Lodz is a city in Poland that sits about 75 miles southwest of Warsaw. It has been a home for Jews long before the Nazi invasion in 1939, and had the second largest Jewish population with over 160,000 Jews living in the city. Before the Nazis invaded, the community was fairly standard, with people going about their daily lives, going to school, getting produce from grocery stores, and so on. Lodz was occupied within a week of the Nazi occupation of Poland in 1939. In February of 1940, the Nazis established a ghetto in the northeastern part of the city, and forced most of the Jewish population to live there. The ghetto was then separated from the rest of Lodz with a barbed-wire fence, and the borders were guarded by special police units. Inside the fences, the people in the ghetto were forced to work in factories, and Lodz became a major producer for Germany throughout the war. The Jewish population was given very minimal food ration, and running water was very limited. Due to the harsh living conditions, over 20% of the population died before the end of the war.
From looking at my own photo, it is evident that people back then had “normal” lives. This is because then, just like now, students went to school where they learned together in classes, and evidently took class photos every once in a while as well. Also, like some schools today, they seem to wear similar clothing, suggesting that they might have had a dress code as well. The photo I chose to share was of my Eighth grade class, and the picture of the Jewish class was also in the same range of ages. Also, both pictures show mixed gender in the class, meaning that back then women and men where presumably close to being equal, just like today.
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