THE MUSEUM OF FAMILY HISTORY presents

The Life of Nina Finkelstein
RECOLLECTIONS OF A FRIEND

 

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The Childhood Years

 



1921


1925



1928



1928



1928



1930

 


NINA FINKELSTEIN
Kovno (Kaunas), Lithuania
1921-1930


"Nina was born in 1920 in Kovno (Kaunus) to Ozer Finkelstein, a lawyer, and Bertha Levine. Her father had been married once before and had children from that marriage--two daughters and a son, I think, who lived in Russia. Bertha had been the piano teacher of Ozer’s children and he fell madly in love with her. Apparently Bertha was not having any of that and kept running away, but eventually he caught her. In spite of this, Nina remained on very good terms with her half-siblings, and actually told me that her sisters, being so much older, were mother figures to her.

In the 1930s, Ozer became a member of the Duma and was quite a prominent figure in Lithuania. He taught law, and a physio classmate of mine, Sarah Shillingovsky, told me that her father was a student of Nina’s father.

The family was quite affluent, taking frequent trips to Paris and many beach resorts. The 1925 photograph of Nina, taken when she was five years old, looks like she is wearing designer clothes from Paris.

Ozer died sometime in the 1930s, and Nina kept his photos and obviously had a very close relationship with him.

When she was a teenager, Nina had a boy friend, Adja Anshell. In 1940 or 1941, when the Germans were approaching Lithuania, Adja was able to get a visa for himself and his mother from Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese consul in Kovno. He wanted Nina to go with him, but she refused because her mother was dying of breast cancer and her grandmother was old and wouldn’t have been able to go."


-Jo Ann Goldwater




 

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