Saved by Schindler, Leyson visits St. Paul

The youngest survivor on Schindler's List will visit the Twin Cities on Tuesday.

Leon Leyson (born Leib Lejzon) was just 13 when his father talked Oskar Schindler into adding the youngster to his roster of factory workers who were protected from the Holocaust. Both of Leyson's parents and two of his four siblings survived thanks to the industrialist, whose rescue of 1,098 Jews was the subject of Stephen's Spielberg's 1993 Oscar-winning movie "Schindler's List."

Leyson, 79, a retired high school teacher, kept his story to himself until the movie was released. The film inspired him to record his account for the Shoah Visual History Foundation, and now he travels the country to share his story in what often are standing-room-only auditoriums.

He was 10 when the Germans invaded Poland. The family was herded from their home in the northern part of the country to the Krakow ghetto and then sent to the Plaszow concentration camp.

His father, Morris, was picked to work in Schindler's enamelware factory and immediately set out to get the rest of his family included. By the time young Leon got there, his mother and a sister already had joined his father.

Being on the list did not guarantee survival. In an interview with Chabad.org, Leyson said that at one point German soldiers pulled him out of the factory and were going to send him to a different concentration camp when Schindler personally intervened and insisted that the boy remain with him.

Leyson will speak at 7:15 p.m. Tuesday in the auditorium of St. Paul College, 235 Marshall Av., St. Paul. His visit is sponsored by the Lubavitch Learning Center of Minnesota, and advance tickets can be reserved online for $15 at www.LubavitchCheder.org/LeonLeyson. If the event is not sold out in advance, tickets will be available at the door for $20.

Lots of good things have happened to Mitch Albom since he wrote the bestseller "Tuesdays With Morrie," a chronicle of the time he spent with a beloved professor who was dying of ALS. But there's one aftershock of the success that still gives him pause.

"I've become everybody's rabbi," he said. "My life changed so dramatically [after the book was published] in 1997. I used to chat with people about who would win the Super Bowl. Now people stop me to tell me about their mother who is dying of cancer."

He probably is setting himself up for another round of personal stories when he comes to town next Sunday to talk about his new book, "Have a Little Faith." It's a story about his friendships with two very different members of the clergy: a retired suburban rabbi and the minister of a struggling inner-city church.

The book's starting point was a request by Albert Lewis, rabbi of Albom's boyhood synagogue, to deliver the eulogy at his funeral. Lewis wasn't dying; he just wanted to get everything lined up, which gave Albom plenty of time to explore the rabbi's philosophy -- and his own.

"I don't know if he knew what he was getting into by getting me involved, but he basically spent eight years re-educating me about my own faith," Albom said.

Henry Covington is the pastor of "a really forgotten church in a really forgotten part of Detroit." Albom went to the church after being told that the pastor there was running a homeless shelter.

"It was surreal," he said. "It's this beautiful old sanctuary with a gaping role in the roof. It was freezing in there. In one corner there was a tent made of plastic sheets, a tiny little space about two pews wide. That's where Henry was holding services."

Albom's appearance is being billed as a reading from his book, but he insists "it will be more like a conversation. This is not a typical book tour. For one thing, I'm not appearing at any bookstores. I'm only going to churches, synagogues, homeless shelters and soup kitchens." To get him to appear, each sponsor also had to promise that part of the admission charge will be donated to charity.

The event is at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 18 at Temple Israel, 2324 Emerson Av. S., Minneapolis. Tickets are $25, and available at 612-374-0313 or speaker@templeisrael.com.

Jeff Strickler • 612-673-7392