Not online: the recording is held by the project and is not on Media Collections Online, YouTube or archive.org. Everything below is a paraphrase of a machine transcript, the weaker of this site's two transcript layers — see how it was made.
Interview with Moyshe Wanshilboym in Berdichev on 25 May 2015, recorded on an audio track. He starts with his Yiddish schooling and Shavuot food, then gives his family history, prewar life and the Berdichev synagogues. The longest part is his account of surviving the war: escaping from police and from the pits where Jews were shot, working for peasants, and the return to Berdichev. It ends with his work at a mill after the war and how he met his wife. Second half of an interview in Berdichev on 25 May 2015 with Moyshe Wanshilboym, an elderly man who speaks Yiddish with strong Russian admixture. He talks about the Jews of Berdichev after the war, the killings and pits, and the town's small Jewish community and synagogue today. Kerler also asks about Yiddish schooling and songs, and about the best years of his life. The recording ends with talk about faith, the soul and a Yiddish word for jealousy.
The interviewee recalls finishing four classes at a Yiddish school before it was closed in 1939, then two years of Russian/Ukrainian schooling. He talks about Shavuot, the two festival days and the giving of the Torah. Answering Kerler, he says dairy food was eaten, and mentions cheese dishes, wine and a festival challah.
Kerler sets the date (25 May 2015) and the interviewee offers to tell how he survived. They recall an earlier visit and a trip together to the pits where Jews were shot, where local peasants later searched for gold among the bones.
He describes his family of six children, three boys and three girls. His father was a painter who played the mandolin and balalaika; an older brother went to the front and was lost; a sister died of scarlet fever in 1939; a younger brother was shot. He recalls hunger and collectivization in the 1930s, the 1936 constitution and cheerful prewar evenings. He then recalls the first days of the German bombing.
He describes several prewar prayer houses in the town, organised by trade (woodcutters, painters, shoemakers). One shul stood closed for a year because the rebbe's wife had died and he lived in Israel. Kerler mentions the rebbe's father as a Chabad man; they speak of Rebbe Moyshe Talye (?) and a Grisha (?) at the tsadik's grave, and of Kerler's telephone contact with him.
He says many Jews, including some from America, come to the tsadik's grave in town. He recalls that at his bar mitzvah at age 13 his father gave him a spoonful of brandy, and discusses drinking customs.
Reflecting on having survived the war, he says he worked many years at a mill and on collective farms, got on well with the managers, and went on pension. He says he loves the land. Kerler asks whether he still bakes bread once a week.
He tells how he survived the roundups at age 13. His mother left him to take the bread from the oven when two policemen came, and he fled and hid for hours in a stable. He recalls being taken with his father to the pit at Sukolinye (?) near Berdichev, where the family was shot. He lay among the dead, then escaped and climbed away at night. He was turned away at one house, went on to villages (Novosyolka, Tirekhova, Volptshintsi, Makhnovka as heard) and was handed over to police who forced him towards a bridge, from which he jumped into the river and swam away. He says he escaped three or four times, and Kerler tries to clarify the count. He also recalls begging for bread and a mother's sister who was killed in the pits in 1942.
He tells of working as a farmhand for a peasant, afraid of the police, and living with sheep in 1943. He says his master claimed he could never run away. After the Soviets returned, he worked with horses, then at a mill, and was drafted into the army in 1950 for four and a half years.
He talks about his late wife and about baking bread at home, which he learned from her. He now cares for his sister-in-law, who has dementia, and a son of hers lives in Canada. He says he goes to shul morning and evening. He mentions working about 25 years at one mill and a large garden.
The talk apparently turns to people who hid Jews during the war and were later recognised, with several women's names mentioned. Part of the exchange includes Russian and the transcript is largely unclear. Kerler recalls that they travelled together past the trees near where the interviewee's father was shot and where he ran away.
He names relatives on his mother's side, including a mother's brother Birl (?) and a Borys (?) who lived in Kiev.
Asked by Kerler about the day the Red Army entered Berdichev, he recalls watching the fighting between the Red Army and the Germans from an attic, and seeing soldiers' leather boots. He mentions the heavy mud of the winter and the tanks standing at Tirekhova. He says he rode a horse back to Berdichev about a week after the town was taken and had been hidden for two months before that.
He describes the hard first postwar years, from 1944, working at a mill with a Jewish director (name unclear, Ray Haridietski (?)). He carried sacks of wheat on his back to the market, where flour was ground and bread baked, and was paid in bread.
He tells how he met his future wife, through his mother's sister and his wife's uncle Katz, while lodging with Russian neighbours at about 17. The wedding was put off in 1950 when he was called up. It was held in her parents' house, where he lived six years; her father was a butcher. Kerler then asks whether Yiddish was still spoken in Berdichev after the war.
Wanshilboym says about five thousand Jews remained in Berdichev after the war. He says the Germans claimed to have killed forty thousand Jews there, and that the local police were also to blame. He names pits in Petirka (?), at a brick factory and in Khazhin (?), and a shooting at a station in Demashen (?). Kerler notes that eighteen thousand are recorded, and the two agree that Jews made up about eighty percent of the town's prewar population.
Kerler asks how many Yiddish schools there were before the war, and the interviewee estimates ten to twelve. They discuss non-Jews who spoke Yiddish. Kerler then asks about the Grebelka (?) and the Kitchinivka (?) districts. The interviewee describes a mill, a river and a mineral-water works there, and then talks about a man named Skablitski (?) or Shchenitski (?).
The interviewee talks about a Berdichev man named Moyshe Chichinitski (?), who after the war guided visitors to the graves of the tsadikim and went blind. He then tells about his own birth date and the number of years he studied. He says an aunt came from America in 1961 (?) and that the rebbe blessed him. He tells about bringing potatoes and napkins to the synagogue.
Kerler asks how many Jews live in Berdichev today, and the interviewee says about five hundred, a mixed population. He says that ten to fifteen people attend the synagogue and that many Jews do not believe in God. He explains that he himself began attending in recent years on the urging of the rabbi. He reflects that the Jewish people survived through the Torah and that Hitler was punished. He also talks about the synagogue's members, including a mentally disturbed man from Slobodka (?) and a man named Shloyme.
The interviewee suggests people Kerler can speak to who still speak Yiddish and discusses a woman named Novik (?) who deals with cemeteries and documents. A telephone number is worked out. He lists older Jews in the synagogue, including Bakmayev (?), Timnagratski (?) and his wife Polina, and Bandarenko (?), with their ages.
The interviewee speaks about a tank driver named Boris and then reflects that one must be a decent person. Kerler asks about his Yiddish schooling, and he says he went to a Yiddish school for four years and can read but has forgotten how to write. He also mentions learning Ukrainian and German and having a little French and English. He says he cannot recall Yiddish texts from school. He talks about a book that he hid in the attic during the German occupation.
Asked for songs from school, the interviewee says his father played instruments and recites a Russian couplet about a Jew with seven daughters, then he speaks of other songs, a Jewish woman's troubles and a song his wife sang. Kerler explains that the song about the seven daughters was written by Leyb Kvitko, translated into Russian and later turned into a pop song. They also mention a song that begins about a Jew and his wife. The talk drifts to the interviewee's grief since his wife's death.
The interviewee talks about giving and taking and about the synagogue's affairs. He describes planting potatoes, onions and other vegetables on a plot. Kerler proposes they walk and he will pay. He then asks about the happiest times in his life.
The interviewee says the best years were before the war, when he played ball and swam. After the war he worked hard at a mill, where theft was common, and he recalls spending two months in a hospital. Kerler asks about Jews at the hospital. The interviewee reflects on what makes a Jew, saying it is the Jewish soul, and mentions a book he read.
The interviewee reflects on the soul as a fire from God, on seventy years of Communism and materialism, and on his return to Jewish learning. He talks about the right and left sides of the Torah, which he links to long life and to wealth and honor. He says reading Hebrew and Yiddish is easier for him than translating.
Kerler asks whether he knows a certain wish for good years, to which the interviewee replies with a gloss for healthy years. He then recites the opening of a song about a Jew and his wife and a tailor's song. Kerler asks about the Yiddish name used for a group.
The interviewee talks about the composer Iliarizhnik (?), a Jew in Moscow, and says the best thing God gave a Jew is to love, and that one must be a decent person. He tells of a physicist teacher who did not believe in God. Kerler and he then discuss the Yiddish word for jealousy, with Kerler offering a Hebrew-component word and the interviewee not accepting it. They settle on a form close to Russian. The recording ends with a Russian aside about a drink.