top of page

HANGING HITLER'S LONG JOHNS

a memoir by Roman Ward and Frank Feldinger

This is the story of Roman Ward from his birth in Poland, through the War and Displaced Persons camps, through his service in the fledgling Israeli Air Force to finally reuniting with his mother in America. This book fulfills Roman's promise to his parents that the family’s account of the Holocaust would be told and that his mother’s memoirs from that time would be printed.

THE STORY BEHIND THE BOOK

In 2010 my new friend Roman Ward (nee Wisniewski) asked me to look at the journal his mother kept during their six-year odyssey of dodging the Nazis, Polish bounty hunters, neo-Nazis and G.I. bigots during and in the aftermath of World War II. Roman had promised his mother, Jadwiga, on her deathbed that he would have her journal published in his lifetime. Three writers had attempted to make a book of her journals but Roman felt all had failed utterly. I would learn that Roman himself had never read his mother’s writing and, like many Jews who survived the Holocaust, Roman and Jadwiga had never even talked about the dangers they faced, the horrors they witnessed or the loss of over a hundred family members.

Reading the journal made it obvious why the other writers had disappointed Roman: The best story was his. In fifty years as a working journalist it is the most astonishing personal narrative I have ever heard; how a 12-year-old boy was entrusted by his father with saving his older sister and mother. “You are the only one who will survive this war,” Roman’s father told him in the Polish ghetto before Roman fled wearing a Hitler Youth uniform.

This then is the story of Roman Ward from his birth in Poland, through the War and DP camps, through his service in the fledgling Israeli Air Force to finally reuniting with his mother in America. He has honored his promise to his mother; each chapter begins with her account of what happened and the book is filled with her accounts wherever Roman could confirm and expand them.

It’s a true and amazing story.

Frank Feldinger
Los Angeles, 2016

Home: Project

"FOR MY MOTHER, MY FATHER, MY SISTER, AND FOR ALL MY RELATIVES MURDERED BY THE NAZIS. ALL SIX MILLION OF THEM."

Home: Widget

GALLERY

14731354_341989409484542_2493468361584638718_n.jpg
14729405_342000332816783_4805470679079050962_n.jpg
14729216_341991376151012_7098779676120886903_n.jpg
14729101_342003229483160_7219105414220450714_n.jpg
14725557_341990719484411_8808617479631675853_n.jpg
14724519_341993506150799_3407820534146664513_n.jpg
14721746_341992106150939_500767216903894957_n.jpg
14721611_341980702818746_4729220863632515324_n.jpg
14721507_342001252816691_4091548995969754206_n.jpg
14721448_341988786151271_3620182053079430792_n.jpg
14720614_341981269485356_6080674142466798284_n.jpg
14720525_341991526150997_2439527121391869987_n.jpg
14720522_342003572816459_6952049387191277910_n.jpg
14718642_341993752817441_5346766020966981697_n.jpg
14717333_341987612818055_17789541534191001_n.jpg
14716145_341989019484581_3975863249883398142_n.jpg
14708196_341995306150619_9184312213901808947_n.jpg
14708336_341997352817081_6961906404817298377_n.jpg
14695589_341996736150476_448119734781542177_n.jpg
14691078_341978892818927_9029722870264946925_n.jpg
14691045_341986132818203_4803810428130705178_n.jpg
14691036_342002732816543_1267452500844873297_n.jpg
14681786_342005089482974_3555346190082057879_n.jpg
14681674_341996122817204_1150571845740293177_n.jpg
14680562_342004872816329_1578915976050079784_n.jpg
14680651_341983012818515_7998291089971005065_n.jpg
14671268_342004346149715_4255802978607361999_n.jpg
14671232_341978172818999_5940058848793577162_n.jpg
14671231_341992486150901_952122521651598395_n.jpg
14671183_341980169485466_8207955978133624869_n.jpg
14670739_342002969483186_1773149681406884414_n.jpg
14670772_342001562816660_8672382143346412168_n.jpg
14670721_341993036150846_3330216527315475520_n.jpg
14657416_341999442816872_7490165257527054035_n.jpg
14657326_342002489483234_4075867644631275796_n.jpg
14657372_341989592817857_5708190211267119899_n.jpg
14657323_341995656150584_9005040334167588625_n.jpg
14656348_341991199484363_1476403535569599594_n.jpg
14650690_341977359485747_3889256778094933161_n.jpg
14650609_341981892818627_4810279364546038084_n.jpg
14650606_341995546150595_6309797172933013207_n.jpg
Home: Portfolio

ROMAN WARD

Roman Ward was born in 1929 in Kalisz, Poland. At the age of 10, with only three years of schooling, he was taken out of school when the Nazis came to Kalisz. He was soon moved to the Ghetto,  but after a short time managed to escape and spent years on the run in hiding with his mother Jadwiga. After the war ended, there was no home to return to and Roman and his mother were put in Displaced Persons Camps in Munich and Stuttgart, where he learned the art of jewelry making from World ORT, the Jewish education and vocational training  organization.

By 1948 Roman had moved to Israel, where he attended pilot school and joined the airforce. After six years of not seeing his mother, he moved to New York to be with her and began working for the well-known jeweler Jack Gutschneider. In 1960 he moved to LA, where he founded the immensely successful Roman Ward Jewelry Institute. Around 60 students attended the school each year, many of them workers who had suffered injuries and could not work elsewhere. In addition to his school, Roman opened a jewelry store in Beverly Hills that catered to some of LA's best known celebrities. Canadian movie star Glenn Ford and Italian operatic singer actress Anna Maria Alberghetti were among his clientele.

Now 87, Roman is retired and lives in West Los Angeles with his beloved wife Sachiko and their two cats. He is the proud father of Annette, a real-estate lawyer, and Isidor, known as "Doron" (Hebrew for "Gift), a successful psychiatrist. His memoir, Hanging Hitler's Longjohns, fulfills the promise he made to his mother to tell their family story.

Bios

FRANK FELDINGER

Frank Feldinger is an award winning print and broadcast journalist for over 50 years. He has written for publications as diverse as The National Enquirer and the New York Times, Fortune and Mother Jones, CBS News and Hard Copy. He is the author of A Slight Epidemic, a well-received account of the Black Plague in Los Angeles. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Lori, two sons and two dogs.

Home: About

Free E-book with Hardcover Purchase

Home: Stores_Product_specific_Widget

CONTACT

Press Inquiries
Author:
hanginghitlerslongjohns@gmail.com

  • facebook
  • twitter
Home: Contact
bottom of page