Figure 1.--This photograph shows a shoe factory in the Lodz Ghetto, The factories did not employ children, but younger teenagers worked there.

Lodz was an important industrial city. Thus many Jews were skilled workers or had a variety of industrial skills. Rumkowski believed that the Jews might be able to survive if they proved useful to the Germans. Given the options available, this was not an irrational response. And there were individuals in the NAZI hierarchy that wanted to use the Jews as a slave labor source to support the war effort and to benefit frompersonally from licrative war contracts. And after the disaster before Moscow (December 1941), it ws becoming increasingly clear that it would not be a short war. Fighting the Soviet Union, Britain, and America, NAZI Germany would have to expand its war production. The Lodz Jews in cooperation with NAZI authorities established a wide range of factories in the Ghetto. One account notes more than 100 factories (August 1942). This created jobs for all those able to work. Ghetto factories did not employ children for the most part the workers had to be over 14 years old. Younger children and elderly workers could find jobs in the mica splitting factories. There were many garment and shoe factories, especially factories producing German military uniforms. One factory even produced the fancy emblems worn by Germany officers. Young girls were employed here because of their small, dexterious hands. There were many other types of plants including even munitions.

Created: 3:48 PM 6/5/2008
Last updated: 3:48 PM 6/5/2008