John Traurig - NNN 2022

John was born January 18, 1935, in Košice, Slovakia, as Ivan Shlomo Traurig, or in He-brew, Shlomo Ben Yisroel HaKohen. His father, Isadore, was a manager of a fabric store and his mother, Gizela, was a housewife. He had one brother, Tami, who also survived the war. His family lived an Orthodox Jewish life in Michalovce, Slovakia, the second largest town in Kosice. He has fond memories of attending Cheder as a little boy and going to shul on Shabbos and Yom Tov with his father. When the war started, nine year old John, together with his mother and his brother, escaped by horse and buggy “to deliver milk” to Budapest, Hungary. However, his father stayed in Slovakia. At first, he and his brother hid in an institution with other children. His aunt smuggled him back to Slovakia for 10,000 pengos and he rejoined his father. His father joined a group of parti-sans who fought the Nazis. The family was able to travel to Romania and survive the war. The whole family survived and returned to Slovakia in time for his Bar Mitzvah. In 1949,the family went to Vienna, Austria, and in 1950, they traveled by boat for 39 days to Australia. In Australia, Ivan and his brother were partners in a successful shirt business. He is currently married to Susan and lives part of the year in Chicago and the other part in Australia. He wakes up every morning being thankful he is a survivor, happy to be alive and proud to have two children and two grandchildren.