The abandoned 18th century Jewish cemetery in Myslowice, Poland has been cleaned up and is being cared for in what a woman who raised the alarm about its condition just one year ago calls a “miracle.”
Małgorzata Płoszaj, a Śląsk Judaica researcher who collaborates with Virtual Shtetl, visited the cemetery a few days ago, on December 30.
“I saw a miracle,” she wrote In a letter sent to Virtual Shtetl.
Residents of Myslowice have done things that a year ago seemed impossible. A group of enthusiasts “recovered” the Jewish cemetery for the world. Today there are no thickets, bottles, debris, garbage. You can see the gravestones, alleys, foundations of the funeral home.
Just one year ago, in January 2013, Płoszaj raised an alarm over the condition of the cemetery in an open letter to authorities:
“I have seen many ruined cemeteries but I was shocked by what I have just seen in the Mysłowice graveyard. The cemetery is used by the locals as a dump fill, a place for drinking sprees and a place where you can dispose of all kinds of objects which the locals do not need anymore. I cannot find any explanation for such behavior of the local population, nor can I justify institutions which neighbor the cemetery, on which they regularly dumped leaves over the past years. There are also piles of leaves discarded by an adjacent senior high school. Heaps made of leaves cover tombstones of former Myslowice residents near the cemetery fence. Is this situation not a shame for the town? How can the locals explain themselves?.”
Starting last August a clean-up operation was initiated, carried out by volunteers “armed with only bags, shears and rakes”, citizen activists, others, with the support of the town.
We posted on some of these developments as they took place. Virtual Shtetl writes:
Within a few weeks of hard work from the cemetery were tons of rubbish were cleared very dense vegetation, which prevented access to most of the tombstones, set over 40 overturned tombstones.
According to the Virtual Shtetl report, social activists who spearheaded the operation, including Bogusława Polak, intend to continue maintenance and care for the cemetery.
Read full article on Virtual Shtetl