Michael Opas
Date of birth
12/18/1910
Name of father, occupation
Baker, owned a bakery
Immediate family (names, birth order)
Parents, 3 sisters, 2 brothers, Michael
Who survived the Holocaust?
One sister and Michael
Michael Opas was born in Łódź, Poland in 1910. In his youth, he learned the furrier trade but as an adult he operated his own shoe business. At the start of World War II, Michael, his wife and young son fled to Warsaw where they were imprisoned in the Warsaw ghetto. Michael was sent to Majdanek then to Budzyn, a forced labor camp that repaired airplanes. From there he was sent to various camps like Ostrowiec and Auschwitz-Birkenau before finally being sent to Buchenwald, where he was liberated by the American Army. At liberation Michael was grossly underweight and had to recuperate for two months in a makeshift hospital in Buchenwald until he regained some weight and his health. After that he spent time in the Landsberg DP camp and then moved to the Stuttgart DP camp where he re-married and started a family. Michael, his new wife and one-year-old daughter moved to Detroit in 1949.
To learn more about this survivor please visit The Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive, University of Michigan-Dearborn.
https://holocaust.umd.umich.edu/interview.php?D=opas§ion=59
To learn more about this survivor please visit The Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive, University of Michigan-Dearborn.
https://holocaust.umd.umich.edu/interview.php?D=opas§ion=59
What DP Camp were you after the war?
Landsberg and Stuttgart
Where did you go after being liberated?
Landsberg DP camp
When did you come to the United States?
July 1949
Where did you settle?
Detroit, Michigan
How is it that you came to Michigan?
Cousins lived in Detroit
Occupation after the war
Furrier and then worked as a leather cutter for General Motors
When and where were you married?
First wife died in concentration camp, met second wife in Stuttgart
Children
One daughter
Interviewer:
Paul Draznan
To learn more about this survivor, please visit:
The Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive, University of Michigan
https://holocaust.umd.umich.edu/opas/
https://holocaust.umd.umich.edu/opas/
