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Evel and Hanna Leibovich, my grandfather and grandmother on my father’s side (I have no information about my grandmother’s maiden name), lived in Kuznechnaya (Gorkogo) street in Kiev. My grandfather Evel was born some time in 1885. He was an intelligent man. I don’t know exactly what kind of education he got, but during the Soviet time he worked as an accountant at a brick factory. I don’t know what he was doing before the Revolution.
My grandmother Hanna, my father’s mother, was born in 1890. She didn’t work before the Revolution. In the early 1920s she also went to work at the factory. She worked at the turning machine. My father’s parents were religious. They went to synagogue and observed the traditional Jewish holidays at home. Nonetheless, they didn’t follow Kashrut and worked on Saturday, as it was a workday at the factory. Besides, it wasn’t possible for Jewish people to be openly religious in Kiev in the early 1930s. That was why my father, along with his brothers and sisters, was not a religious person. My father was raised in a very intelligent Jewish family. He had two brothers and a sister. His older brother Leonid was born in 1907, his sister Rachel in 1917, and his younger brother Iosif in 1919. Neither my father, nor his brothers and sister got any Jewish education, and they did not know and did not keep Jewish traditions; in their youth this was not fashionable and it was even discriminated against by the authorities. But they always read a lot and learned a lot from people.
Leonid worked at a factory after finishing school. Later he studied at an institute and became an engineer. Iosif was a worker, and Rachel married Isaak Wainer and didn’t work after her wedding. All my father’s relatives were evacuated during the war and returned to Kiev after it ended. Rachel died in 1972, and Iosif in 1975. Leonid died in Kiev in 1977.
My grandmother Hanna, my father’s mother, was born in 1890. She didn’t work before the Revolution. In the early 1920s she also went to work at the factory. She worked at the turning machine. My father’s parents were religious. They went to synagogue and observed the traditional Jewish holidays at home. Nonetheless, they didn’t follow Kashrut and worked on Saturday, as it was a workday at the factory. Besides, it wasn’t possible for Jewish people to be openly religious in Kiev in the early 1930s. That was why my father, along with his brothers and sisters, was not a religious person. My father was raised in a very intelligent Jewish family. He had two brothers and a sister. His older brother Leonid was born in 1907, his sister Rachel in 1917, and his younger brother Iosif in 1919. Neither my father, nor his brothers and sister got any Jewish education, and they did not know and did not keep Jewish traditions; in their youth this was not fashionable and it was even discriminated against by the authorities. But they always read a lot and learned a lot from people.
Leonid worked at a factory after finishing school. Later he studied at an institute and became an engineer. Iosif was a worker, and Rachel married Isaak Wainer and didn’t work after her wedding. All my father’s relatives were evacuated during the war and returned to Kiev after it ended. Rachel died in 1972, and Iosif in 1975. Leonid died in Kiev in 1977.
Location
Ukraine
Interview
Zinaida Leibovich