Irena Sendlerowa – Google Doodle celebrates Polish social worker Irena Sendler’s 110th birthday

Today’s Google Doodle celebrates 110th birthday of the life of Polish social worker Irena Sendlerowa, likewise known as Irena Sendler (Irena Sentler), nom de guerre “Jolanta”.

Irena Stanisława Sendler, likewise alluded to as Irena Sendlerowa in Poland, nom de guerre “Jolanta”, was a Polish humanitarian, social worker, and nurse who served in the Polish Underground Resistance during World War II in German-occupied Warsaw. From October 1943 she was head of the children’s section of Żegota, the Polish Council to Aid Jews.

Irena Sendlerowa was born on this day in 1910 simply outside the Polish capital of Warsaw, to Stanisław Henryk Krzyżanowski. She was baptized on 2 February 1917 in Otwock as Irena Stanisława Krzyżanowska. From her dad’s work treating tuberculosis patients, Sendlerowa learned at an early age that one ought to consistently help those in need—no matter their race, religion, or financial status.

This courageous humanitarian is credited for sparing the lives of Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto during World War II. She proved to be an amazing strategist and became a symbol of courage and equity by organizing the assistance of those in need, paying little mind to nationality or religion.

During the 1930s, Sendler conducted her social work as one of the activists associated with the Free Polish University. From 1935 to October 1943, she worked for the Department of Social Welfare and Public Health of the City of Warsaw. She additionally sought informally, and during the war conspiratorial activities, for example, saving Jews, primarily as a major aspect of the network of workers and volunteers from that department, mostly women. Sendler took an interest, with many others, in smuggling Jewish children out of the Warsaw Ghetto and afterward giving them false identity documents and asylum with willing Polish families or in orphanages and other consideration facilities, including Catholic nun convents, sparing those kids from the Holocaust.

Sendlerowa set up those principles into practice, becoming a social worker with the Warsaw City Council in 1939. As World War II progressed, her position gave her unusual access to the Warsaw Ghetto, and she got resolved to help spare however many Jewish individuals as could reasonably be expected.

Using ambulances, underground tunnels, and fake identities, Sendlerowa and her partners from a mystery association called Żegota took a chance with their lives to sneak several kids to security. As appeared in the Doodle work of art, written records of the kids and their families were covered in the jar under the apple tree, with the expectation that the families could be brought together toward the finish of the war.

Sendler became related with social and educational units of the Free Polish University (Wolna Wszechnica Polska), where she met and was impacted by activists from the illegal Communist Party of Poland. At Wszechnica Sendler had a place with a group of social workers led by Professor Helena Radlińska; a dozen or more women from that circle would later participate in saving Jews. From her social work on-site interviews, Sendler reviewed numerous cases of extraordinary poverty that she experienced among the Jewish populace of Warsaw.

Poland honored Sendlerowa’s selflessness in 2003, awarding her the Order of the White Eagle, and in 2008, she was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.

On 14 March 2007, Sendler was honored by the Senate of Poland, and after a year, on 30 July, by the United States Congress. On 11 April 2007, she got the Order of the Smile; around then, she was the oldest recipient of the award. In 2007 she became an honorary resident of the urban areas of Warsaw and Tarczyn.

In 2016, a permanent display was established to respect Sendler’s life at the Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes gallery, in Fort Scott, KS.

Dziękuję, Irena Sendlerowa, for your bravery in sparing the lives of many.

On February 15, 2020, Google Doodle was made by Doodler Lydia Nichols. Doodle intended to reflect the seriousness of the war and to echo the expectation and perseverance Sendlerowa showed in her activities. In Google Doodle, the tree would serve as a hopeful symbol of life. The Doodle uses a limited palette of five colors that are overlaid and utilized at different opacities for visual wealth.