David Mandel
Survivor, Holocaust educator, and successful businessman
Introduction
David "Tibor" Mandel (1929-2021) was born in the Czech town of Munkács. He was the second of Yitczak and Zisel Mandel's six children. His father ran a wood-working shop when the town was absorbed by Hungary in 1938. Six years later the Nazis invaded and in May 1944 sent the Mandel family to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where David's mother, sister, and three younger brothers were gassed upon arrival. David and his older brother Jaakov "Jeno" survived several concentration camps and were reunited with their father after the war.
After immigrating to Pennsylvania, where they had relatives, the surviving Mandels moved to Detroit, with David eventually relocating to Grand Rapids, where he first worked at William Klein clothiers and eventually came to own the business.
Beginning in the 1980s, David began to talk in public, especially to school groups, about his experiences. He was featured in the film Auschwitz: If You Cried, You Died and was especially interested in sharing his Holocaust lessons with young people.
This story traces David Mandel's journey from Munkács to life in America, from the darkest days of Hitler's Europe to years of personal and professional success in his adopted country. Please visit the West Michigan Holocaust Memorial site for other inspiring stories of survival and selflessness. We also invite you to contact us with corrections or additions you believe would enhance this story.
Life in Munkács
David Mandel was born in Munkacs, Czechoslovakia, in 1929.
Munkács, Czechoslovakia, 1930
Munkács is a scenic town, nestled in the Carpathian Mountains, and it is home to the beautiful Bereg Castle, seen in this photo .
Munkács is located in Subcarpathian (literally 'Under the Carpathian Mountains') Ruthenia: 13,000 square kilometers of lushly green, densely tree-covered mountainous terrain.
This is a 1933 map of Czechoslovakia, with Munkacs situated on the far eastern end of the country. The region has a long history of shifting borders, with 17 recorded changes of statehood. It has a very diverse mix of national and ethnic minorities, as reflected in its various names throughout history:
Mukacheve (Ukrainian). Mukaczewo (Polish)
Mukachiv (Ruthenian). Munkacs (Hungarian)
Mukachevo (Russia). Munkatsch (German)
Mukacevo (Czech, Slovak) Minkach (Yiddish)
"It is possible to: Have been born in Austria-Hungary; have been married in Czechoslovakia; have given birth in Hungary; have lived with your family in the Soviet Union; reside currently in Ukraine . . . and never have left the city of Mukacheve."
-Anna Berger found a version of this humorous statement framed on a wall during a visit to the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation in Los Angeles.
from Anna Berger's Munkacs: A Jewish World that Was, page 14
This is a bird's-eye view of the town of Munkács, Czechoslovakia.
"The city skyline is dominated by the well-fortified 14th century Palanok Castle on Lamkova Hill, rising to a height of 68 meters on Munkács's outskirts. It was once the seat of the Ruthenian 'Prince of Mukacevo' and used at different times as a fortress and a prison by successive rulers."
-from Anna Berger's "Munkács: A Jewish World that Was," page 20.
"The Latoritsa River runs through Munkács, dividing the city."
--from Anna Berger's "Munkács: A Jewish World that Was," page 20.
This is a vintage postcard of sunbathers in Munkács at the Strand on the Latoritsa River.
"The Latoritsa served as a source of entertainment and activity. In warmer weather, swimming in the river, at a spot called A Strand (Hungarian - the beach), was a popular pastime . . ."
--from Anna Berger's "Munkács: A Jewish World that Was," page 50.
This is a vintage postcard of a Munkacs market scene.
". . . the Jews of the region around Munkács were among the poorest in Europe, engaging largely in manual and agricultural labour . . . In Munkacs itself, Jews were a little better off, the majority being involved in petty commerce, trade and crafts. They were tailors, dressmakers, shoemakers, carpenters, printers, wig makers."
-from Anna Berger's "Munkács: A Jewish World that Was," page 27.
Yad Vashem Site on Munkács
The World Holocaust Remeberance Center in Jerusalem created an extensive online exhibition about the Jews of Munkács, which includes pictures of the Mandel Family
David Mandel on Munkács
The Mandel family began with the marriage of Yitzcak Mandel and Zisel Karp.
David Mandel's parents' engagement photo from 1926.
Ytzcak Mandel and Ziesel Karp
Ten years later, Yitzcak and Zisel had six children in their family in Munkács.
The Munkacs Family, 3 December 1939
From left: Shmuel-Zvi (Sandor), David (Tibor), Zisel (Zsemka) the mother, Ester Malkeh (Vera), Yaacov-Moshe (Yeno Gino), Becalel Erno, Yitzhak Izso the father, Yehudah-Arjeh (Lajos).
"My immediate family consisted of five brothers and one sister. We lived a very, very happy, close family life in Munkács. And we went to Hebrew school as kids. We went to cheder. And we were very, very happy."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
"This is a picture of my aunt's wedding, taken in 1935. One of the few pictures that I have of my family other than immediate family. On the very end, that's my grandmother, Rifka, who is my mother's mother. And in the middle is my mother's sister, Dora, with her husband, Avram. My mother is on the other end with my father, who's holding my younger brother. And in the front, there's my oldest brother . . . all those people [except my brother, father, and I] have been murdered in the death camps during the Holocaust."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
The Mandels' idyllic life in Munkács came to a halt at the end of 1938 when Hungary took control of the town. The Hungarians imposed what were mild restrictions, however, compared to what was to come.
"Kids could not go beyond the sixth grade in school. Jewish men had to have permission to travel certain distances . . . they just advanced the rules, you know, to 1943, '44, where they formed ghettos."
from David Mandel Testimony Interview, 1996
photo of Munkács Castle.
". . . the downtrodden area, the worst area, encompassed certain blocks, and that was designated to be the ghetto." David Mandel from 1996 Testimony Interview
The Munkács Ghetto (1944)
By early 1944, the Nazis formed the Munkács Ghetto, as seen in this photo. David and his family, like all of the Jews of the town, lived in this confined and wretched area until May, 1944. In a 1996 interview, David Mandel said,
"I remember in our house, we had my mother's sister, whose husband was taken away. And she had two children and some other cousins, and we were just crammed in . . . we lived in miserable conditions."
photo of Munkács Ghetto entrance, where soldiers checked identification.
David Mandel on the ghetto
Map of Munkács Ghetto
This is a map of the Munkács Ghetto, drawn by Eliyahu Rubin in Tel Aviv in 1956. Latorica Street in Munkács was designated as the ghetto, but the area of the ghetto was later reduced in size, and the Jews were forced to live in terrible poverty and forced labor.
As the war neared an end, the Nazis sent as many Jewish people as possible to concentration camps. Those in Munkacs were some of the last Jews to be deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau in May of 1944.
On the first day of the liquidation, David Mandel remembers:
"Word came that we were going to be resettled in a Hungarian prairie"; instead, we were awakened "to gunshots and yelling . . . and they were whipping people . . . And they were cutting beards and there was blood splattered all over."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
This is a photo of the liquidation of the Munkács Ghetto, which began on May 11, 1944. The Jews were eventually moved to a brick yard, where they would be again forced into labor, and from that brick yard they were to be deported to Auschwitz.
David Mandel and his family, along with all of the Munkács Jews, were assembled in a brick factory before being deported to Auschwitz.
David Mandel on the brick factory
The brick factory had "long sheds where they dried the bricks . . . They didn't feed us. We had to carry bricks from one end of the factory to the other for no reason whatsoever, just to torture us."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
Auschwitz
All of the Jews from that brick yard were eventually moved to death camps.Taken in May of 1944, Jews from Carpathia Ruthania, including Munkács, arrive at Auschwitz camp.
Jewish Survivor David Mandel Testimony
As one method of dehumanizing the prisoners, Nazis forced concentration camp prisoners -- including Jews as well as many other targeted groups of people -- to wear striped uniforms.
"When we arrived [at Auschwitz-Birkenau], they started yelling, 'Get out! Leave all your belongings behind. It's going to follow you. All able-bodied men to the left. All women and children to the right . . . And there was [sic] the people with striped garb. We didn't know who they were or where we were."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
Once the Mandel family disembarked from the train at Auschwitz-Birkenau, the women and children were ordered to line up on the right, and the able-bodied men were told to go to the left.
"My father understood. I was fourteen-and-a-half years old. He told me to stand tall and lie about my age, tell them I'm eighteen."
-David Mandel, testimony interview, 1996
Transport of Jews lined up for selection at Auschwitz in 1944.
The Mandel family children in the yard of their home in Munkács in 1943, wearing their Sabbath clothes. Top row, left to right: Shmuel-Zvi (Sandor), David (Tibor), Yaacov-Moshe (Yeno Gino). Bottom row, left to right: Ester-Malkeh (Vera), Yehudah (Lajos) and Becalel Erno.
All but David and Sandor of the Mandel children were murdered on their arrival to Auschwitz-Birkenau.
I had my brother, who was younger. And he had this little bag of food. And by that time my mother and my little brothers and my sister and my aunt and my cousins went to the right. And my father told my brother to take over the food stuff to my mother because we didn't know how long before we'll see one another again. And they wouldn't let my little brother back."
-David Mandel, testimony interview, 1996
"And then all these people who were on the right, they marched them off to this building. I remember there was some stench in the air. There was a big chimney. We didn't know anything . . . And they were ushered into this room where there were looked [sic] like showers. Now we know instead of showers they turned on these Zyklon B gas faucets and they gassed these poor souls. That's the kind of death my family met."
-David Mandel, testimony interview, 1996
This image shows one of the crematoriums at Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.
"My brother and my dad, we were ushered the other way on the double. We ran to these barracks following orders . . .They marched us off from Birkenau to Auschwitz, which is about, maybe, three kilometers. I remember going through this gate. It said, 'Arbeit Macht Frei,' or Work Makes You Free. Another lure to keep us calm . . . But the second or third day my father was . . . put on a truck and carted off. And my brother and I were left there. My brother was 17. I was 15 years old."
-David Mandel, testimony interview, 1996
After being separated from his brother (in addition to his father), surviving Birkenau, Auschwitz, Jaworzno, Gleiwitz, and Blechhammer concentration and slave labor camps. He and a friend escaped during a forced march.
David Mandel on his escape
David Mandel was officially liberated by the Russian army and reunited at a Polish Red Cross center with his father in February of 1944.
"I was in Krakow, the center where survivors gathered . . . so I ran into this fellow from my homeown. And he recognized me. And he told me that he saw my dad alive . . . And I went to this room [at the Red Cross center]. There was my dad. He survived. And how he survived, is a miracle, because he's a sugar diabetic -- and he needed . . . insulin."
-David Mandel, testimony interview, 1996
This photo shows David Mandel, his brother Yaacov-Moshe (Yeno), and their sister, Ester-Malkeh (Vera).
It was a rough life for my dad, especially, having lost his -- most of his family . . . in the middle of the night, he would cry out . . . See, my sister, who was five years old, there was a Gentile family who loved her very much. And they begged my father to have her stay with them. And at the time, my father . . . came to the decision, you know, that families have to stick together . . . Also, the fact that he sent my younger brother back to my mother, trying to help out my mother and his younger children, that sent him to his death."
from David Mandel Testimony Interview, 1996
Reunited with a Plan
David and his father left Krakow for Munkács, hoping that David's brother, and perhaps other relatives, might have survived and would make their way back to their hometown.
David's brother Yeno (John) had remained imprisoned at Auschwitz until he was marched to Ebensee Concentration Camp, which was a satellite of Mauthausen Concentration Camp.
"I found out that [David and our father] had gone back home, so . . . I headed back home . . . My brother had gone looking for me, so we had crossed paths. And I found my father there. And when I saw that the Russians were there, I didn't want to have anything to do with that, and I stayed only there a couple days and I left. I went to Praha, which is the capital city of Czechoslovakia, and eventually found my way back to Germany, and my father and my brother came there and eventually we migrated to the United States.
John Mandel Holocaust Testimony, May 26, 1981
David, his father, and his older brother, Yeno, were eventually reunited in Munkacs, where they decided they would try to emigrate.
"So we left Munkacs, and we went to Czechoslovakia . . . And after that, we decided to make arrangements . . . to migrate, emigrate to the United States, because [our aunt] was the only relative we really have aside from Europe. So we went to Germany."
This is David Mandel's American Expeditionary Forces Displaced Persons Record from March of 1946.
This is the United States sponsor document for the only survivors of the Mandel family: Isaak, Jeno, and David Mandel
". . . we were preparing ourselves to start a new life . . . On July 15, 1946, we arrived in New York."
from David Mandel Testimony Interview 1996
A New Life in Michigan
Detroit to Grand Rapids, Michigan
While in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, David had taken "a job, and [he] went to night school to learn English. [His] brother went to continue on as a dental technician. And we started a new life."
-David Mandel from 1996 Interview
". . . we had an aunt who lived in Pennsylvania. She brought us out to this country. And we had some relations here in Detroit. And my father, of course, was a widower then. And one of our cousins knew this lady who she thought might be a good wife for my father, and he came to Detroit and met this lady, who is our mom, we love her very dearly . . . And when he married her, we came to Detroit, my brother and I."
from John Mandel Holocaust Testimony, May 26, 1981
David (2nd from left, standing) and his brother, Yeno (John) (7th from right, standing), participated in the Maccabees Soccer League in Detroit, Michigan, in 1947.
". . . we, as refugees, survivors of camps, most of us, formed a soccer team called the Maccabees."
from David Mandel Testimony Interview, 1996
This is David Mandel's successful Petition for Naturalization from February of 1948.
David took a job as a salesman in Grand Rapids, Michigan, with the William Klein Store for Men, a boutique shop located in the prestigious Pantlind Hotel -- known today as the Amway Grand Hotel.
David went on to become the partner and eventual owner of the William Klein Store for Men, and he even branched out to several shops in the Grand Rapids area. He very successfully sold fine men's clothing, such as this dress shirt, displayed in the Grand Rapids Public Museum.
Items such as this specially made clothing hanger, neck ties, and other clothing are currently on display in the Grand Rapids Public Museum.
These items are significant for their "historical association with a downtown Grand Rapids specialty retailer. The history of some of Grand Rapids' long-time retailers still resonates today because of the active role these businesses and their owners played in contributing to the development of the city, its economy, arts, and culture."
Bearing Witness
Beginning in the 1980s, David Mandel started speaking to local groups about his experiences during the Holocaust. Here he explains his motivation:
Jewish Survivor David Mandel Testimony
He was also the subject of two documentaries. The first film is entitled, "Auschwitz: If You Cried You Died," and it earned a place as documentary short and official selection of the 2008 Heartland Film Festival in Indiana.
Mr. Mandel was also the subject of the "The Fire Within: The David Mandel Story," which is available at The Zekelman Holocaust Center in Farmington Hills, Michigan.
By the mid-1970's, David Mandel had begun telling his story to reporters, adult groups, and many middle schools and high schools in west Michigan. He received several honors, including this degree from Grand Valley.
Grand Valley State University Press Release regarding the awarding of a Doctorate of Humane Letters degree to David Mandel in December of 1988.
David Mandel is seen, far right, at a special convocation ceremony on the Allendale campus of Grand Valley State University in December, 1988.
As a Holocaust survivor, David Mandel also participated in the March of the Living twice.
"The International March of the Living is an annual educational program, bringing individuals from around the world to Poland and Israel to study the history of the Holocaust and to examine the roots of prejudice, intolerance and hatred."
from March of the Living Website
David Mandel never married, but he was very close to his brother's children.
"This is a picture of my brother's daughter, Sherry, her husband, David, and the two kids. In the center, the little one is Kiva, and his brother Noah. And since this picture's been taken, they have a third one whose name is Ezra. They live in Cleveland, Ohio. Very proud of my new family."
from David Mandel Testimony Interview, 1996
David Mandel passed away at the age of 92, on October 7, 2021.
To the very end of his life, David Mandel testified to the toll of the Holocaust on his family and worked to share its lessons with future generations.
He recorded this video for the Holocaust Education Resource Center in Talahassee, Florida, in 2021
Interview 10: David Mandel
