The Schiffer family visits Mohács

The Schiffer family visits Mohács, Erzsébet’s hometown on the Danube, in summer 1932. (00:16) Adults and children in bathing suits. They swim in a wooden structure moored to the shore of the Danube. János and his mother, Erzsébet Schiffer. (01:29) János and his cousins play in Klári and János Molnar’s yard with a toy stroller and ball. (01:53) Nurse-maid (brief). The children play outdoors. (02:42) MS, Erzsébet's mother Jenny Tornai (nee Reicher) and Klári seated at an outdoor table, smile and nod for the camera. Three children sit at a table. The family group eats a meal. The three children sit on a bench with the nurse-maid. (04:14) More swimming in the Danube, children jump or dive into the water from the wooden rafts. (05:02) The children play on a swing in the Popper family’s yard, then play in the garden. Nice CUs of the children, kissing. (05:58) Erzsébet poses with her mother and sister Margit. Brief shot of János Schiffer (toddler) walking across yard. (06:14) Courtyard of the family home (earlier than previous sequence). Peter Molnar in a sailor suit and his sister Anni with a doll, in March 1930. The children from Mohács take turns and walk towards camera. (06:57) Peter climbs a tree. (07:13) The children greet their uncle János Molnar. (07:18) The Poppers stand on the street, outside the entrance to their home in Mohács. MS, Sandor holds his daughter, Anni. (07:49) Margit with Eva in a stroller. (08:05) WS, Peter comes home from school with satchel, runs to parents when he notices them filming. (08:20) Father János cleans Peter’s face. (08:25) Nurse-maid and Eva Popper play with ball, around 1929, on the street outside their home. They also play with a child-sized parasol. Anni sits in the window with her grandmother, and plays ball with cousin Eva. (09:37) János (elder) sits on a stool reading paper, walks towards the camera. The children and family continue to play on the street, and look at photographs. (10:28) Pan, landscape, filmed from train. City scenes and countryside. (11:36) Child Anni sits outside her home reading a book. An older girl plays ball. Grandmother looks out the window, and talks with the family. The three women look at photographs; children play ball. (13:45) MS, the young couple, Erzsébet and Ernö, on a steam-boat trip on the Danube, around 1929. Views from the boat, trees along shore. (15:00) Child in sailor uniform. (15:06) Margit Popper and Klári Molnar hold Margit’s daughter, Eva Popper (born 1927). Family members gather in the garden (quick shots), including Tornai grandmother Jenny, Ernö, and Sandor Popper. (15:51) End “Danubius Pathé Baby Budapest” Ernö (Ernest) Schiffer, born in Námesztó in 1893, studied medicine at university in Budapest. He enlisted in the Austro-Hungarian Army during World War I and was in charge of a medical unit on the Russian Front. In the 1920s, he worked at the Jewish Hospital in Budapest and specialized in the new field of radiology, developing techniques for the X-ray apparatus, various shutters, and cooling devices, and diagnostic dyes and methods. He also found time to study the new field in Vienna, Zurich, and Stockholm. The severe exposure to X-rays he received during this period likely later resulted in his early death from leukemia. He met Erzsébet while interning at the Jewish Hospital in Budapest. They married in 1928 and had János (John) in 1930. The family lived in Budapest next to City Park (Városliget). Ernö bought a car (an Opel) and learned to drive in the mid-1930s. Their daughter Éva was born in 1933. By about 1941 the Nazi threat was becoming more serious in Hungary. Ernö had a patient who was a Unitarian minister who agreed to baptize the Schiffers into the Unitarian church. Initially, Ernö was partly protected from the changing laws against Jews because of his military service and that he treated many influential persons (including the regent) as patients; there was also a minor distinction between Jews who had recently settled in Hungary and those whose families had lived there a long time. After March 19, 1944 yellow stars had to be worn and the family moved into a designated Jewish apartment. Ernö was able to obtain protective passports for the family from the Swedish embassy (through the Wallenberg initiative). Ernö was taken in a labor brigade in summer 1944 to dig trenches for the defense of the city; many of his family members went into hiding. In October 1944, the Schiffers were briefly moved into a house under Swedish embassy protection, and then back to their apartment at Katona Jozsef utca 23/a where they had kept a hidden store of food. Ernö had been marching with the labor brigade towards Germany but simply walked away from them one day and crossed the Danube by foot back to Budapest where he reunited with his family. The Schiffers remained together in the apartment during the Russian siege of the city until they were liberated in January 1945. Born in Mohács in 1899, Erzsébet (known as Bözske) was also the first in her family to go on the university track at a gymnasium in Fiume (on the Adriatic), followed by studies at the University of Pécs in Slovakia and the Medical University in Budapest, where she focused on dentistry (the quickest specialty to start earning a living). She met Ernö Schiffer while interning at the Jewish Hospital in Budapest. They married in 1928 and had János (John) in 1930. The family lived in Budapest next to City Park (Városliget). Erzsébet worked part-time for the National Health Insurance and had a dental office in the apartment. Their daughter Éva was born in 1933. By about 1941 the Nazi threat was becoming more serious in Hungary. Ernö had a patient who was a Unitarian minister who agreed to baptize the Schiffers into the Unitarian church. After March 19, 1944, yellow stars had to be worn and the family moved into a designated Jewish apartment; while in Southern Hungary, Erzsébet’s sisters and their families were deported to a ghetto and transported by train to Auschwitz in early summer where they perished. Ernö was able to obtain protective passports for the family from the Swedish embassy (through the Wallenberg initiative). In October 1944, the Schiffers were briefly moved into a house under Swedish embassy protection, and then back to their apartment at Katona Jozsef utca 23/a where they had kept a hidden store of food. Erzsébet and her children remained in the Budapest apartment during the Russian siege of the city until they were liberated in January 1945. Bözske and Éva came to the US in 1957 in the aftermath of the 1956 Hungarian revolution.