Jaap Polak (1912–2015)

Jacob "Jaap" Polak was born to a religious Jewish family in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, that could trace its roots in the country back 200 years. He attended a Jewish elementary school until age 12, and then entered a commercial high school, where he studied accounting. After graduating, he took a job at the Amsterdam Carlton Hotel. While working, he also studied to become a certified public tax consultant; in 1937, he passed the qualifying exam, and joined his father's accounting practice. In 1943, during Nazi Germany's occupation of the Netherlands, Polak was deported to the Westerbork camp. There he became principal of the camp's school. The school was equipped with books and supplies because the Nazis wanted to foster the illusion that Jews were simply on their way to "resettlement in the east." Most children attended class for only a week before being transported. In February 1944, Polak was deported to the concentration camp at Bergen-Belsen. He survived to be liberated by the Red Army in April 1945 and then a bout with typhus. His parents Frederick and Grietje Polak and sister Juul died in the Holocaust. After the war, he returned to the Netherlands and his accounting practice. He married Catharina (Ina) Soep, with whom he had three children. The family emigrated to the USA in 1951. Known as Jack Polak, he was a founder and served as president and chairman of the Anne Frank Center USA (AFC-USA) for many years, and was the keynote speaker at more than 100 openings of the Anne Frank traveling exhibitions nationwide. He also spoke at schools, churches, synagogues, universities, and private organizations. He was a founding board member of the Westchester Holocaust Education Center, in Purchase, New York, and a member of the NY State Commission on the Holocaust. On his 80th birthday in 1992, he was honored by Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands with the Order of Orange-Nassau for his work as the president of the AFC-USA and for his public speaking. Mr. Polak and his wife co-wrote a memoir entitled Steal a Pencil for Me (2000), largely comprised of love letters they wrote to each other during their time in the concentration camps. A documentary film of the same name based on the book, directed by Michael Ohayon, appeared in 2007 and won many awards. Mr. Polak contributed two chapters to the 1998 book Inspired Lives: Exploring the Role of Faith and Spirituality in the Lives of Extraordinary People by Johanna Laufer and Kenneth S. Lewis, and also wrote a chapter on the Netherlands for Sephardim and the Holocaust (1987), edited by Dr. M. Mitchell Serels and Rabbi Solomon Gaon.