Obituary of Henry Rosenfarb

Henry Rosenfarb (December 18, 1922-August 19, 2016) "Helloodare!!!" was Henry's signature greeting. He was a man of the people. Until recently, he walked miles of the Broadwalk in Hollywood Beach, Florida each and every day. Everyone knew Henry. He always had a big gregarious smile on his face. He seemed to always be happy. Very happy. He especially loved talking to people. He wanted to know everything about them. His family nicknamed him "The Great Inquisitor". He remembered everything about them too. Quite a remarkable man. Henry was born in Stashover, Poland. He was the youngest of nine children (three died very young). He was poor, but he was a happy child. Then the Nazis invaded Poland. His oldest brother Yussel and his sister Jane wanted to take their baby brother and flee with him to Siberia, but he was not old enough, said his mother. Soon the Nazis built a walled ghetto around Lodz, Poland where Henry lived. Then the Nazis took Henry to the concentration camps. He saw the Nazis do unspeakable things. Every day wondering if it was to be his last. Somehow Henry survived the Holocaust. Maybe it was this superhuman optimism that he always seemed to hold onto? After the war, Henry lived in the Displaced Person camps in Germany. It was there he was reunited with his brother Yussel. When he first saw Yussel they both ran to each other and hugged, falling down a hill, laughing and crying the whole way down. It was in the DP camps that Henry saw Ruth (Rivka), a girl from his hometown. A girl, whose sister, Bronia, was married to Yussel. Wouldn't you know it, Henry and Ruth fell in love, married, and had two sons. First Sam was born in the DP camps and then seven years later in Brooklyn, NY came Irwin. Henry moved to Brooklyn in 1955. He eventually opened a grocery. He worked six days a week and retired in 1982. Henry started jogging to lose weight. It worked and he was hooked. Henry ran the NY Marathon five times while in his 70’s. He exercised every day. Henry spent his winters in south Florida, his summers in a bungalow in the Catskills, and the other months in Queens. Eventually living full time in Hallandale, Florida. Henry loved retirement. He loved reading the newspaper in the sun, playing cards with his friends, talking politics and world news, the ocean, watching soccer and tennis, and he loved his family. He thought it was a miracle that he had a big, beautiful family. The world is a better place because Henry Rosenfarb was here. Henry is survived by his two sons, Sam and Irwin and their wives Marilyn and Bobbie, his five grandsons and their wives, Andrew and Gina, Ronald, Mark and Susan, Noah and Amanda, and Jacob; and his seven great grandchildren, David, Dalton, Drew, Jared, Eden, Zori and Haddie.