Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Holocaust survivors honored
Birthday car parades, cakes part of party
Goodman Jewish Family Services of Broward County surprised two local centenarian Holocaust survivors with birthday car parades that featured vehicles carrying balloons and cakes.
One caravan celebrated the 100th birthday of Hilda Frenkel of Hallandale Beach. The other celebrated the 101st birthday of Helen Becher in Coral Springs.
Frenkel was pleasantly surprised by the celebration as well wishers drove by her home.
“I couldn’t believe that they would do a thing like that for me. There were so many cars with balloons and with my picture. I enjoyed seeing everyone come out to sing ‘Happy birthday’ to me. That was very nice.”
Frenkel was born on June 14, 1920, in Storozhynets, Romania (modern-day Ukraine). She never thought she would live past 21 years old when she was sent to the Bershad Ghetto in Transnistria, which was a German and Romanian-occupied territory during World War II.
During her years in a concentration camp, she watched her parents and younger brother die of typhus. She was liberated from the camp at age 24. She later met and married Sal Frenkel, moved to New York and raised three children.
A day before the car parade, Frenkel was able to celebrate her milestone birthday with family members from around the world on a Zoom call. While the family originally had a party planned at a restaurant with people flying in, that celebration was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Her granddaughter Zipporah Frenkel from Nashville came up with the idea for the virtual celebration.
” I know it meant so much to her to be able to still be with her family in some way,” Zipporah Frenkel said. “Im so grateful to everyone who came out for the parade and who were able to make the Zoom call, and to everyone who played a part in making this celebration truly special for her, despite having to cancel what we had planned.”
Hilda Frenkel’s daughter Charlotte Tomic-Mowerman of Miami Beach said the highlight from the Zoom celebration was having so many family members and other people from different parts of the country and Argentina who hadn’t seen her mother in a long time see each other on a screen.
“Everyone was able to see each other and it was a family reunion in a way. It was all for a good reason for everyone to wish her ‘Happy birthday’ and sing her ‘Happy birthday’ and celebrate her mental capabilities at this age.”
Tomic-Mowerman said her mother, who lives alone with aides, reads her Kindle every day, watches the news and tells her what to watch on television.
Becher, who was born on June 15, 1919 in Rzeszow, Poland, said regarding the car parade celebrating her birthday, “I felt so happy that they [Goodman JFS] remembered my birthday.”
“I appreciate that these people who have taken care of me were there.”