Alfred Zbik

Alfred (Wladyslaw) Zbik was born January 6, 1913, in Krakow, Poland to Stefan and Sefanina Zbik. He had two sisters. He finished university in 1931 and went to work in the civic court until 1933. He then worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and was sent to Lille, France. In 1939 he was called back to Poland and lived in Warsaw until 1941, when he moved back to Krakow.

During the War Alfred sheltered some of his Jewish friends from high school and university. He supplied Barbara Dyga, Edward Nabel, Krystyna Nabel, and Zygmunt Kem with false papers from his fathers printing shop and jobs. Stefan’s printing shop was also used by underground and resistance movements. He printed leaflets for underground organizations and fake coupons for gasoline.

After the war ended, Alfred returned to Krakow for university and worked for a radio broadcasting company. He was given a diplomatic position by the communist party in Poland after he graduated and was sent to Ottawa in 1946 as a Polish diplomat to be the Second Secretary at the Polish Legation. In 1949 Alfred sought political asylum in Canada and quit his diplomatic job because he did not want to work for the communist party. He returned to radio broadcasting in 1952 and started working for the Polish Department of CBC Radio Canada/International Section. Alfred and his wife Anna had one daughter in Canada.

Alfred Zbik died in 2002, and his full testimony is part of the Canadian Collection of Holocaust survivor testimonies. It is preserved in the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive and accessible through the Ekstein Library.

Alfred Zbik

It was the only thing to do… they were guests.