Kievitstraat 38

Franz Pollack, the eldest of the two children of internist Kurt Pollack and his Dutch wife Gertrud Simons, grew up in Breslau in a liberal Jewish environment.

Franz Pollack, the eldest of the two children of internist Kurt Pollack and his Dutch wife Gertrud Simons, grew up in Breslau in a liberal Jewish environment.
After primary school, he went to the Johannes Gymnasium in 1928, which he had to leave prematurely in 1933, after the Pollacks had visited the Netherlands in the summer of that year to discuss with the family there the situation caused by the takeover of power. The visit led to a decision about Franz's future: he would follow a technical training in the Netherlands, where his mother's family would help him in every way.
Back in Breslau, Franz went on to work as a volunteer for a few months at the Maschinen- und Pumpen-Fabrik Gebr. Stern. He learned practical skills such as milling and turning, and at the end of the year he left with a favorable certificate.
In the spring of 1934 he moved to Amsterdam. A room was found for him in the De Lairessestraat - he later moved to the Olympiaplein - and during the 1934/1935 school year he attended the fourth year of the trade school "Van den Hooff" on the Ruysdaelkade, which he needed to be admitted. can be up to the MTS. He passed with brilliant grades, did a good entrance exam for the Secondary Technical School "Amsterdam" on the Plantage Muidergracht, and three years later he obtained the final diploma in mechanical engineering.
Those were good years. Franz was a young man appreciated by everyone who knew him. He did his job with dedication, got on well with his fellow students and was a welcome member of the Amsterdam branch of the Jewish youth federation.
Just before Franz obtained his MTS diploma, his parents and his brother Fritz also moved to the Netherlands, a step that Dr. Pollack meant that he could no longer practice his profession because his German diplomas were not recognized in the Netherlands. It would take until 1943 before he could work as a doctor again, but then in Westerbork.

Kurt and Gertrud Pollack went to live in Leiden with their youngest son. They saw little Franz. Due to the lack of an income they found themselves in extremely difficult financial circumstances, so that they could hardly afford the travel money.
In September 1940 the German order came that all non-Dutch Jews had to leave the coastal region. The Pollacks found shelter with a Jewish family in Enschede, which brought them closer to Franz, who had started in September 1938 as a volunteer at the Machinefabriek Gebr. Stork and Co. NV in Hengelo. A year later he was appointed as a draftsman in the company drawing office.
In Twente he also remained active in the Jewish Youth Federation in addition to his work. In the absence of a department in Hengelo, he joined the Almelo department.
The career for which Franz had prepared with such dedication lasted no more than two years. Early in the morning on Sunday 14 September, he was taken away from his room in Kievitstraat. Immediately the next day, Stork began to do everything in his power to get him released, but before anything could be achieved, the transport left for Mauthausen. Franz died there that same month. He was 23 years old.

His father died on January 14, 1945 in Bergen-Belsen, his mother died on April 25, 1945 in Trobitz, in the train in which the prisoners of Bergen-Belsen were put on a transport without a final destination.
His brother, Fritz, was the only survivor of the family to be freed in Trobitz, married Elly Boasson, and left for Israel after his studies in Wageningen. In Israel he had two daughters and five grandchildren.

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