Josip’s father in front of his shop

Josip’s father in front of his shop

Photo of my father Abram Papo, Makarska 1935. He is standing in front of his shop in Makarska, with a friend Povic, who had a shop next to ours. 

My father was a merchant and my mother a housewife. We owned the shop which was registered in my mother's name because my father did a little of everything. He finished one year of Jewish school and then spent nine years in the Austrian army. He spoke German, Hungarian and Spanish and learned them all while he was in the army. The textiles sold in the shop were mainly supplied from Sarajevo, and my father also sold seasonal goods - souvenirs. Since the shop was not big enough, we moved to a bigger store in which they sold many souvenirs, especially in the summertime. They did not sell any kinds of ritual items in the store, only those things that were used by the people of Makarska and those from the surrounding villages. There were a lot of confections, pants, jackets and coats. My father brought the merchandise in trunks from Sarajevo. The store functioned until 1941 when we emptied it but even then a section continued to work. At the beginning of 1942, we received orders that I was to and over the store keys to the local municipality which would take over the store, since the confiscation of Jewish property had begun. The day before I had to turn them over, I opened the store and permitted the young people to take whatever they needed in order to empty the store, leaving only one piece of each item. Afterwards, I took the keys of the liquidated shop, the municipal authorities took them and sealed off the store. The shop was called a manufacturing merchandise. 

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