in 1927, at the age of eighteen, jean kowalyk moved to the ukrainian village of czortowiec, where she worked as a seamstress. when the germans invaded in 1941, they brought to the village forced laborers to build a work camp. jean “watched the cruelty [done to the workers] day after day […] when i saw people being molested, my religious heart whispered to me, ‘do not kill. love others as you love yourself’”. some time later, she heard a knock on her door. when she opened it, solomon berger, a jewish doctor the family knew, was “on his knees”, put his arms around her legs, and “begged for help”. jean let him in and hid him – along with several others – behind a false wall until the end of the war (1).