The German industrialist Oskar Schindler established an enamelware factory in Podgorze, Krakow. For its purposes a sub-camp called "Emalia" was created. He attempted to protect his Jewish workers, some 900 people, from abuse in Plaszow and from deportation to extermination camps. When he moved the factory and his Jewish work force to the Sudetenland (an area formerly in Czechoslovakia) in 1944, he prevented the deportation of more than 1,000 Jews.

The tragic chapter in Podgorze history starts with World War II. Hans Frank, the governor of German, created province of General Government, with Krakow as the capital, was very reluctant to establish the Jewish ghetto in this city. Nevertheless opening ghettos was the case in all other cities of Nazi occupied Poland. His ambition was to make Krakow "Juden Rein", cleared of all Jewish inhabitants and in this way make it an exemplary German city. Finally, only in 1941 the ghetto had to be established and Podgorze was chosen as its territory. Nazi reasoning was to push the Jews as far as possible from Krakow's center. Podgorze behind Vistula River seemed to be perfect.
Schindler renamed already existing factory owned by Jew, Wurzel, into Deutsche Emaillewaren-Fabrik, or DEF, to manufacture enamelware. He obtained around 1,300 Jewish slave labourers to work there with the help of his Jewish accountant Itzhak Stern.
Initially Schindler may have been motivated by money — hiding wealthy Jewish investors, for instance — but later he began shielding his workers without regard to cost. He would, for instance, claim that unskilled workers were essential to the factory. Harming his workers would result in complaints and demands for compensation from the government. Employment during the ghetto time was crucial because this was the only way not to undergo a deportation. Prisoners employed at the Schindler's Factory were working hard, for 12 hours a day, but they were not exposed to torture, flogging and prolonged roll-calls, as was the case in other employment places. Several times Schindler was to save the lives of Jews who worked in his factory. He bribed higher officers of the SS when a life of his workers was at risk. Schindler was arrested three times during the war, once even for just kissing a young Jewish girl on the cheek. His second arrest was by the Gestapo for black market activities. Schindler would typically bribe government officials to avoid investigation.
While witnessing a 1942 raid on the Kraków Ghetto, where soldiers were used to round up the inhabitants for shipment to the concentration camp at Plaszow, Schindler was appalled by the murder of many of the Jews who had been working for him. He was a very persuasive individual, and after the raid, increasingly used all of his skills to protect his Schindlerjuden (Schindler's Jews). Schindler went out of his way to take care of the Jews who worked at DEF, often calling on his legendary charm and ingratiating manner to help his workers get out of difficult situations. Schindler also reportedly began to smuggle children out of the ghetto, delivering them to Polish nuns, who either hid them from the Nazis or claimed they were Christian orphans. He arranged with Amon Göth, the commandant of Plaszow, for 900 Jews to be transferred to an adjacent factory compound, where they would be relatively safe from the depredations of the German guards.
 When the advance of the Red Army threatened to liberate the concentration camps, almost all were destroyed and a majority of the inmates murdered. Schindler, however, moved 1,200 "workers" to a factory at Brněnec-Brünnlitz in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in October 1944. When one shipment of his workers was misrouted to Auschwitz, he managed to have them returned to him at an extremely hefty price. Brněnec was liberated in May 1945.
At the end of the war, Schindler emigrated to Argentina. He went bankrupt and returned to Germany in 1958, to a series of unsuccessful business ventures. Schindler settled down in a little apartment at Am Hauptbahnhof Nr. 4 in Frankfurt am Main, West Germany and tried—again with help from the Jewish organization—to establish a cement factory. This went bankrupt in 1961.
No one really knows what Schindler's motives were. However, he was quoted as saying "I knew the people who worked for me... When you know people, you have to behave toward them like human beings."

What to see:
Schindler's Factory - 4 Lipowa Street.
Plaszów Camp memorial - Kamienskiego Street. The large monument commemorating all the victims who died in the Plaszów concentration camp. Established in 1942, it was the largest concentration camp in Kraków area.
Podgórze is only a short walk across the Vistula river from Kazimierz,  tram 6, 8 or 10 to the 'Korona' stop or 3, 13 or 24 to the 'Plac Bohaterów Getta' or 'Powstanców slaskich' stop
It is also worth seeing "The Schindler's List" directed by S. Spielberg, filmed in Krakow, Podgorze. You may recognize places, where shots were taken while visiting Krakow.
sources: Wikipedia,
www.podgorze.pl
www.scrapbookpages.com
www.jewish-guide.pl

Justyna Zielinska