Clara Kramer

Clara was born in Zolkiew, Poland April 9, 1927. When the Germans invaded her town in 1942, eighteen people including Clara and her family went into hiding in a crawlspace they dug under one of their homes. They were hidden underground for almost two years by Valentin Beck and his family. While in hiding, Clara kept a diary. The original diary is in the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC.

After the war, Clara met her husband Sol Kramer in the Displaced Persons camps in Austria and they were married in 1949. They made Aliyah to Israel where their children Philip and Eli were born. They came to America in 1957 and settled in Elizabeth, NJ in 1965. They were drawn to Elizabeth by its community of Holocaust Survivors and immediately became active members of that community.

Clara and her husband, Sol, were active in numerous causes and communal organizations and took leadership roles in the Jewish Educational Center, Elizabeth; the Jewish Federation of Central NJ; State of Israel Bonds; the Green Lane YM & YWHA, Union; Jewish Family and Children’s Service; the Central NJ Jewish Home for the Aged; and Trinitas Regional Healthcare Foundation.

Clara believed that Holocaust Survivors had an obligation to tell their story for generations to come and together with a small group of survivors, co-founded the Holocaust Resource Center at Kean University. Due to their efforts, thousands of teachers have been educated on the horrors of the Holocaust and received training in order to perpetuate that knowledge with generations of students.

In her 80’s, Clara together with co-author Stephen Glantz, wrote Clara’s War --- a memoir of her wartime experience hiding from the Nazis. The book was published in over a dozen languages on five different continents.

Clara was predeceased by her sister Manya, who was killed by the Nazis, and by her husband Sol Kramer to whom she was married for 62 years. She is survived by a brother Alex Orli; sister Naomi (Metukah) Kornberg; son Philip Kramer and Wife Drora; son Eli Kramer and wife Randi; grandchildren Micki & and husband David; Tracy & husband Ryan; Brian and Fiancée Alicia; Jamie and husband Andrew; and Mindy and husband Mark; and great-grandchildren Cooper, Boston, Zev and Alexander.

Contributions in her memory may be made to the Holocaust Resource Foundation of Kean University. http://www.kuhrc.org