In the heart of Warsaw Zoo stands the historic villa of its former director, Jan Żabiński. During the Second World War, the property became a discreet refuge: Jan and his wife Antonina sheltered several hundred Jews who had escaped from the Warsaw Ghetto, hiding them in the villa’s basement and across the extensive, partly abandoned zoo grounds. When the war began, the Żabińskis became involved in the underground resistance, with even their young son Ryś helping them. People, weapons and ammunition were concealed in empty cages and pavilions, and many Jews found refuge at the zoo. Jan, a lieutenant in the Home Army, supported his family partly by teaching clandestine classes. He fought in the Warsaw Uprising and, after its defeat, was sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Germany. During the German occupation, Warsaw Zoo under Jan Żabiński’s direction became a hiding place for many Jews. The family’s modernist villa, known as the “House Under the Crazy Star”, sheltered, among others, the writer Rachela Auerbach, the sculptor Magdalena Gross and the boxer Samuel Koenigswein with his family. In recognition of their help, Jan Żabiński and his wife Antonina were honoured in 1965 with the title Righteous Among the Nations.
Today, the villa houses a moving exhibition that recounts the courageous work of the Żabiński couple and their extraordinary fate during the war years.
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