Jan Karski

The Polish American Awareness Foundation (PAAF) is proud to have recently united an accomplished group of filmmakers, authors, historians, and philanthropists to bring to screen a long-overdue story of righteous humanity. 

"This very special Jan Karski documentary will discuss the matters of indifference in our society in a much broader context. I am particularly proud of an excellent production team we were able to assemble for this project, there is a lot talent here" said Paul Hardej, the president of PAAF.

Author E. Thomas Wood has joined veteran screenwriter William Akers and Oscar-nominated director Hanna Polak in the creation of the first English-language feature-length documentary conveying the memory and legacy of Jan Karski.  Additionally, the Foundation plans to team with a host of like-minded organizations that share a desire to bring this timeless story to a wider audience. 

Inspired both by the success of its “Jan Karski – An Ambassador of Peace and Justice” event at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, thrown in conjunction with the Holocaust Memorial Foundation of Illinois and PLUS Journal, and by yet-unseen footage of Karski’s last taped interview, the PAAF has decided to produce a film that challenges the viewer’s notions of effective activism.  In showcasing the lifelong missions of Karski and other emissaries of social justice, the PAAF urges the audience to recognize how far we have to go as a society before we eradicate the world of the horrific genocides that continue to plague humankind.

Screenwriter William Akers, the newest emissary of Karski’s legacy has already been moved by his story: “Jan Karski was a messenger.  He was smuggled into the death camp for the sole reason that he was the right person at the right time to convince the world the Holocaust was actually happening.  That he was able to survive, not only the knowledge he had, but the indifference of the great powers, is a testament to his character and courage.  I am proud to have been asked to help tell his story, not in the least because the overwhelming need to bear witness to inhumanity is with us every day.”

Added Wood, co-author of the biography Karski: How One Man Tried to Stop the Holocaust (Wiley, 1994), "I'm thrilled at the prospect of helping to share Jan Karski's message of humanitarian concern and moral action. It is a message as relevant today as ever before."  In addition to his services as a screenwriter, the author will also contributed over five hours of filmed interview footage to the project, the last recordings of the film’s driving character.  Karski passed away in 2000 at 86. 

Since the release of his definitive story on Karski’s journey, countless potential producers have approached Wood and organizations about licensing his footage and lending his expertise to a cinematic adaptation of Karski’s message.  Sharing the organization’s ideas regarding the meaningful universal potential and appeal of the story itself, Wood has now picked the PAAF to help make this long-awaited project a reality.  And Karski himself would surely be thrilled about this recent announcement.

"Professor Karski became a friend and my foremost mentor in the years after the book came out," Wood recalled. "It was his idea that I ought to conduct the one definitive interview with him, taking into account all that he and I had learned through my research for the biography.

"'Mr. Wood,' he told me, "I am an old man, not here for much longer. Perhaps you can find a good use for such video after I am gone.'

"Our personal bond, as well as our ability to talk with a knowledge of the paper trail that had emerged in Europe and the U.S. on his wartime activities, made these interviews unique.

"Watching the films again in recent weeks has amounted to a visit with an old friend, much missed," Wood said.

Wood, Akers, and the PAAF are honored to submit their story to the direction of Hanna Polak, whose Children of Leningradsky (2004) won countless awards and earned a nomination for Best Documentary Short Subject at the 2004 Academy Awards,

With the film’s theatrical release slated for Fall 2009, the PAAF and its partners hope to disseminate a message of proactivity in the face of crimes against humanity, while furthering still-needed reconciliation efforts between Poles and Jews. 

Serving with the Polish Army in 1939—four years after earning his degree in diplomatic sciences from Jan Kazimierz University in Lwow—Karski was captured by the Red Army and imprisoned. He escaped and joined the Polish Home Army, A.K., and served as a courier between the Polish Government-in-Exile in London and underground authorities in Poland. As a courier, Karski reported on the mass exterminations of Polish Jews under German direction. His accounts were initially believed to be too outrageous to be true. For his efforts, he was later awarded Israel's "Righteous Among the Nations" award, and was named an Honorary Citizen of Israel.

Jan Karski interviewed by E. Thomas Wood - click here to read more

Interview with Tom Wood about Jan Karski - Click here to read

Polish American Awareness Foundation (PAAF) - Click here to read more about the organization

Photo: Jan Karski at USHMM, 1994. Photo by E. Thomas Wood. This file is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.0 License (cc-by-sa-2.0).