Oskar schindler biography plotinus

While those familiar with Schindler today may find that surprising, Stewart stresses that his story isn’t one-of-a-kind.

“Schindler was one of many people across Europe, including Krakow, who got into business due to the war, or who otherwise profited from it,” he explains.

He grew up in a Catholic family and initially followed in his father's footsteps by working in the family business. This act not only secured the work and lives of those listed but also demonstrated Schindler's profound transformation from a self-serving businessman to a hero risking his own safety for the sake of others.

Net Worth and Earning: Financial Struggles

Oskar Schindler's journey from an opportunistic businessman to a wartime savior was marked by significant financial challenges.

His efforts culminated in the creation of a list identifying 1,100 workers deemed essential, which allowed them to relocate with him and escape the impending horrors of Auschwitz. Schindler's charm and keen business acumen positioned him well, allowing the factory to expand its staff to over 1,700 employees by 1944, with a significant portion being Jewish workers seeking refuge from Nazi persecution.

He was lauded as a hero and received many awards including an honour on the ‘Avenue of the Righteous’ and the German Order of Merit in 1966.

Early Life and Education

Oskar Schindler was born on April 28, 1908, in Svitavy, Sudetenland, which is now part of the Czech Republic. With the increasing threat of deportations to concentration camps, Schindler expanded his hiring strategy to include Jewish workers regardless of their skills, ultimately leading to the famous designation of “Schindlerjuden.” Collaborating closely with Itzhak Stern, his Jewish accountant, Schindler orchestrated a plan to protect his employees.

“He tried different ventures, but they weren't very successful,” says Randall. Together, they navigated the tumultuous waters of wartime circumstances, with Emilie actively supporting her husband’s efforts to save Jewish workers through their enamelware factory. In early 1939, Schindler became an official member of the Nazi Party, though his motivations for doing so remain unclear.

“For me, the question is how much of it was out of a belief in Nazi ideology, versus, as some people have suggested, that as a businessman, he was pragmatic, and saw this as an opportunity to do well under the new regime, in a new reality,” says Randall.

Wasting no time, Schindler relocated to Kraków in October 1939, after Germany had invaded and started occupying Poland.

Remarkably, his past workers from the Jewish community, known as the Schindlerjuden, rallied to support him, reflecting the deep gratitude and connection formed during the war years. He joined the separatist Sudeten German Party, and in 1936 started working as a paid informant for the Abwehr – Nazi Germany’s military intelligence service.

After their separation in 1957, Oskar returned to Germany, where a series of unsuccessful business ventures led to his bankruptcy in 1963. Upon relocating to Krakow at the onset of World War II, he engaged deeply in the black market, using charm and bribery to secure lucrative contracts for his newly acquired enamelware factory. Though Keneally used documentation available at the time, as well as interviews with multiple Holocaust survivors to research his book, it is a work of historical fiction.

That same year he was promoted to second in command of his Abwehr unit and moved to Kraków following Germany’s invasion and subsequent occupation of Poland.

Although there is debate about the extent of Schindler’s involvement, the Gestapo considered Schindler to be merely a ‘confidante’ of the Abwehr rather than an agent.

However, the German authorities were never able to provide sufficient grounds to charge him, and using his charm and bribery, Schindler walked free each time.

Schindler’s list

In 1944, the Nazis relocated the Jews who worked in the Emalia factory to the Płaszów camp. Initially joining pro-Nazi organizations and even working as a spy for the German military, Schindler saw the war as an opportunity to profit.

Any Jews found beyond the walls without official permission – and anyone caught assisting them – were sentenced to death

Conditions in the ghetto were cramped and unsanitary and most Jews were forced to work for German businesses, both within and beyond the ghetto walls, including Schindler’s enamel factory.

Liquidation of the Kraków ghetto

From May 1942, the Nazi’s began shifting their policy away from exploiting Jews to plans to exterminate them, implementing systematic deportations from the ghetto to surrounding concentration camps.

By February 1943, Schindler’s primary useful relationship was with the SS Untersturmführer Amon Göth, the commandant of a new labour camp at Płaszów, just south of the Kraków ghetto.

Through a combination of bribes and his connections within the Nazi regime, Schindler got permission to establish a Plaszow subcamp on the grounds of his factory, housing approximately 1,000 Jews in sanitary conditions, and providing them with food.

By expanding his factory to include the manufacturing of military weapons and ammunition, Schindler was able to make the claim that his Jewish workers were essential for wartime production.

When the Jews working in the Emalia factory were transferred to Plaszow in the fall of 1944, Schindler lobbied for and was granted permission to relocate his munitions manufacturing operations to Brünnlitz (Brněnec), a town near where he grew up in what was then the Sudetenland, where it would be classified as a subcamp of the Gross-Rosen concentration camp.

He also made the case that the Jewish laborers who had staffed his Kraków factory were essential to his wartime production, and needed to come with him to Brünnlitz.

He was also given a ring, made using gold from dental-work taken out of the mouth of Schindlerjude Simon Jeret.