Rubin Friedman

I’m heartbroken to say that my father Rubin Friedman passed away yesterday. He was 103 years old. As many of you know my Dad was a holocaust survivor who was forced to do slave labor in numerous concentration camps.His grandmother, father, mother and sister end was murdered by the Nazis. Miraculously, he and his brother survived together through all the camps. Because of the horrible conditions he developed Typhus and later Tuberculosis. After the war he spent three years in a TB sanitarium in Germany. Half of the patients there died from TB. He came to the US in 1950 as a stateless refugee. He met my mother Margaret,also a holocaust survivor , in 1953 . They got married later in the year. In 1954 they had their first son Norman. I came along in 1959. My mom was diagnosed with cancer in 1960 and my father had to take of us while he held down a full time job. We moved to Los Angeles in 1962 for my mom’s health. My mom was finally cancer free in 1964. In the following years my dad went through several periods of unemployment. When he worked many times it was in liquor stores in bad areas. In 1971 he and a partner borrowed money to buy their own liquor stores in Santa Monica. During the time he owned the store he was robbed at gunpoint and the robber pistoled whipped my dad in the head. Luckily my dad survived the attack even though he had a concussion. My dad decided to sell the store in 1976. He bought another store in the valley in 1978 but the store went out of business in 1981. My dad had to go on disability because of a bad knee injury. He never worked again. In 1986 my mother was once again diagnosed with cancer. For the next year he was her full time caregiver until she passed away in 1987 at the age of 56 years old. My dad later remarried a woman named Bella whose husband died around the same time as my mother. Bella was also a holocaust survivor who was originally from Radom Poland which was also my dad’s hometown. For the next 20 years they had a very stress free life until Bella developed dementia. For the next 7years my dad was once again a full time caregiver even though he was in his 90’s. When my dad was unable to take care of her she had to go to a home. She died in 2019. My Dad lived alone until he was almost 101. He finally needed a caregiver when his health started to deteriorate.for the last 2years of his life he was in and out of hospitals but always managed to bounce back until he wasn’t able to.