Helene Frankle died Sunday. She was 82.
Frankle was born May 29, 1923 in Kolo, Poland. Her family was relocated to the Warsaw Ghetto in 1939, where she met her beloved husband, Bernard, who died in 2000. They escaped through the sewers during the Uprising in 1943 and lived under false papers in Vienna until 1947, when they immigrated to the United States. Their parents and siblings all perished. Her story is included in “Voices of the Holocaust,” edited by Sylvia Rothchild.
After attending night school to learn English, Frankle obtained a bachelor’s degree from Roosevelt University in 1962 and a master’s degree in social work from the Jane Addams College of Social Work at the University of Illinois in 1965. She worked as a social worker at Jewish Family and Community Service for more than 20 years, initiating its Children of Survivors Group, and doing research in Israel on child survivors of the Holocaust. Frankle enjoyed travel, bridge, reading, tennis, theater and all cultural and intellectual pursuits. A funeral will take place at 1 p.m. on Friday at Sinai Temple in Michigan City, Ind. Sommerfeld-Smith Family Funeral Home, New Buffalo, Mich. is in charge of arrangements. Call 269.469.2233 for more information.
Frankle is survived by her sons, David and his wife Rosemarie of Malibu, Larry and his wife Ellen and Mark and his wife Mary; her grandchildren, Jaime, Stephanie, Nicholas, Lauren, Sean and Jason; her nephews Anthony Novak and Richard Novak and his wife Tammy and her closest friend, Anna Novak. Memorial donations may be made to the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago (www.juf.org), Doctors Without Borders (www.doctorswithoutborders.org) or the charity of your choice.