Julie Keefer, a Holocaust survivor, was described by many as a “beautiful soul” who cared for others despite profound challenges in her early life.
Born in April 1941 in Lwów, Poland, present-day Ukraine, Keefer was only two months old when Germany invaded her town, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The Nazi authorities forced Lwów’s Jewish residents into a ghetto that fall, prompting Keefer’s family to seek refuge in a bunker they dug under Keefer’s grandfather’s, Aizik Eisen’s, barn.
After being arrested twice and sent to two labor camps, Eisen returned to the ghetto to rescue his family. He found 2-year-old Keefer, her parents and her baby sister, Tola, and helped the family escape to a forest bunker he’d built. But the young girls cried frequently, jeopardizing the others’ safety.
The sisters were sent to live with a non-Jewish family friend, a housekeeper named Lucia Nowicka, as her “orphaned nieces” back in Lwów. Eisen — who disguised himself as Nowicka’s late husband — traveled back and forth between Lwów and the bunker.
A neighbor turned Nowicka in for sheltering Jewish children, so the housekeeper was arrested and imprisoned by the Gestapo. Eisen took baby Tola to a Catholic orphanage, renamed her and visited her regularly. In April 1944, when Eisen was visiting his granddaughters in Lwów, the Nazis discovered the bunker and killed everyone they saw inside, including Keefer’s parents.
Soon after, Eisen found the orphanage empty with Tola nowhere to be found. Despite their searches, Eisen and Keefer never located her — Keefer penned “Where Are You, Tola?” about the lifelong grief she endured.
Keefer lived in western Poland, then Austria, with Eisen and Nowicka, who had married, before her grandfather sent Keefer to the United States in 1948. Her grandparents, who followed shortly after, weren’t allowed to adopt Keefer due to their limited income.
“She was orphaned at a super young age, and then shipped to family in Brooklyn in an abusive home, and then went to an orphanage in Cleveland and then adopted as a teenager” by a German Jewish couple, according to Keefer’s son, Steve Keefer.
Julie used her degrees in psychology, special education and administration as a French teacher at Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda and later, a principal. She and her husband, Larry, raised their two children in the Washington, D.C. area.
Her turbulent childhood may have informed Julie’s career working with at-risk youth.
“She worked with gangs and troubled youth along her path as an educator and I’ve seen the lives that she impacted and changed,” Steve Keefer said.
One of Steve’s childhood friends recently said that Julie was the “only one to put him on the straight and narrow when his life was going in a bad direction,” Steve said, echoing a message he’s heard from many people.
Julie used her Spanish-speaking skills — she spoke six languages in addition to English — and a “nonthreatening authoritative” approach that calmed students and redirected their harmful thinking.
Julie’s teachings extended beyond the classroom. She encouraged her children to be open with their emotions.
“She hardened me the heck up,” Steve Keefer said. “That profoundly influenced me and toughened me up [in] evolving past the hurt and the ‘tough guy’ thing, [instead leaning into] what really matters in this world and what we are doing here and what kinds of lives we’re living, what kind of impact we’re making.”
Julie’s impact was one of peacebuilding and striving to make the world a better place, Steve Keefer said.
“My mom worked on Palestinian-Israeli peace,” he said, recalling a childhood memory of her talking with Israelis and Palestinians “trying to understand the situation” and seek commonalities. “She put her beliefs into practice and I really respect that and appreciate it.”
Julie told her Holocaust story at various schools as a way of healing from her trauma, but also to educate others about the consequences of unchecked hatred. Her message? “If you see somebody being picked on, maybe go be a friend.”
Despite the difficulty of reliving painful experiences, Julie approached the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2014, interested in telling her story. There, she would sit at the Survivor’s Desk and talk to visitors of the museum.
“Visitors were so moved, hanging onto every word,” Diane Saltzman, USHMM’s director of survivor affairs, said. “I saw that with Julie when she was here, that she would make them feel very comfortable sharing her story, having them ask questions, often coming around behind the desk to take a picture.
“Her early childhood was marked by such trauma, but she would push through that to share the story with people. … I never cease to be amazed at the strength that our survivors [exhibit].”
Julie also talked about her childhood in written works over the years. Mila Kirstein, one of Julie’s longtime friends, had been sitting across from Julie at a writing workshop 10 years ago.
“She became part of my heart — she was just so sincere and had so much depth of character,” Kirstein said. “I was always intrigued about her history and especially [about] her sister.”
Rachel Newman, another longtime friend, noted that the usually private Julie deeply embraced her friendships with Newman and Kirstein: “I think Julie opened her heart up to me and Mila.”
“She took us in as family members and she just cared about us with every ounce of her soul about her legacy and about us as humans,” Newman said. “She asked so many questions and was so inquisitive and so smart. She is one of the most remarkable women I’ve ever met in my life.”
Julie Keefer died on April 30 at her Kensington retirement home at the age of 84. She never stopped searching for her younger sister, a mystery that Newman and Kirstein have taken on.
“She carried that [grief] with her forever, and I can’t imagine going through what [she’s] been through and never having resolution, but yet she always smiled; she was always warm,” Newman said. “She just created a beautiful life for herself.”
Although Julie was my “sister-in-law”, as she was married to my older brother, Larry, she was more like a lifetime sister to me. I miss talking with her over coffee and going for walks whenever we visited each other. Fortunately we have our memories, so she still “lives” not only in my memory, but in my heart!
What a gift to have had her in your life.