Watching Walter

WATCHING WALTER

LOGLINE:

When a random customer drops off a gold pocket watch for repair, the watch sets off a series of haunting memories for an elderly watchmaker and Holocaust survivor.

SYNOPSIS:

WLADYSLAW WOJNAS, affectionately known as “Walter,” was born on August 8th, 1924 in Lukawiec, Poland. Shortly before his 15th birthday, WWII broke out and changed his life forever. After taking a bike ride into the country, Walter returned to find Nazi troops burning down his village and murdering his entire family. Walter was kidnapped, thrown into a military truck, and sent to a labor camp.

From 1940 to 1945, Walter endured the Stutthof Concentration Camp in Germany. He worked under the extreme authoritative hand of a Nazi Master Watchmaker. There he experienced sustenance rations, long hours of work, senseless beatings, and the devastation of bombings from the opposing Allied Powers.
He was, however, determined to learn everything he could about the internal workings of clocks and watches. He felt he could get some kind of revenge by obtaining as much knowledge as he could and become the very best master watchmaker. In 1950, after the war, he decided to start a new life in America. On June 7th, 1952, Walter married his beloved wife Wieslawa (Vivian) and in 1956, became an American citizen.

Walter overcame many hardships and survived the horrors of WWII, and through his undying ambition achieved his goal of becoming a First Class Standard of Proficiency in watchmaking. Walter was a loving husband for sixty years and lived a simple, yet prosperous life until his death in 2009 at the age of eighty-five.

Walter’s workbench and tools are featured in a special exhibition at the Hoffman Clock Museum in Newark, New York.

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” -Viktor Frankl, "Man's Search For Meaning"