The Jewish community of the city of Kleczew came into existence in the sixteenth century. It remained large and strong throughout the next four hundred years, and in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries it formed between 40 and 60% of the total population. The Kahal of Kleczew acquired its autonomy in the eighteenth century, and formed a separate Jewish quarter of the municipal infrastructure, possessing a synagogue, a cemetery, a ritual bath, and a cheder. In the years 1918-1939, Jewish life in Kleczew developed strongly political-social aspects, with branches of multiple political groups and organizations forming and attracting members. After the outbreak of war in 1939, Kleczew's Jewish inhabitants were the first victims of the Nazis' mass extermination campaign, murdered between September and November 1941. This edited volume presents and explores the history of this complex, long-lived Jewish community.

About the Author
Anetta Glowacka-Penczynska has been working at the University of Bydgoszcz since 1998 and defended her PhD dissertation in 2006. Since 2007, she is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Cultural History, Institute of History and International Relations at the Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz.

Tomasz Kawski was born in 1969 in Wloclawek, Poland. He studied law at Mikolaj Kopernik University in Torun and social science and history at Kazimierz Wielki University (UKW) in Bydgoszcz, receiving a PhD in history in 2001. Since 1994, he works as a Researcher in the Institute of History and International Relationships (IHiSM) at UKW in Bydgoszcz.

Witold W. Medykowski, born in Lublin, is a historian and political scientist, and a senior specialist at the Yad Vashem Archives. He is a graduate of the University of Life Sciences in Lublin and Tel Aviv University. He received his PhD in political science at the Institute of Political Studies - Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw and his PhD in Jewish studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has published numerous articles and books on the Holocaust, Polish-Jewish relations and ethnic conflicts in Central and Eastern Europe.

Tuvia Horev (PhD, MPH, DMD) has served in high-ranking positions in the Israeli healthcare system, as well as in research institutes and academia. His latest executive position was as Senior Deputy Director General for Strategic and Economic Planning in the Ministry of Health. Since November 2014, he has been an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Systems Management at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. As a descendant of a family that lived in Kleczew, Poland for generations, Professor Horev's contribution to the current project has been given out of a personal commitment to promote historical research on Jewish life in Eastern Greater Poland.

Book Information
ISBN 9781618114846
Author T. Horev
Format Paperback
Page Count 648
Imprint Academic Studies Press
Publisher Academic Studies Press