Baranovichi
(Baranavichy, Belarus)

53°08' / 26°02'

Excerpts from My Memoirs

by: Rubin Kaplan

Acknowledgments

Project Coordinator

This is excerpts from the unpublished memoirs: My Memoirs from Palonkeh and Baranovichi, Belarus, 1904 to 1922
by Rubin Kaplan; written in English. This material originally appeared in the Belarus SIG Newsletter
Issue No. 3 (May 1999).

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In 1979, I was sitting in the Tel Aviv kitchen of my grandfather, Rubin Kaplan (b. 1904, d: 1990) with him, asking a lot of questions about his life. Although I had heard many of his stories, I was looking for a more complete picture. As we sat and talked I realized that I wanted to preserve his memories for my (then) future children. So I asked him to write his memoirs. He consented.

He worked for many months and finally stopped when he got to the 1940's. I was stunned by what he had written. Not only did he write down his memories, to me he captured an entire way of life which no longer exists. Although he wrote this for his family, I don't think he would mind us sharing it.

What follows are excerpts from his memoirs that pertain to Palonkeh and Baranovichi, Belarus, from 1904 to 1922 - from his early youth to age eighteen.

Thanks go to several other people involved in putting my grandfather's memoirs in this form: his daughters Nira Yakir and Helen Bernstein, and my sister Karen Bernstein.

My Memoirs

From Palonkeh and Baranovichi, Belarus, 1904 to 1922

by Rubin Kaplan

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