Janusz Korczak

Janusz Korczak, the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit (22 July 1878 or 1879 – August 7, 1942), was a Polish-Jewish educator, children's author, and pediatrician known as Pan Doktor ("Mr. Doctor") or Stary Doktor ("Old Doctor"). After spending many years working as director of an orphanage in Warsaw, he refused freedom and stayed with his orphans when the institution was sent from the Ghetto to the Treblinka extermination camp, during the Grossaktion Warsaw of 1942. Korczak was born in Warsaw in 1878 or 1879 (sources vary) into the family of Józef Goldszmit, a respected lawyer from a family of proponents of the haskalah, and Cecylia nee Gębicka, daughter of a prominent Kalisz family. Born to a Jewish family, he was an agnostic in later life who did not believe in forcing religion on children. His father fell ill around 1890 and was admitted to a mental hospital where he died six years later in April 1896. Spacious apartments were given up on Miodowa street, then Świętojerska. Henryk worked as a tutor after school. In 1898 he used Janusz Korczak as a writing pseudonym in the Ignacy Jan Paderewski Literary Contest. The name originated from the book Janasz Korczak and the Pretty Swordsweeperlady (O Janaszu Korczaku i pięknej Miecznikównie) by Józef Ignacy Kraszewski. In the 1890s he studied in the Flying University. During the years 1898–1904 Korczak studied medicine at the University of Warsaw and also wrote for several Polish language newspapers. After graduation he became a pediatrician. In 1905−1912 Korczak worked at Bersohns and Baumans Children's Hospital in Warsaw. During the Russo-Japanese War in 1905–1906 he served as a military doctor. Meanwhile his book Child of the Drawing Room (Dziecko salonu) gained him some literary recognition. After the war he continued his practice in Warsaw.