Jakob (Kuba) Enoch OAM, Holocaust educator

In September of last year I received an email that my grandfather, my Zeida, Kuba Enoch, was being considered for the award of the Medal of the Order of Australia, for service to the community through education (specifically Holocaust education). Instantly, I broke down in tears. Partly tears of grief, my Zeida had passed away two months earlier and like so many across the globe over the last couple of years have realised, it’s challenging to grieve properly when most of your connection to family is through Zoom during lockdowns.

These tears were also of relief, possibly joy. I was happy that after submitting the nomination the December prior, that my Zeida was being recognised not just for the last 20 years of his life that he had devoted almost solely to Holocaust education, but for the life that he lived as the most humble, caring, hardworking person there was.

In one of my visits I had told him about the nomination for his services to education on behalf of our family. He was typically humble, seemingly nonplussed, the look on his face said “why me?”. To someone who led every interaction with grace and humility he never wanted any of this kind of attention or recognition himself, but I could also see a glimmer of a smile and nearly a tear. I viewed this as satisfaction that how he had lived his life and what he had decided to spend his time on was worthy of his family nominating him for such an award.

Kuba endured the worst that humankind has seen. He lost most of his extended family in the Holocaust, including his beloved younger brother who was liquidated in the Krakow Ghetto and his dear mother who was so close to him, whom he never saw after she was transported from the Plaszow Concentration Camp to her death. Kuba was beaten to the ground with the butt of a rifle for trying to find out where she was taken to.

This was just one of many horrific stories that he eventually shared, when he finally realised after documenting his testimony for the Spielberg Foundation more than 20 years ago that he would not be burdening us with his stories, but that we wanted to hear and needed to hear. This was reinforced in 2007 on the March of the Living program where accompanied by my father and 4 of his grandchildren, Kuba guided 80 school children through Poland with the energy of someone 20 years younger than the 81 years of age he was at the time.

“It’s up to us to make this world better. That is why I am speaking here to the children, to make the world a bit better.”

When people often asked him how he survived, or why he survived, he would simply say “I was lucky", probably with the word ‘darling’ following, especially if it was a child or family member who asked. While no doubt there was luck along the way; things like being born with blond hair and blue eyes, being of working age, speaking fluently and just being in the right place at the right time; Kuba had a resilience that is just not seen often and a steadfast determination to survive. Plaszow in itself was a horror and not commonly heard about in testimonies. At this stage in his life he was a teenager who had lost his mother, brother, extended family and been separated from his father.

Beyond Plaszow, Kuba survived transports to the Ostrowiec Labour camp, taking a transport where he hoped to find his mother, and then from there onto Auschwitz. As Auschwitz was being liberated in January 1945, he was death marched to Buchenwald in Germany in the middle of Winter, another horrific experience which to my understanding only around two thirds made it through. Upon liberation in April 1945, now 18, with nothing except for an emaciated body and the horrors of 6 years of war, ghettos, camps, labour and loss, he snuck into a foster program in Switzerland for Jewish children (which he was now too old for) under his late younger cousins passport. In 1948 he made his way to Australia, which seemed to him the furthest place away from the horrors of Europe.

He arrived in Australia as a refugee and loved the Australian values of freedom, respect, fairness and equality of opportunity. Starting with nothing, the opportunity Australia presented meant with his work ethic he not only found work but built businesses and a loving, Jewish family with our grandmother Kitty in a place where they were free to practice their religion. Kuba retained an even stronger faith in Judaism after the war noting that if “Hitler wanted to kill me for being Jewish, it must be important”. Personally, I do feel there was something bigger at play in the Universe when the first email I read after Yom Kippur finished (the Jewish Day of Atonement and the holiest day in the calendar), was the one that shared the news about him being considered for the award of the OAM, just months after his passing. Typically I would be by his side in Synagogue for close to 12 hours of Yom Kippur.

The humble and gentle man his family loved, would not say more than a few words at the dinner table growing up, went on to give his testimony to tens of thousands in large groups well into his nineties as a living historian and volunteer survivor at the Sydney Jewish Museum, which welcomes more than 50,000 visitors per year. He saw the power education had, to ensure atrocities like the Holocaust never happened again. He has educated children and adults alike, through the museum and other avenues for nearly 20 years creating a better, more collaborative future for our society.

"No matter what race you are, what colour you are, what religion you are, respect each other."

Kuba was a smart man with a thirst for knowledge. Though he had no formal education, he read widely and was street smart. He was sharp till the end, had a green thumb, especially for a lemon tree, possessed a quick wit and a cheeky grin. As well as having his stories and recollections we are so lucky he fought ailing health to film the Dimensions in Testimony project. He has left us a marvellous legacy where all coming generations will be able to spend time in the presence of our Zeida in an interactive two way narrative to learn about his story.

His family of 4 children, 11 grandchildren, together with their partners have produced 10 great grandchildren and that number is still growing. Last May we celebrated his 95th birthday, where he sat surrounded by three loving generations of his offspring smiling ear to ear with the quiet acknowledgement that he had indeed succeeded. He took so much pride in his family, once reflecting to me that it was all worth it for how we turned out.

“Hitler did not win……my family and Jewish continuity are my victory over the Nazis.”

Yesterday in the 2022 Australia Day Honour roll, he was formally recognised with the OAM. Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. There is no more fitting day for me to share this slightly more personal story than I typically would on LinkedIn.

My Zeida would be humble but proud of the award of the OAM, in my eyes never has someone been so deserving of this recognition, and probably never has a person craved it less.