Alexander Pollak was part of a small, close-knit Jewish community in pre-war Yugoslavia. His father, Kalman, was a chief engineer, and the family lived on a Mobile Oil refinery. Alexander’s Orthodox maternal grandparents made certain that he recieved a Jewish education; he went to shul every Saturday, attended religious school, and watched his mother, Berta, light candles on Shabbat. As a young child, Alexander didn’t notice a distinction between Jews and non-Jews due to how integrated Jewish life was into the larger community. He even noted that his grandfather was “probably the only Jew that worked for John D. Rockefeller” in the early 1900s.
After his father was arrested during the rise of facism, Alexander moved around fifteen miles away to the town of Bosanski Brod. At one point, he and his family were placed in an internment camp, sleeping in crowded dormitories and recieving packages from the Red Cross. Christian friends later helped the Pollak family escape to the Adriatic Coast, where they were safer. In 1943, Berta joined the Croatian Partisans, an anti-facist group. She contributed her knowledge of German, French, and Italian to the resistance effort. With the Partisans, the Pollaks travelled through the mountains back to Bosanski Brod and arrived in 1944. Berta was immediately arrested. A Catholic friend, Mrs. Joris, arranged for Alexander and his sister to be disguised as Catholic children and smuggled them to an orphanage in a monestary in Zagreb, where he continued his education and worked in the garden.
When World War 2 ended, Mrs. Joris sent Alexander to live with his aunt and uncle in Bucharest, Romania. He kept in contact with his sister, but he never reconnected with his parents; he learned in the 1990s that Kalman perished in Jasenovac and Berta was never released from prison after her arrest. In 1953, Alexander emigrated to Israel and completed a term of military service. At the age of 27, he moved to England to study at Birmingham University and got certified as a chemical engineer. His career brought him to live in the United States, where he worked on cutting-edge technology for several decades.
Alexander held great admiration and appreciation for the people who saved him, his sister, and countless other Jews during the war. He maintained correspondence with Mrs. Joris and was dedicated to honoring the memories of Jewish and non-Jewish heroes alike who recognized their “big bond of humanity” in the face of atrocity.
Parents:
Berta Pollak
Kalman Pollak, d. Jasenovac
Sibling:
Gizella Pollak