New Pictures from the Horowitz Family Archive

Thanks to the kindness of the descendants of the Horowitz family, we are publishing new photos and a postcard from their family archive.

The history of the Horowitz family from Miętustwo and Czarny Dunajec is described here. Last year, Kirena Rympel, daughter of Eliasz and granddaughter of Józef and Kreisel Horowitz, died in Krakow. Thanks to the family's kindness, additional documents have been added to the Jewish Czarny Dunajec archive.

The house where the Horowitz family lived in Czarny Dunajec (Photo from the Horowitz family archives)

The first picture shows the house where the Horowitz family lived in Czarny Dunajec. They likely rented part or all of the building. Unfortunately, we have not been able to determine its exact location.

A postcard from 1916 sent from Czarny Dunajec to Jakub Horowitz (Photo from the Horowitz family archives)

The second picture is an incomplete postcard, likely sent by Eliasz Horowitz in 1916 to his brother Jakub. The postcard is written in German, with numerous spelling errors, but indicates a good command of the spoken language. If Eliasz is indeed the author of the text, he was 11 years old at the time, while Jakub was around 14-16. Family accounts indicate that Jakub left home early, still a teenager, to train for a profession. The postcard indicates that he was staying with a certain Samuel Felix in the village of Isep near Żywiec (today part of the city), where a small Jewish community lived (around 70 kilometers away from Czarny Dunajec).

The author of the postcard mentions that he was unable to surprise his brother by sending a photo of their father, but such a photo, likely of Józef Horowitz, has been preserved in the family archives. The father of the family served in the Austrian army during World War I and may have sent or brought such a photo to the family home in his military uniform in 1916.

The photo probably shows Józef Horowitz, who served in the Austrian army during World War I (Photo from the Horowitz family archives)

The text from the postcard, translated below, reads:

Dear and dearest brother, I am telling you that all is well with me. Thank God I'm healthy, I wish you the same, and I hope to hear the same from you. Dear brother, I've already written to you, but you haven't replied. So I tried to surprise you by sending a photo of our dearest father, but I failed. I ask you with all my heart to come for the holidays (the next part is illegible).

A card sent from Czarny Dunajec, March 29, 1916, addressed to Jakub Horowitz, who was then staying with Samuel Felix in Isep near Żywiec.

Jakub Horowitz with his wife and two children in Bochnia in 1938 (Photo from the Horowitz family archives)

The last photo shows Jakub Horowitz with his wife and two children in Bochnia in 1938, where part of the family had moved. He was around 36-38 years old at the time. We haven't been able to determine the names of his wife and two children. All four perished in the Holocaust.