Friends of Jewish Renewal in Poland
*POLISH TRANSLATION*
(coming soon)
Freighted Legacies Webinar
Olkusz Remembers Its Jewish Families
The "Barefoot Rabbi" and the Evolution of an Iconic Holocaust Photograph
JUNE 14, 2026
REGISTER FOR THIS WEBINAR HERE
10AM PST | 12PM Chicago | 1PM EST | 6PM London | 7PM Poland | 8PM Israel
The Barefoot Rabbi lived in the same building as Rabbi Beliak’s mother.
Please join us for a webinar in Polish, English, and perhaps Hebrew, on June 14, 2026, for a gathering of descendants of Olkusz and the Zagłębie region, including Sosnowiec, Będzin, and Dąbrowa Górnicza, the eastern part of the larger Silesian region. This webinar arose from our talks related to a translation to English of the Krzysztof Kocjan book “Jewish Olkusz.” We realized Olkusz descendants are dispersed over the world but possess elements of a common heritage. Our purpose for June 14, 2026 is to create a friendly platform for keeping the memory alive. A brief portion of time will be allotted for webinar attendees to share their story and a few documents (please email haimbeliak@gmail.com in advance to participate).
We will be joined by noted Polish historians and guardians of Jewish life memory in Poland. Israeli scholar at Bar Ilan University, Yechiel Weizman will explain the evolving significance of the “Barefoot Rabbi.” There will be a background briefing in English with simultaneous translation to Polish (and possibly Hebrew).
On June 13, 2026, current residents of Olkusz will mark the 84th year of the mass expulsion of Olkusz Jews to their death. Irek Cieślik initiated a March of Memory 20 years ago. Now, a small group including Olgerd Dziechciarz, Jacek Sypień, Dariusz Rozmus, Michal Ostrowski and Krzysztof Kocjan continue this commemorative event every year on June 13th. Our Freighted Legacies webinar on June 14, 2026 will reflect on this memorial march.
REGISTER FOR THIS WEBINAR HERE
Krzysztof Kocjan – Olkusz native, Krzysztof Kocjan’s 800-page registry and catalog of Jewish life focusing on September 1, 1939. Including materials about survivors, this book is unprecedented in its scope. It exceeds and augments the Olkusz Yizkor book. It is in Polish and soon will be available in English. The book is a street-by-street, family-by-family preservation of records. By combing through official census records in Polish, tracking pictures, postcards, and official documents from private collections, Nazi records, and pre-War Polish primary sources, a picture emerges. With the special “testimonies” Poland’s children congratulated America on its 150th anniversary. Many Jewish children participated.
Michal Ostrowski, a professor emeritus of the Jagiellonian University, living all his life in Olkusz, has contributed Polish and English documents on an ever expanding website on Olkusz Jews. The website resources are increasing in both English and Polish with multiple documents, books and various information preserving history and reporting on present events. Ostrowski will give a short survey of the website and current commemorations in Olkusz.
Yechiel Weizman (grandson of Olkusz resident) and a lecturer at Bar Ilan will speak about his groundbreaking research on Olkusz: The Afterlife of the Barefoot Rabbi and the Making of an Iconic Holocaust Photograph.
His work includes Unsettled Heritage: Living Next to Poland’s Material Jewish Traces After the Holocaust and numerous essays engaged with memory projects.
