Auschwitz inmate who survived by cutting hair dies aged 98

23 November 2017, 2:48 pm

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A former inmate of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp who, together with his brother, survived the Holocaust by cutting the hair of other prisoners and then went on to work as barber for 60 years, died last week aged 98.

Benjamin Scheinkopf, who worked in Chicago where he was known as “Ben the Barber,” was 97 when he finally retired, the Chicago Sun Times reports.

He was born in Plonsk, Poland, the hometown of David Ben Guirion. Although his father told him to become a shoemaker he decided to be a barber, a choice of profession that may have saved his life.

He was sent to Auschwitz where over a million Jews were murdered. At the time he left, he weighed 65 lbs. Only two of his nine siblings survived.