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1930
Hitler and the Nazi party are telling the world that the Jews are a diseased race. -
October 4 1934
Lola is born. -
November 9, 1938
A German officer is killed in Paris by a Jew. Sets off backlash known as the Night of Broken Glass -
Summer 1939
Czortkow starts having rolling blackouts. All the streetlights are turned off, and Jews tape black paper over their windows so German bombers don't see them. -
September 1,1939
Hitler invades Poland where 3.3 million Jews live. England and France then declare war on Germany. This sparks the begining of ww2. -
September 1939
Lola is free to roam around and not be shamed on until the Russians invade. -
September 17,1939
The Russian's take over the town of Czortkow -
1941
Hitler comes up with a plan to exterminate all of Europe's Jews. -
Spring 1941
Lola is six and a half and is going to nursery school at her cousins house. There are about a dozen other kids there to. -
October 15, 1941
The Nazis have made laws that anyone hiding or helping the Jews will be punished or killed. -
December 7 1941 A date which will live in infamy
The Japanese bomb pearl harbor an American navy ship yard. Now America has joined the war. -
Summer 1942
Lola's Dad dies at home. -
April 1942
The Jews in Czortkow are confined to a ghetto, a series of streets and buildings where the Jews must live. You must have the proper papers to leave the ghetto. -
August 26-27, 1942
The first "action" comes, for the Germans, It means a day set aside for rounding up huge amounts of Jews and sending them by train to the concentration camps. Lola, her Mother, and her Grandmother hide in a narrow space between a storage area and a wall of another building -
March 21, 1943
Today is Purim, a Jewish holiday. Lola's mother, a cousin, and 2 other women are killed by a German soldier, Kurt Kollner, enacting revenge for another German soldier going into his territory and shooting "his Jews". -
May 1943
A few months after Lola's Mother is killed, Babcia takes Lola aside right before bed, explaining she will be sneaking out of the ghetto that night. Babcia does not go with Lola. Tekla picks Lola up at the bridge. -
Spring 1943
Tekla's son-in-law works in the fields even though it is still windy, and cold Lola is always scared of him because he doesn't want her there. -
Summer 1943
A couple goes to Tekla's house and talk to Lola but Lola lies to them and tells them that shes deaf and mute. -
June 1943
A final action happened and all Jews in Czortkow was "liquidated" and all Jews were killed, including Babcia. -
Summer 1944
After Anna's son-in-law says he will take Lola to the Gestapo Anna takes Lola to a different persons farm where Lola has to stay in a hole in the ground in a barn with three other Jews. -
March 1944
Lola and the others hear fighting near by. they can hear the tanks rumbling and the crack of gunfire. To Lola, this time it is a wonderful sound. -
A morning in March 1944
Anna tells them that they have been liberated by the Russians but they can't come out because its during the day. At night Lola and the others crawl out of the hole they had been in for 9 months. -
March 23, 1944
Russians control Czortkow, which was officially liberated in 1944. -
March 25-26, 1944
Germans come back to Czortkow trying to reclaim the territory, Lola has to leave because Rose wouldn't take her back to the farm house. -
April 4, 1944
Lola is 9 years old and was found by a man who claimed to know her father and takes her to a strangers house, and leaves her there, Russian soldiers come back and take her to Dzymalow. -
April 10, 1944
Lola has to beg for food A Russian soldier offers to take her to the orphanage in Kiev. -
April 12 1944
The Russian soldier has to drop Lola off in the small town of Gritsev. He explains to the mayor that he is dropping Lola off at the orphanage in Kiev but his plans have been changed and he has to go back from where they came now. Sergie a man who happened to be at the city, offers to take Lola. -
June 6 1944
D-Day. America stormed the beaches of Normandy with the British and have started to push the Germans back. -
Summer 1944
Germans completely disappear from Czortkow. -
October 4 1944
Lola turns 10 years old while living with Sergei. She is sad and upset but will not let anyone.She is dealing with big emotions about losing her family, and being tossed from place to place. Feelings of being unwanted. Sergei has been writing letters to Czortkow to try and find a family of Lola's. -
April 12 1945
Sergei finally gets into contact with Lola's uncle George. He is living In Lwow. He is one of Lola's Mother's brothers. Uncle George goes to Kiev to get Lola but she isn't at the orphanage and he goes there without papers so he gets arrested and goes to jail where he gets really sick. -
April 30 1945
Adolf Hitler commits suicide. -
January 1944
Just after the new year of 1944, Anna tells Lola and the 3 other Jews that the Nazis are losing the war and retreating. -
September 1949
Lola starts high school but drops out to start a full time job because she takes care of her self. She doesn't ask her aunt or uncle for anything. -
October 1949
Lola is a teenager but still feels like a child. The only thing she knows for sure is that she can walk. This is stemming from her trauma during WWII. -
September 1950
Lola graduates at 16 with her comptometer operator certificate. She starts working at the Saks 34th street
during the day and goes to high school during the night but drops out again. -
October 1951
Lola goes to Brighton beach where she meets her husband. He is 11 years older and is from Poland too. -
April 1952
Lola and Walter get married. Lola goes to school and gets her high school diploma. -
September 1955
Lola is 21 and worked until the birth of her first child, Deborah Renee. She was named after her Mother, Rachel. They live in a one bedroom apartment in brooklyn. -
1958
Lola's second child Michael Jay. He is named after Walter's father and Lola's Father. Walter has gone to school to design and create patterns for coats and suits and they end up moving to the suburbs of long island -
June 26th 1962
Lola is 28 years old and has been living in America for 13 years. She opens the New York Post and sees an article with a headline that says NAZI OFFICER GETS LIFE IN 9 MURDERS. Kurt Kollner is found guilty of killing Jews is Cwortkow in the years 1942-1943. Her mothers murderer was held accountable in a German court for his wrong doings. -
1966
Lola gives birth to her third child, Jeffery Scott. He is named after Lola's paternal grandfather and her oldest uncle. -
memorial day weekend 1991
50 years of silence was broken when Jane Marks asks Lola for an interview for a book she is writing about hidden children. Jane unlocks not just Lolas words but her emotions too. -
1993
Jane Mark's book on hidden children during WWII is published. Lola's story has been told for the first time. -
November 21 1994
Anna Aksenczuk, the non-jew who hid Lola in the hole was officially considered on e of the righteous at the "the righteous among the nations." -
2002
Lola receives a letter from the United States Holocaust memorial Museum in Washington D.C. looking for artifacts that survived WWII.Lola donates her dress she wore for nine months in the hole -
2008
Lola Rein Kaufman writes 'The Hidden Girl: A true story of the Holocaust -
October 1st 2014
Lola passed away at the age of 79.