BDE: Mrs. Leah Platschek, a”h

    We are saddened to inform the community of the petira of Mrs. Leah Platschek, a”h, who was 87 years old.

     Mrs. Platschek, who was a descendant of the Machne Chaim, zt”l, was a Holocaust survivor, who, before coming to New York, lived in a ghetto in Mako, Hungary, where she was born in 1934.

     When the war ended, Mrs. Platschek first went to Vienna, Austria, where she met her husband, Reb Yehuda Platschek, a”h, who was a Vienner chassid, who was known for helping the elderly in many ways.

    When the Platscheks first came the US, they created a beautiful Yiddishe home in Williamsburg, where they lived for 25 years, before moving to Boro Park, where their grandchildren and great-grandchildren now live.

    Mrs. Platschek, who was the daughter Reb Yehudah Schreiber, a”h, and Mrs. Perry Shreiber, a”h, earned parnassah as a seamstress in a clothing factory, but for what she will be remembered will be the tremendous amount of time she spent doing chesed and caring for others.

      "My mother dedicated herself to doing bikur cholim, where she volunteered at Maimonides Medical Center with four other friends for 25 to 30 years,” said Perry Rosenfeld, one of her daughters. “They were a force to be reckoned with. They brought coffee to everybody.

     “My mother went to see people at 5am, just to spend time with them. She did chesed 24 hours day. Chesed was her passion, and she taught it to my kids, and we all so much admire everything she did.

      "She was a special, amazing woman. Like my father, my mother also wanted to dedicate her life to helping older people.

       "She did not grow up or ever have much in the way of material things, but she dedicated her life to bikur cholim. She never had money or craved money. Doing bikur cholim meant much more to my mother than the few dollars she could make.

     “Her life goal was to help people. It made her proud to be part of it.”

   In addition to Mrs. Platschek’s volunteering at the hospital, sometimes she would visit children with Down Syndrome.

    “With the few dollars she had, my mother would buy the children oranges, tea biscuits, and chocolate bars,” Mrs. Rosenfeld said with obvious pride. “She didn’t have a lot of money, but that is what she spent it on. She never needed money for herself. Her passion and her joy was helping others.”

    Mrs. Platschek will join her ancestors in Eretz Yisroel, when her kvura will take place at Har Maminuchos in Yerushaylim.

    Yehi Zichro Boruch.