From August 5 to 19, 2019, nearly 30 volunteers from the US-based Bialystok Cemetery Restoration Project (BCRP) worked on the Bagnowka Jewish Cemetery in Białystok, Poland, joined by local Polish volunteers. The work coincided with that of the German-based Aktion Suchnezeichen Friedendienste with 15 volunteers from Germany, Poland and Israel, coordinated by Centrum Edukacji Obywatelskiej Bialymstoku Polska-Izrael.
In our Jewish Cemeteries Portal section, we publish a lengthy and detailed illustrated report on the restoration work accomplished during the 2019 Summercamp, including statistics of work completed, evaluation of best practices under scrutiny this season, highlights from the inscriptions that have reentered the historical record this season.
The report was prepared by Dr. Heidi M. Szpek, a translator, epigrapher and historian of this cemetery and author of a book about it, Bagnówka: A Modern Jewish Cemetery on the Russian Pale tells the story of Białystok’s last Jewish cemetery and its epitaphs.
In her report on the 2019 work, she describes what she defines as THE 2019 Story — showing how the graves of the past intersect with the present, and noting preservation questions raised by these connections.
Dr. Szpek wrote a Have Your Say personal essay for JHE about her work at the cemetery, Epitaphs: Poignant Connections to a World Now Gone, which we published in February, 2017.
Click here to access the 2019 Report
Click here to access the Report for 2017 (also on JHE)
Click here to read Heidi Szpek’s Have Your Say