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Pokempner Family
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#pkpnr-1:

Chana Kier (born in Birzai to Leibe Freedman and Asna nee Even )
standing by her car in Chicago with her cousin, my father Dave Kempner
in 1937.
Marlene Dobrin
Family names Kempner, PoKempner, PaKempner, Mirvis, Rief, Melman,
Krechmer, Litt, Lunch, Meyerson, Marovich, Shanker, Hillman, Zox,
Sachs, Fleischman, Segall, Friedman, Dobrin, Schuman, Fuxman

#pkpnr-2:

On the left; Jack, right; Dave Kempner (my father) and their
grandfather Yitzhak Iche Zvi Nafthali Hirsch PoKempner. I do believe
it is in Radviliskis ( Jack or Birzai) Lithuania.

Marlene Kempner Dobrin
Family names Kempner, PoKempner, PaKempner, Mirvis, Rief, Westerman,
Melman, Zox, Sachs, Krechmer, Litt, Lunch, Meyerson, Marovich, Shanker,
Herzog, Hillman, Fleischman, Segall, Friedman, Dobrin, Schuman, Fuxman

 

#pkpnr-3:

The Shanken (Scheinker) family standing in front of (I presume) their
dental office in Birzai probably 1923-1914. My father Dave Kempner
told me that Scheinker stood for a canker sore hence last name
referring to the occupation. My father Dave is the young man in the
back row in the middle of the picture
and he is standing with his cousins behind two young girls who I
believe is Tirtza with her arms folded and Ruchel.

Marlene Kempner Dobrin

 

#pkpnr-4:

Gravestone of Yitzhak Iche Zvi Nafthali Hirsch
PoKempner 1923 Radviliski Lithuania.

 

My nephew Ward Karson is the first of our family since 1921 to go back
to his Grandpa Dave Kempner (Radviliskis) & Grandma Bess Rief Kempner
(Seduva) home towns (villages?) in Lithuania. He met a young man
Gediminas Vaicekauskas who worked at some kind of community services
office in the Radviliskis city center who spoke a bit of English.
Gediminas told Ward of the defunct Jewish cemetery outside of town and
he left his office in the presence of his managers to drive Ward to the
cemetery.

The Jewish cemetery in Radviliskis is closed, but Gediminas convinced
the caretaker (a 60 year old woman who has been the lone caretaker of
the vandalized property for the past 40 years) to put the guard dog in
a pen and allow Ward through the locked gates. The weeds were
knee-high, and so they had to wade through the weeds to eventually get
to Yitzchak Zvi Hirsch PoKempner's grave. Ward was standing in front of
his great, great grandfather's grave. Ward did not take a photo of the
grave, since it was raining outside and he wasn't entirely sure if it
was the correct grave. Only later did he realize it was the right
grave.

Ward took a bus to Seduva. He was successfully able to find the name of
two streets which Bess Kempner's family lived on, but was not able to
find the homes. After that, he took a bus to Kaunas and spent the
evening there. The next morning he went to the Ninth Fort of Kaunas
and toured the facility in order to understand how and where people
were killed during World War II. He walked around the entire old city
of Kaunas for many hours and then took a bus to Vilnius.

Marlene Kempner Dobrin

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