This is a portrait of my father David Braginsky. The photo was taken in the 1930's, place unknown. My father was an engineer by profession. In 1937 he was as a master of a workshop of some factory in Podol. This factory put out plastic articles. I don't know what institute he had graduated from.
We knew little about the course of the war, and had no idea what the Germans did to the Jews. We received not a single letter from my father from the front. We learnt about his death somewhere in Austria only after the war.
My mother graduated from the Knekker college after the revolution. I don't remember where she worked prior to the war. My mother was a real lady, while my father was a very elegant man. They were a beautiful couple. At home we spoke Russian; mother and father would start speaking Yiddish only when my sister and I weren't to know what they were talking about. Neither my sister nor I wanted to learn Yiddish - at the time it was out of fashion.
David Braginsky
The Centropa Collection at USHMM
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