Letters donated to the POLIN Museum collection document a fragment of the history of the Glocer family. In their correspondence, the family members exchange information about their situation during World War II, as well as in the several years directly preceding and following the armed conflict. The Glocers were a family of Jewish entrepreneurs from Warsaw. In 1895, Teofil Glocer (1863–1947) established a factory producing machines used in the textile industry. Later, together with his son Władysław (1898–1973), he also ran the company “Teofil Glocer i Syn” [Teofil Glocer and Son]. The enterprise dealt with the import of accounting and computing machines and their sale in the territory of the country. In addition to shops in Warsaw, the company had branches all over Poland. Besides Władysław, who co-ran the family business with his father, Teofil and his wife Marta (1877–1945) had four daughters: Halina (1899–1993), Ewa (1900–1974), Bronisława (b. 1902) and Janina (1905–1997). The family's fortune and its connections resulting from the conducted business were to play a significant role in saving its members from the Holocaust and in their quick return to a prosperous and comfortable life after the war. The correspondence was donated to the collection by Hildie Kraus, great-granddaughter of Teofil and Marta Glocer, granddaughter of Halina. When the war began on 1 September 1939, Halina with her husband (Mieczysław Kraus) and their then 10-year-old son Stefan (Hildie's father) fled Warsaw in a company car, taking six other people with them. First, they went to Romania, and later to the erstwhile Yugoslavia. Between 1941 and 1947, the family stayed in Palestine, from where they moved to New York. Teofil and Marta Glocer found themselves in the Warsaw ghetto during the war, from where they were led out by their son-in-law, Janka's husband Franciszek (“Franio”) Puncuh (1902–1944), who was a Yugoslav diplomat. Thanks to his connections, he also managed to save many other people from the ghetto. Franio was also the only family member who perished during the war (most likely during the Warsaw Uprising). Thanks to Franciszek's position and the alliance of his homeland with Germany, Janka's family could afford to live freely during the occupation. Their son, Andrzej, was sent to the family villa in Konstancin. Ewa Glocer was hiding under a false name in Warsaw's Praga district. Her daughter (Wanda) was placed with a Polish family. Bronka made it to London before the war. Bronka's and Ewa's husbands were drafted into the army. Both survived. Władysław first made it to Sweden, from where he left for New York as early as 1941. After the war, the whole family finally met in New York, where they were able to resume business. It would not have been possible without the help of the former contractors who helped the Glocers store their pre-war assets and establish contacts in the new place."
Marta Frączkiewicz
