Jewish Sites on a Contemporary Map of Mazeikiai

Close to the Jewish New Year of 5768 our co-webmaster Benzi Kahana received from Mr. Algimantas Muturas, the Curator of the Historical Museum of Mazeikiai (Mazheik), a brand new 2007, detailed street map of the town of Mazheik.

The most important contribution is not the new map itself. Mr. Muturas has placed numbered circles on the map, at the locations of some of the former Jewish community institutions, as well as a number of the houses where Jewish families lived until they found their tragic fate.

In his cover letter Mr. Muturas explains that only some of the Jewish houses were marked due to map size limitations.

The map was scanned into four quarters, according to the following table.

Press any quarter of the map on the main Geography page to display the detailed map.

Some web browsers enable zooming-in of the detailed map by pressing on the map.

Note: there is some overlap between the maps of the different quarters.

List of Jewish community institutes and Jewish family houses

Circle No.	Description	Square at Map	Map quarter
1.	Jewish cemetery, location of mass murder in August 1941	D6	SE/SW
2.	Rachmel house	D3	NE/NW
3.	Synagogue	D3	NE/NW
4.	Jewish school	D3	NE/NW
5.	Mikveh (ritual bath)	D3	NE/NW
6.	Jewish bank	D3	NE/NW
7.	Geiman (Heiman?) house	D3	NE/NW
8.	Dr. Krongold's house	E3	NE
9.	Moskevitz shop	E3	NE
10.	Tuvie house	E3	NE
11.	Katz's wheat mill	F3	NE
12.	Peres's flax factory	F3	NE
13.	Iting house	E4	SE
14.	Kagan's ice-cream factory	E4	SE
15.	Kalvaria's leather processing workshop	E4	SE
16.	Avrech's brick factory	E4	SE
17.	Kindergarten	D3	NE/NW
18.	Rabbi's home	D3	NE/NW
19.	Gross's cinema	D3	NE/NW

From the map it appears that most of Jewish community institutions, as well as Jewish houses, were located on squares D3-E3, on and around Laisvas street, north of the local railway station.

Most factories and workshops were located on square E4, possibly an industrial area, located south of the southern branch of the railway.

Some factories and workshops were located on square F3, possibly another smaller industrial area, slightly north of the northern branch of the railway.

We can just imagine how, in the terrible summer days of 1941, Jews were forced to walk southwards, from the synagogue in Laisvas street, crossing the railway, continuing along Tirkshliu street and Sedos street, until they approached the Jewish cemetery near the Venta river, where they found their tragic fate….

Compiled by Ilan Ganot, October 2007