Timeline - Jack Fried
1938
Jack Fried was born in Chorostkow, Poland (Now Khorostkov, Ukraine).
1941
July: German soldiers came in and occupied the city. The soldiers that came were hungry and so Jack’s mother fed them. The soldiers warned them to leave before the SS came but they had nowhere else to go; therefore, they stayed. By the end of the year the Chorostkow ghetto was formed and Jack and his family were placed there. Every day they would take 200-300 Jews away on the train and they never returned.
1942
The Chorostkow ghetto was liquidated, and Jack and his family were moved to a camp six kilometers away. That camp was also liquidated in 1943.
1943
Jack and his family were then brought to the Jablonica Forced Labor Camp. His mother was made to cook, and his father was a confectioner (baker). Their extra provision of food was the main reason they managed to survive.
At the age of 5, Jack was put to work gathering fruits and vegetables in a farm co-cop to feed German soldiers. Soldiers watched to ensure that the Jews didn’t eat the food.
1944
Jack’s father escaped with his sister to return home and unearth hidden money. He returned to the camp, bribing the guard to release Jack and his mother. The German guard smuggled them out, and paid a Polish farmer to hide them all in his hayloft.
Six months later, as the Russian Army pushed troops west, Jack and his family traveled under protection to Romania, and then made their way through Bulgaria and Turkey into Palestine. The family settled in Palestine until 1951 and then they traveled to and settled in Canada.
1946
Jack's family traveled to the Cinecitta movie studio complex in Italy, converted to a refugee camp, then on to Poland. His family moved to Israel in 1950.
1995
Jack moved to Manchester, Tennessee, where he lived for the next 16 years.
2011
May 10: Jack Fried passed away in Manchester, Tennessee at the age of 72.