Historical Background and Interviews
I. Ludvipol: A Modem Shtetl Ludvipol: A Modern Shtetl
The Family Business Despite the Depression and growing anti-Semitism, at the time of Aharon’s childhood, Ludvipol was lively, even idyllic. The town was small enough for people to say that when a carriage entered Ludvipol, the heads of the horses stuck out on one end of town and the wheels of the carriage on the other. Ludvipol was surrounded by natural beauty. On one side were the waters of the Slusch River and on the other, a branch of the Slus- ch formed two creeks, the Smorodinka and Habel. Near the center of town was a third creek, the Kolchik. A dam on the Smorodinka Creek guided water to a mill pond, a section of which was kept clear of vegetation and served as a recreational spot where the children practiced swimming and the adults exercised and enjoyed the sun. The men bathed there on Friday afternoons before Shabbat. Some- times they bathed in the Slusch River, and sometimes they hauled drinking and cleaning water from the Slusch; only rarely did they haul water from the big river in early or late winter, when the ice might suddenly crack and they might slide under it to their doom. For a spring hike or picnic, the favorite destination was a beautiful park east of the Slusch, nestled among towering trees near the ruins of the ancient castle. Beyond the park lay a meadow and then the vast forest. Most of the houses were neat, one-story homes; larger houses of two stories stood at the corners of the town. Most of the three hundred or so families who lived in them were traditional families with neither too much nor too little. Ludvipol’s council had decided, in the early 1930s, to spruce up the town: The main streets and the marketplace were paved, which decreased the amount of unsightly and inconvenient mud. This made it easier to drive a car into town — the county supervi- sor was one of the few who did. The wide wooden sidewalks were replaced with brick walkways, although they were too narrow and only accommodated two people abreast. Lovely new plantings of trees and grasses graced the main street, and everyone was ordered
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