2.    Semyon Fanshel

Interview with the Shoah survivor, Semyon Fanshel (b. 12 June 1928 in Kryzhopol, Ukraine), for Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation. The interview covers his life in Kryzhopol, and that of his father and grandparents in the near-by village of Zhabokrich, and other locations, as well as life during the Shoah and after World War Two in Ukraine.  The interview, that can also be found on Youtube, is in Russian with English subtitles. 

Interview. Part I

Interview. Part II

Interview. Part III

Interview. Part IV

Interview. Part V

Interview. Part VI

Interview. Part VII

 

3.   Sidor Belarsky

Sidor Belarsky, born Isidor Livshitz (12 February 1898 – 7 June 1975), was a Ukrainian-American singer born to a Jewish family in Kryzhopol, Ukraine.  His recording of "Dem Milners Trern" ("The Miller's Tears"), a Yiddish folk song composed by M. M. Warshavsky, was featured in the Coen brothers's film, A Serious Man. The song's subject is the expulsion of Jews from hundreds of villages in the Czarist Russian Empire.

In the following Oral History Project video, Isabel remembers her father, Sidor Belarsky, the "master singer of the Jewish people", providing a unique perspective into the life of his life. In the video, one learns about Sidor Belarsky's unlikely career beginnings, his late-nights at the famous hangout for Jewish artists Cafe Royal, and his home in the Washington Heights neighborhood of New York, in the United States. Two You Tube videos are: Sidor Belarsky - Avoth Video  and  Sidor Belarsky - Veal Yedai.

Many thanks to the Wexler Oral History Project for sharing this video. For more information on the project, visit: http://www.yiddishbookcenter.org/tell...