Tadeusz Pankiewicz and the Krakow Ghetto

Under the German Nazi occupation of Poland during World War II, the Podgórze district was closed off in March 1941 and became what is now known as the Krakow Ghetto. Within the walls of the Kraków Ghetto there were four prewar pharmacies, all of them owned by non-Jews. Pankiewicz was the only proprietor to decline the German offer of relocating to a pharmacy outside of the ghetto, in the Nazi occupied city. He was given permission to continue operating his establishment as the only pharmacy in the Ghetto, and reside on the premises. His staff were given passage permits to enter and exit the ghetto for work. Whatever his motivations were to begin with, we can only guess. The neighborhood was not Jewish beforehand, so why he chose this risky path we do not know (he did write a book himself, but the reason he is best known is from the book on Oskar Schindler, which Spielberg brought to the silver screen). But whatever it was, he made a difference in the lifes of those who did not have a choice about being there. The often-scarce medications and pharmaceutical products supplied to the ghetto's residents, often free of charge, substantially improved their quality of life. In effect, apart from health care considerations, they contributed to survival itself. In his published testimonies, Pankiewicz makes particular mention of hair dyes used by those disguising their identities and tranquilizers given to children required to keep silent during Gestapo raids. The pharmacy became a meeting place for the ghetto's intelligentsia, and a hub of underground activity. Pankiewicz and his staff, Irena Drozdzikowska, Helena Krywaniuk, and Aurelia Danek, risked their lives to undertake numerous clandestine operations: smuggling food and information, and offering shelter on the premises for Jews facing deportation to the camps.