed in a rented house there in summers, surrounded by pine trees and with a river to swim. Grisza's father would join on weekends.

Równe, 1929: Top center, Grisza and three other boys wearing the special hat of the private, all-Jewish Oświata (Polish for Education) gimnazjum Polska-Żydowska from which he would graduate in 1932-33.

Nowostaw, 1929-30: Grisza and friends

Równe and Nowostaw: bottom left, 1938 photo of Jascha, father, stepmother; right, Wolf Boyarsky, Grisza's uncle. 

Równe: Cousin Aron Marchez and unknown others

Równe, 1930-31: Grisza the artist with palette and posters on Feb. 27, 1931; New Year's greeting, sixth grade; "Dawn," wall newspaper edited by Grisza, No. 6, Jan. 12, 1930; "Literary Department."

Równe: 1929, Grisza plays chess. 1934, Grisza in swimsuit rests arm on a girl's leg. Center right, Grisza has thumb on a girl's arm. Pink photo, cousin Aron Marchez. 

Warsaw, before-and-after images from a postwar French periodical: Top, Royal Castle, destroyed by Germans in September 1944; lower left, Napoleon Square; lower right, Brühl Palace, destroyed by Germans on Dec. 18, 1944.

Równe: Sonia (Sura) Szojmer Priszkulnik wearing fur, pregnant with Grisza, Dec. 20, 1913. Sonia with her younger sister, Fania. Sonia at front entrance to the house on Zdolbunow Street.

Równe: left, Sonia (Sura) Szojmer Priszkulnik, Grisza's mother; right, her sister, Fania Szojmer Boyarsky.

Równe, 1929, and Nowostaw, 1929-30: Grisza plays chess. Sonia (Sura) at bottom left. At bottom right in tiny photo is Sonia in Warsaw, where Grisza accompanied her to a doctor's visit. 

Równe: Sonia (Sura) at front entrance to the house on Zdolbunow Street (same photo on Page 14). In the empty space was a photo of Sonia, lying dead in her bedroom on Friday, Oct. 10, 1931. She died of an undiagnosed ailment at age 42. The photo is temporarily missing.

Nowostaw, 1930: Grisza with parents and brother

Warsaw: Grisza the engineering student

Warsaw, before-and-after images from a postwar French periodical: top, French embassy; bottom, St. Alexander's Church 

Wilno (Vilnius), 1935: Grisza the engineering student

Cousin Aron Marchez photo inscribed to Grisza from Równe on Jan. 31, 1937. Aron survived the war in Russia and reunited with Grisza in Moscow in 1984.

Wilno (Vilnius), 1935: Grisza the engineering student

Krzemieniec, 1934-35; Lwów, 1935-36; Krynica

University of Caen, 1935-36: Georges Priszkulnik studying at 14 Rue Frementel

Georges on a motorcycle

Le Havre, 1936

1936

Sept. 15, 1936: Suzanne

Caen, 1937

University of Caen, Technical Institute of Normandy, 1937: Grisza at far left. Diploma in electrical and mechanical engineering issued to "Gersz Priszkulnik," June 22, 1937. Same 21 men on Page 32.

University of Caen, Technical Institute of Normandy, 1937: Grisza at far left in front row. Diploma in electrical and mechanical engineering issued to "Gersz Priszkulnik," June 22, 1937. 

Deauville and Trouville, 1936-37

Caen, 1937: Grisza and a friend at monument to galloping 14th century knight Bertrand du Guesclin, dedicated 1922. Sculptor Arthur J. le Duc (1848-1918). Same photo on Page 32.

Równe, 1935, and Truskawiec, 1936:  Grisza's father, stepmother, and brother listen to a radio broadcast; Grisza smokes a pipe.

Grisza and friends pose at a tree. Location and date unknown.

Paris

Paris

Paris, 1937: Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne (International Exposition of Art and Technology in Modern Life)

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1938

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1937

Paris, 1937

Versailles, 1937

Versailles, 1937

Versailles, 1937

Versailles and Paris, 1937

Versailles, 1937

Równe, 1938-39: Grisza visits his family; Grisza plays the mandolin; his stepmother plays the piano; bottom center, cousin Aron Marchez.

Boston: Photos sent by relatives and positioned on page to replace Paris photos. Left, Uncle Philip Kramer and family; center and right, Aunt Jennie Kliger, her husband Philip Kliger, son Herbert Kliger. Philip Kramer and Jennie Kliger were siblings of Dovid Leyb Priszkulnik.

Równe, 1938-39

Równe, 1938-39

Krynica, 1938

Nowostaw, 1938

Krynica, 1938 (same photos on Page 57)

Malo-les-Bains (Dunkirk), 1939

Równe: Brothers Grisza and Jascha. Jascha and their father and stepmother were among 23,500 Jewish men, women and children murdered in the Sosenki forest by German death squads and Ukrainian collaborationists over three days in November 1941.

Lille, 1939-40

Lille, 1940: Georges Priszkulnik, engineer

Lille, 1940: Mme. Raymonde Demay

Brussels, 1940

Lille, 1940

Lille, 1940: Mme. Raymonde Demay

Lille, 1940: Georges Priszkulnik, engineer

Lille, 1940

Wilmington, Delaware, December 1982: Bill Frank column, Wilmington News-Journal, inserted out of chronological sequence

Seclin and Amiens, 1940

Ablain-Saint-Nazaire, 1940: Top and center, Notre-Dame de Lorette, French National War Cemetery. The gate reads 1914. The cemetery holds the remains of 40,000 French Army soldiers, more than 22,000 of whom are marked as unknown.

The origin of this photo of Grisza/Georges and the reason he placed it on this page are unclear.

Lille

Bersée

Lille: Mme. Raymonde Demay

Lille: Georges Priszkulnik

Lille: Mme. Raymonde Demay

Lille: Mme. Raymonde Demay

Paris: The last page is adorned with the advertising cards of four popular Parisian night spots.