Historical outline
Zygmunt Szyper was only 9 years old when World War II broke out. After Lodz was occupied by German troops, he was forced to leave his home at Kilińskiego 120 and move with his grandparents to the ghetto, to an apartment at Limanowskiego 26. In the ghetto, he studied at school and trained for work. As a result of hunger and epidemics of infectious diseases, he lost most of his family in the ghetto. He was deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, together with his grandmother, from where he was later sent to Stutthof and then to other camps. Only two people from the entire family survived.
After 80 years, Zygmunt's daughters Lou and Michelle, and the journalist Jon Kay accompanying them, return to Lodz to discover their father's story. They follow the trail of his pre-war memories and stories from the ghetto and camps. They are accompanied by a BBC camera, which records the sentimental journey. The discovery of the Lodz part of history was aided by a historian from the Philip Friedman Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Lodz, Dr Adam Sitarek, who has found many facts from Zygmunt Szyper's life that the daughters did not know. He also helped locate places related to their father's history.
The Reportage
Source and photos: Philip Friedman Centre for Jewish Studies, University of Lodz