Tag #151790 - Interview #84041 (Yacob Hollander)

I finished school in 1942. My father decided that I had to learn a profession and I became a shoemaker’s apprentice. My training lasted 3 years. In my first year I made wooden nails for fixing shoes, washed the shoes to be repaired and helped the shoemaker’s wife about the house. She told me to fetch water, cut wood and start the stove. I also had to look after the baby. I helped her to do washing and sweep the floors. My father didn’t pay for my training. I had meals with my master, and came home in the evening. In my 2nd year I began to learn the shoemaker’s business. However, my mother kept insisting that my father took me back home and he gave up finally. He decided that I had to go to yeshivah, a higher Talmudic school. Yeshivas trained rabbis and melameds for cheder schools. There was no yeshivah in the village and I entered one in Munkacs. I lived in a hostel sharing a room with 3 guys. We had free clothing and meals. We studied all day long and did homework in the evening.