4 results for "Biography"

Measure of a man: from Auschwitz survivor to presidents' tailor

Greenfield, Martin,Hall, Wynton
He's been called "America's greatest living tailor" and "the most interesting man in the world." Now, for the first time, Holocaust survivor Martin Greenfield tells his incredible life story. Taken from his Czechoslovakian home at age fifteen and transported to the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz with his family, Greenfield came face to face with "Angel of Death" Dr. Joseph Mengele and was divided forever from his parents, sisters, and baby brother. In haunting, powerful prose, Greenfield remembers his desperation and fear as a teenager alone in the death camp—and how an SS soldier's shirt dramatically altered the course of his life. He learned how to sew; and when he began wearing the shirt under his prisoner uniform, he learned that clothes possess great power and could even help save his life. Measure of a Man is the story of a man who suffered unimaginable horror and emerged with a dream of success. From sweeping floors at a New York clothing factory to founding America’s premier custom suit company, Greenfield built a fashion empire. Now 86 years old and working with his sons, Greenfield has dressed the famous and powerful of D.C. and Hollywood, including Presidents Dwight Eisenhower, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama, celebrities Paul Newman, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Jimmy Fallon, and the stars of Martin Scorsese's films. Written with soul-baring honesty and, at times, a wry sense of humor, Measure of a Man is a memoir unlike any other—one that will inspire hope and renew faith in the resilience of man.
Regnery History 2016-08-22 234 pages

The Holocaust odyssey of Daniel Bennahmias, Sonderkommando

Fromer, Rebecca
A poignant reminder of the ways enslaved Jews and others were forced to destroy their families and fellow prisoners In The Holocaust Odyssey , Rebecca Fromer leads us through the experiences of Danny Bennahmias, a Greek Jew of Italian citizenship whose forced labor as a Sonderkommando at Auschwitz included the disentangling of hundreds of thousands of gassed men, women, and children. The book is the result of a diligent collaboration. As it unfolds, it becomes a poignant reminder of the manner in which enslaved Jews and others were forced to destroy their families and fellow prisoners. It is a story of human decency, the spark of which remains against all odds.
University of Alabama 1993 151 pages

A world apart

Herling-Grudziński, Gustaw
A WORLD APART by GUSTAV HERLING. Contents include: PREFACE , k PART I CHAP. PAGE 1 VITEBSK LENINGRAD VOLOGDA 1 2 HUNTING BY NIGHT 20 3 WORK 1 DAY AFTER DAY 32 2 THROWN TO THE WOLVES 45 3 STALINS MURDERER 50 4 DREI KAMERADEN 56 5 THE ICE-BREAKER 65 6 THE HOUSE OF MEETINGS 86 7 RESURRECTION 97 8 THE DAY OF REST 113 PART II 9 HUNGER 131 10 NIGHTFALL 143 11 THE HOUSE OF THE DEAD 152 12 N THE REAR OF THE WAR FOR THE FATHERLAND 1 A GAME OF CHESS 174 2 HAYMAKING 183 13 MARTYRDOM FOR THE FAITH 190 14 THE MORTUARY 210 15 IN THE URALS, 1942 227 EPILOGUE THE FALL OF PARIS 242 APPENDIX 249 ILLUSTRATIONS THE AUTHORS PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN IN GRODNO PRISON IN 1940, AND STOLEN BY HIM FROM HIS DOSSIER ON THE DAY OF HIS RELEASE FROM KARGOPOL CAMP frontispiece A PHOTOGRAPH OF ONE OF THE CAMP-SECTIONS OF THE KARGOPOL CAMP, TAKEN ORIGINALLY BY A CAMP GUARD AS A SOUVENIR, AND LATER SOLD BY HIM TO ONE OF THE PRISONERS facing page 24 A PHOTOGRAPH OF THE HANDKERCHIEF MADE AND EMBROI DERED BY Miss Z. facing page 220 IGANOVS POSTCARD facing page 228 AN EXTRACT FROM THE AUTHORS DIARY, KEPT AFTER HIS RELEASE FROM THE CAMP facing page 234. PREFACE by BERTRAND RUSSELL: OF the many books that I have read relating the experiences of victims in Soviet prisons and labour camps, Mr. Gustav Herlings A World Apart is the most impressive and the best written. He possesses in a very rare degree the power of simple and vivid description, and it is quite impossible to question his sincerity at any point. In the years 1940-42 he was first in prison and then in a forced labour camp near Archangel. The bulk of the book relates what he saw and suffered in the camp. The book ends with letters from eminent Communists saying that no such camps exist. Those who write these letters and those fellow-travellers who allow themselves to believe them share responsibility for the almost unbelievable horrors which are being inflicted upon millions of wretched men and women, slowly done to death by hard labour and starvation in the Arctic cold. Fellow-travellers who refuse to believe the evidence of books such as Mr. Herlings are necessarily people devoid of humanity, for if they had any humanity they would not merely dismiss the evidence, but would take some trouble to look into it. Communists and Nazis alike have tragically demonstrated that in a large proportion of mankind the impulse to inflict torture exists, and requires only opportunity to display itself in all its naked horror. But I do not think that these evils can be cured by blind hatred of their perpetrators. This will only lead us to become like them. Although the effort is not easy, one should attempt, in reading such a book as this one, to understand the circumstances that turn men into fiends, and to realise that it is not by blind rage that such evils will be prevented. I do not say that to understand is to pardon there are things which for my part I find I cannot pardon. But I do say that to understand is absolutely necessary if the spread of similar evils over the whole world is to be prevented. I hope that Mr...
Greenwood Press 1974 262 pages