Eddie Weinstein (1924–2010)

Eddie Weinstein was born Yehuda Jakob Wajnsztajn to a Jewish family in Poland. He was living in Łosice with his parents and younger brother when the Germans occupied Poland in World War II and turned the town into a ghetto. Three months later, he was deported to a forced labor camp 30 miles away. He escaped with a friend and went into hiding. In 1942, the Nazis deported most of the ghetto's population by forced march and then cattle car to the death camp at Treblinka. The next day, he was shot in the chest by an camp guard -- the bullet pierced his lungs and exited through his back. His brother Israel hid him and left to get him water, but never returned. With two other boys, he sneaked aboard an empty train car that was leaving the camp, then broke the windows and jumped. They made their way back to Łosice and Eddie again went into hiding. He joined the Polish Army after the Russians liberated the country from the Germans. He met his wife, Jean Zucker, in a displaced persons camp before emigrating to the USA after the war, settling in New York. They married and had children, and Eddie worked for many years as the owner of a knitwear factory. He published his Holocaust memoir in Hebrew in 2001 and in English in 2002 under the title Quenched Steel: The Story of an Escape from Treblinka. The title of the book was changed in 2009 by publisher Yad Vashem to 17 Days in Treblinka.