Antoni Dobrowolski, the oldest known survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp died today in Debno, Poland. Born on October 8, 1904 Dobrowolski was 108 years old when he died. In a world where today the word "hero" is almost casually applied Dobrowolski truly was one.

A teacher, Dobrowolski practiced his profession during the World War II German occupation of Poland. What made him so memorable was that he continued to teach in spite of the fact that the Germans had banned education of most Poles past four years of elementary school.

In August and September of 1939 Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union invaded Poland and divided up the country between themselves. The Germans quickly went to work murdering tens of thousands of people. Meanwhile, Josef Stalin's Soviet Union more quietly, but still brutally, subjugated its part of the former Polish state. To this day the German atrocities garner the bulk of the attention, and rightly so in many respects.