Brzeziny and Brzeziny Jews {cont.}

Every entrepreneur employed several masters. The work was done in the masters' workshops. A master worked for several magazine owners. The work was executed by the master and his family (wife and children) with the help of one or more journeymen, a female hand stitcher, and an apprentice. There were different grades of journeymen; they were paid by the week and had to complete a specified amount of work. Apprentices were hired for a specified time (from Pesach to Succos or from Succos to Pesach), for room and board and sometimes also given a minimum of pocket money. The apprenticeship lasted, before the war, from two to four years; after the war, from one to three years. After the war apprentices were already paid by the week.

The following table shows the large number of family members that the masters employed.^[17]

	Total	Working for the father	Working for strangers
Journeymen	352	241	111
Hand stitchers (female)	136	123	13
Apprentices	55	22	33
Totals	543	386	157

Before World War I, the owners were organized into an association under the name “Producers Association of Ready-Made Clothing;” there were ninety members. The war caused their flight to Russia together with the reserves of finished clothing. After the war the majority of those who were left alive came back and renewed their economic activity.

After the War

The situation changed with the rise of the Polish state. In Brzeziny in the beginning of 1919 the government ordered larger amounts of merchandise for the army. A distinguished Lodz manufacturer came to Brzeziny to see if the Brzeziny tailors would be able to fulfill the military's order. There were many obstacles to overcome. Among others there were simply no machines, since during wartime the tailors had sold the machines to alleviate hunger. Ten masters joined together with Mordechai Winter at the head. They decided to try to fulfill a three-month military contract. They barely found one hundred sewing machines in the town. They divided the tailors into groups of six. Each group received only two machines. Of the thirty-two groups, one part sewed pants, others, uniforms. Those that did not sew occupied themselves with other tasks. The army contract ended in October 1919. A group of disgruntled tailors left for Lodz.

A bit of revival came with the return of Sulkowicz, who before the war worked for Szotenberg and Zygmuntowicz and during the war became well-to-do. Sulkowicz, in partnership with two other tailors, established the first magazine. Right after that sprang up a second magazine. The two enterprises began giving out work to tailors, and others followed. In 1920 there were ties linking them to all of Poland, and in the forefront was Galicia, from which major merchants began to come, mainly from Lemberg [Lwow] and Krakow.

In 1921 a two-week-long strike broke out because of a rise in prices. Groups of up to three tailors began to buy a bolt of cloth and even half a bolt of cloth. They made garments and prepared them for the coming season. They advertised them well in the press. Within a short time merchants came from different towns to buy directly from the tailors. It may be that the tailors had as their goal to free themselves economically from the magazine owners and take their fate into their own hands, but at the end of 1921 a crisis in the tailoring trade broke out, and this compelled the economically weaker masters to surrender and again accept work from the magazine owners. A number of persistent master tailors held out, however, and became independent. Especially successful were those who received help from American relatives in higher-value foreign currency. Later they themselves parceled out home work to other tailors.

Sales Markets

Although the following table is incomplete, it certainly gives a good idea of the train shipments of Brzeziny work that traveled to Russian markets.

Dispatched from Station		Amount in Pood (40 Russian pounds)*
From:		1890	1891	1897	1899	1900	1901	1905	1909	1912
1)	Rogow to Russia	734	4,968	25,732	22,235	42,556	40,704	49,960	12,594	–
	Russia to**	–	–	–	1,926	3,080	3,379	1,774	–	–
	Baku	–	–	–	1,555	3,295	1,993	2,485	–	–
	Bakhmut	–	–	–	1,199	–	–	–	–	–
	Vladikavkaz	–	–	–	1,717	2,749	–	–	–	–
	Rostow	–	–	–	1,344	–	–	–	–	–
	Petersburg	–	–	–	1,752	–	–	–	–	–
	Lugansk	–	–	–	1,024	10,532	6,946	11,753	–	–
	Odessa	–	–	1105	–	–	–	1,096	–	–
	Kharkov	–	–	–	–	–	–	1,044	–	–
	Elizavetgrad [Kirovograd]	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–
2)	Koluszki	12	–	31	–	–	–	–	–	–
3)	Lodz Fabryczna	9,256	10,015	11,761	20,309	–	–	–	–	–
	through Koluszki	–	701	–	–	18,029	17,700	81,360	254,177	240,528
		–	–	–	–	30,352	64,321	–	60,170	61,888
4)	Czestochowa	115	781	2,428	–	1,331	1,531	–	193,977	177,993
5)	Ruda Guzowska	560	4,627	21,440	36,300	4,714	60	14,841	4,958	–
	Zyrardow	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	10,281	45,582
6)	Zawiercie	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	25,583

*	Relying on the Brzeziny method of calculating that eight suits of clothing weigh one pood, we come to the following approximate number of suits of clothing dispatched – in 1800, 5600 pood; in 1891, 32,200; in 1897, 200,000; in 1899, 176,000; in 1900, 480,000; in 1901, 464,000; in 1905, 400,000; in 1909, 576,000, and in 1912, 592,000.
**	[This table is translated as it appears in the book. However, it may have been incorrectly transcribed for the original publication. It is possible that all the numerical entries in this section should be pushed down one row so that there would be no entry in this row and there would then be an entry in the Elizavetgrad row. Ed.]

Negotiations between Labor and Capital

Taking into account that after the war Polish money and the [German] mark fell in value by the hour, striking was the only effective means to improve the wretched condition of the tailors. On the other hand, the frequent conflicts caused the magazine owners to pay starvation wages when work was scarce in bad times and the starving artisans needed something to give them earnings. Because of this the tailors worked and suffered, waiting for better times that seldom came. To show the result of calling strikes at an inopportune time, it is enough to mention the frequent “lockouts” proclaimed by the magazine owners. For long weeks they indulged themselves by not giving out work to the tailors. ^[18]

In order to characterize the distribution of work time just after the war, we present the following table by year and month from 1919 to 1922.

Year	Month	Pattern of work
1919	From January to March	Worked part time to execute military work on trial.
	From April to September	Worked to carry out military contracts.
	From October to December	Did not work when the magazines were closed because of speculation and usury.
1920	From January to December	Began going back to work.
1921	From January to May	Three-week strike of master tailors because of the fall of the mark. It ended with a small salary increase.
	June	Worked, a short work-strike for an 8-hour workday. Ended without result.
	July-August	Worked without interruption.
	September	Four-week strike of master tailors – without result.
	From October to November	There was no work.
	December	A lot of work; the price was raised 100%.
1922	From January to May	Worked a little.
	From June to July	A workers' strike that ended with a salary increase.
	From July to October	Little work; worked with pauses.

From this data we see that out of forty-six months, they worked only twenty-five, including even a few months with little or part-time work. During this time the magazines were closed for fifteen months by the government bureau that combats usury and speculation. It shows, however, that there were strikes for three months, apart from a series of smaller strikes that were not taken into account here. All the strikes were for a salary increase or a shorter workday. Only in 1922 was a small improvement noticeable. In later years, after the stabilization of the Polish zloty, the situation improved a little – but really only a little, not more.

In the earliest postwar period of Brzeziny tailoring, the scourge of the economic policy by the government authorities, especially the office for combating usury and speculation, was also added. At the end of 1919 the government sealed up all the magazines. The intervention of the town government on behalf of their opening did not help. Extensive correspondence with clarifications from the town council was carried out with the higher financial authorities in Warsaw, but all without results. ^[19] The road to building themselves back up was a difficult one. In 1920 many magazine owners and tailors left Brzeziny and went abroad. At the same time others sought new paths and markets for Brzeziny production. In 1922, because of the rapid rise of the pound sterling and the dollar, efforts were made to take Brzeziny tailored goods by way of Danzig to England and the United States, where the Brzeziny merchandise could easily compete with the local market.

A great obstacle in the development of postwar tailoring was lack of credit because of the low value of the mark. After the stabilization of the zloty, the financial world also became interested in Brzeziny. In the beginning of 1923 banks and credit institutions were established – a local Cooperative Bank and the Jewish Savings and Loan Society. The Warsaw Credit Bank also opened a branch in Brzeziny. The banks stimulated business but also rekindled the earlier woes of promissory notes, wherein twelve percent was deducted [by the bank upon redemption] from the half-year IOU's that the tailors got for their work. In later years the IOU's and the percentage deducted were the main causes of conflicts between labor and capital.

III

Brzeziny Powiat

Its surface occupies 20.28 square miles. It is a flat land. Until not long ago it was still covered with forests and marshes, as evidenced by the numerous names of the towns and villages – Brzeziny [brzozy –birch], Lipiny [lipa–linden], Leszczyny [hazel], Osiny [aspen], Rokociny [creeping willow], etc. There were also numerous small brooks and streams. The southern body of water that is part of the powiat – the Czarna Wolborka River – flows into the Pilica, forming the border of the powiat for a couple of miles. A watery dividing line runs through the environs of the Brzeziny powiat between the town of Brzeziny and the villages of Grzmiaca [Gzhmiontsa], Lipiny, and Malczew, where the highest mountains are found. These mountains reach 122.8 sazni [sonzhni] ^[20] near Lipiny and Teolin, on the right of the highway between Brzeziny and Lodz, and 104 to 108 sazni near Malczew and Grzmiaca. To the north of these mountains, the water flows from the river Mroga into the Bzura. The Warsaw–Vienna Railroad, cutting through the length of the Brzeziny powiat , fostered the development of the manufacturing industry in Tomaszow. Tomaszow's location on the southern border also fostered a strong growth of agriculture, although the soil there was mediocre.

The numerous roads that cut through the powiat in various directions linked the most important towns and villages. The railroad from Koluszki to Lodz made this line well suited to the development of agriculture and industry. With the building of the railroad and roadways, the forests disappeared. Only near Ujazd were there still large tracts of forest, which were also disappearing because of the development of the Tomaszow textile industry.

In 1890 there were six cotton mills in the powiat , a mere 2000 weaving workshops, 525 cloth workshops, 14 distilleries, 2 beer breweries, 1 distillation factory, 1 paper factory, 1 steam mill and 88 ordinary mills, 1 lime factory, 10 brickyards, and 3 iron works.

As to the organization of its judiciary, the Brzeziny powiat was divided into four district courts – Wola Cyrusowa, Galkow, Ujazd, and Strykow, and into one court of peace [lower court] for Brzeziny and Tomaszow.

As for administration, Brzeziny powiat was divided into fifteen gminy [administrative districts] – Bedkow, Bratoszewice, Biala, Ciosny, Dlugie, Dmosin, Dobra, Lipiny, Laznow [Waznoof], Lazisko [Wazhisko], Mroga Dolna, Mikolajew, Niesulkow, Popien (Jezow), Osada. Those without town status were Glowno, Strykow, Jezow, and Ujazd. The two largest towns were Tomaszow and Brzeziny.

In 1890 the population of Brzeziny powiat numbered 93,778 souls. This number included 18,393 Protestants, 15,528 Jews, and 120 Greek Orthodox; the rest were Catholics.

Towns and Shtetls around Brzeziny

Ujazd

In 1616 Kasper Denhopf obtained from the Sieradz province an estate and palace in Ujazd for his wife and daughter. In 1786 the palace was repaired. The Prussian Kaiser stopped there at the end of the 18^th century when he visited the newly captured provinces. He stayed at the palace in Ujazd.

When in 1584 Ujazd went to the Ossolinski Family, Krzysztof Ossolinski built there on the very top of the mountain a castle in the Italian style. On the entry tower (1631) was a large stone cross. A defensive wall ringed the palace. The castle was very well known in Poland. The structure was according to the times of the year – four spires as in the four seasons of the year, twelve halls as in the twelve months, fifty-two rooms for each week, and three hundred sixty-five windows for each day. There was a glass roof with water where there were goldfish. On the walls between the windows were engraved the names of their ancestors in their own signatures.

There were superb gardens there. Eleven years later the Swedes surrounded and destroyed the castle. Until shortly before the end of the 19^th century there were still remarkable remains of the castle.

Ujazd was also famous for its traditional Jewish life. A son-in-law of the famous rebbe, Fiszele Strykower, was rebbe there. After the First World War they created national cultural Jewish youth organizations there that carried out widespread enlightenment activities. With the exception of a small number of rescued Jewish survivors, Jewish Ujazd, along with the six million holy martyrs in Europe, was completely destroyed.

Glowno

Tomaszow

More that two hundred years ago this was a site of forests and swamps, and it belonged to the landowner Ostrowski, who was at that time chairman of the senate.

Tomaszow begin developing only one hundred fifty years later, after the Congress of Vienna, when Poland was given to Tsarist Russia, and, in the last third of the 19^th century, it made rapid progress. In 1879 there were twelve thousand residents with twenty-two enterprises powered by steam. As early as 1886 the town produced textiles and hardware worth seven million rubles and employed eight thousand workers.

The town and surrounding area had superb beautiful scenery and had a large number of people engaged in trades.

Because of its own importance and stature and above all because of the fact that Tomaszow itself is ready to publish a big yizkor book, we are only mentioning it as a town in the Brzeziny powiat.

Jezow

In Jezow in the 16^th century there were blacksmith, wheelwright, and shoemaker guilds. In 1778 King Stanislaw August renewed the privileges of holding the already established market fairs and added four new ones.

In the local church there were stands from the distant Middle Ages almost a thousand years old. Later, Jezow became less important, but its market fairs were renowned in the entire area.

There was a significant Jewish settlement there, hundreds of bright people, and a progressive, religious, and secular youth, organized into clubs, unions, and societies. The well-known Jewish writer Yitzhok Janasowicz came from Jezow.

With few exceptions, all the Jews perished in Hitler's death camps.

Strykow

Strykow is among the oldest settlements in the Brzeziny area. Very long ago the stopping place between the provincial towns of Leczyca and Rawa was there. Already as early as 1394 Strykow was a town, and Wladislaw Jagiello decreed in Brzeziny that Strykow should pay taxes on wagons, horses, and cattle.

The Strykow landowner, Piotr Strykowski, became kasztelan (starosta) in Inowroclaw in 1457. He also served as advisor to the imperial court for an extended period. His or his father's name was signed on the famous treaty with the Teutonic Knights of the Cross in Brzesc [Kujawski] in 1436. This family, Strykowski, after whom the present-day town is most likely named, dispersed to different lands after accumulating a large estate.

In the 15^th century Strykow went to Mikolaj of Kurozweki, whose underage heir, after the death of his father, was under the (legal) supervision of Jan Laski, the Archbishop of Gniezno, and his brother, Jaroslaw. In the 16^th century Strykow belonged to landowner Jaroslaw Laski. He received Strykow as a dowry from the Kurozweckis when the Kurozweckis divided their estates (1531) with their brother Stanislaw in Krakow. Stanislaw gave Strykow to Laski. From the Laskis, Strykow went to the Moskowskis. In the middle of the 17^th century, Strykow passed over to the Malinskis, and in the 18^th century, to the Czarneckis.

In 1459 Strykow provided six foot soldiers to the Prussian government, which shows that it was a significant shtetl, while other towns provided only up to two soldiers.

After a fire destroyed the town, Sigismund I freed the town from various taxes for fifteen years (1520). In 1525 market fairs were added, and in 1543 Strykow was again freed from the burden of taxes. In 1576 five grzywnas, eight florins, and twenty-four groszen were collected.

By the end of the 16^th century there were the following artisans: 5 fishermen, 6 shoemakers, 6 tailors, 3 blacksmiths, 13 bakers, 2 potters, 5 furriers, and 2 barrel makers. They paid [as taxes] between 5 kegs of mashke [liquor] up to 24 grzywnas . The three butchers paid up to 12 grzywnas. Altogether the town paid 59 florins and 18 groszen.

In 1827 there were 141 houses with 2,022 inhabitants, of which 1,332 were Jews. In 1858 there were already 171 houses, 4 of them brick, with 2,613 inhabitants, of which there were 1,744 Jews and 88 Germans; the rest were Catholics.

In the 18^th century there was a large Jewish population in Strykow, twice as large as in Brzeziny, with well-known rabbis. Rebbe Fiszele was famous in all of Poland as a miracle worker. Twenty-nine villages belonged to the Strykow kehile [Jewish community]. Zgierz, then a village of nine Jews, also belonged to Strykow. The first Jews who died in the village of Lodz were buried in Strykow.

After the Nazi destruction there were no more Jews in Strykow.

Koluszki

In 1764 there were already eight Jews living there who paid their taxes to the Brzeziny kehile . Until the war ten Jewish families, who later shared the fate of all the Jews of Poland, lived there. Few saved themselves.

Rogow

There were ten well-to-do Jewish families. Almost all of them perished.

IV

Organizations

The Master Tailors' Union

1. To have a shul in which the members could daven [pray].
2. To write their own seyfer-toyre [Torah scroll].
3. To help downtrodden members.
4. To have the right to assemble twice a day. ^[22]
   
5. To have the right for someone to attend the sick.

The meetings took place after minkhe [afternoon prayer]. The tables and chairs were arranged in back of the synagogue lectern, and the speaker at the lectern was always referred to as the cantor. Gradually the union developed. The main activity was the mutual assistance of its members.

After the war the union grew greatly; it played an important role in the economic and social life of the town. During the local and national elections, all the political parties took pains to get support from the Master Tailors' Union. The Master Tailors' Union always had their elected members on the town council, the kehile [Jewish community council], and the krankn-kase [fund for the sick]. The important leaders were: Abraham Frajnd, Mojsze Dzialoszynski, Pesach Grinszpan, Lajbl Szajbowicz (Lajbl Bik), Herszl Szmulewicz, Majer Kozak, and Mojsze Berber.

In 1927 the Polish government implemented a trade guild statute that renewed the old privileges of the guilds, with the intention of restricting Jewish access to work. According to the statute, the guilds had to issue master certificates, without which one could not operate a workshop. The Master Tailors' Union carried out an intense battle to weaken the effect of the evil decree. Thanks to the strong protest movement, organized jointly with the Socialist Artisans Union, the so-called tailor chalupnicy [cottage workers] succeeded in getting the evil decree repealed. ^[23] But this did not last long. In 1935, the anti-Semites achieved their aim. It did not help to argue that modern economic life demanded freedom of work and employment. By means of examinations, guilds, and closed groups, Jewish artisans were threatened, and, even worse, these actions brought about unemployment and poverty.

The Master Tailors' Union separated itself from public political influence and thus managed to pull through all the storms and political changes in Poland.

The Clothing Workers’ Union

The large worker emigration and the high percentage of workers who worked for their own parents weakened the union. Certainly, disregarding all the difficulties, the Workers' Union achieved important gains for workers. At the initiative of the Workers' Union and with the help of inspectors of workplaces and of the town hall, a conference took place on the strict observance of the eight-hour workday, which in truth had never been put into practice. In 1926–27 factions from Poale Zion, Royte [Red–procommunist], and the Bund existed within the union. There were approximately seven hundred members. The union had a beautiful library and a good drama club with a part-time director who periodically staged works from the Yiddish repertoire and from workers' lives.

A First of May demonstration was organized in 1927, which Brzeziny had never seen before then. The streets lost their normal appearance. One did not hear the hum of the machines. All the workers dressed as for a holiday. Activity stopped. The closer to the gathering place near the Workers' Union, the more evident was the scope of the united workers' strength. All the political workers' parties hurried with their red flags to their designated places. At the head went the representative of the Clothing Workers' Union, the mayor, and a representative of PPS (Polish Socialist Party). With banners and slogans for an eight-hour workday and higher wages, a fight against Fascism, child labor, and the persecution of the Yiddish language and culture and for a workers' government – the demonstrators marched through the main streets of the town, and a large orchestra played songs about work and battle. Hundreds of workers participated in the joint march. Three-quarters of them were Jewish workers.

A scene in a tailor workshop in Brzeziny – Ezekiel Niewodowicz with his daughters and hired hand stitchers

The Commercial Employees Union

The Transportation Union

The Left-Wing Poale Zion, the Bund, and the “Reds”

A. Poale Zion

In 1925 a rift took place. A significant group of important leaders went over to the Communists; others went to the right and to the Bund. In subsequent years the organization made an effort to make up for the loss from this split. In the later 1920s they won three seats on the town council, which at that time was regarded as a significant victory. For the first time, a female worker, Ester Winter, was among those newly elected to the council. A different impression was created in the town council by the resignation of Comrade Mordechai Dawid Biedak. At the first meeting of the newly elected town council in the large Firemen's Hall, he seceded from the organization in the name of the Poale Zionist town council faction, with a militant twenty-minute speech in Yiddish, in which he demanded equal rights of life, work, and culture for the Jewish masses. The anti-Semitic Endeks [National Democratic Party] gnashed their teeth and made their own groups. The secession signaled the awakening of the Jewish worker between the two world wars. There was enthusiasm, boldness, and dynamism and especially an awareness of the goal. They knew and understood what they were striving for. In later years, they suffered from police persecution; they became partly illegal. ^[25] In 1939, just before the great destruction, Poale Zion, in a united front with the Bund and other worker parties, was still able to win six seats on the town council.

The most important leaders in the establishment of the Society for Workers' Evening Courses were: Mojsze Icek Ginzberg, Jozef Baruch Szajbowicz, Mordechai Dawid Biedak, Lajb Sieradzki and Jankiel Dawidowicz.

B. The Bund [Jewish Socialists]

In the time of the Nazi destruction the Bundist party leaders were active in Brzeziny. After the transfer of the Brzeziny Ghetto inhabitants to Lodz, Abraham Opatowski, a former Bundist councilman in the Brzeziny Town Council was co-opted by the Lodz resistance group to direct self-help work in the ghetto. ^[28] The Bundist group in the ghetto numbered fifteen men.

C. The Reds [Communists]

In the course of time, under the extraordinary political persecutions, emigration, and personal disappointments, the movement declined drastically. The most important leaders, if they were not sitting in prison, had dispersed to other cities. Many of them went to South America, Western Europe, and Russia.

Final Observations

Table of Contents

Footnotes:

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