Keller Maria ; Son: Arnold

Dagarova-Noim, Aleksandra Keller, Marija Keller, Arnold In 1940, Aleksandra Bikše (b. 1909) a resident of Rīga, married David Epshtein, a Jewish architect and designer who also involved in the film industry where he used a pseudonym, Dagarov. After the marriage, Aleksandra changed her family name to Dagarova. With the German occupation of Rīga on July 1, 1941, Epshtein was interned in the ghetto and later in the Kaiserwald concentration camp. While Dagarova was searching for ways to get her husband out, she met Žanis Lipke*, who until then had smuggled scores of Jews out of the ghetto and the concentration camp, and had hidden them in Rīga and on farms near the town of Dobele. Lipke told Dagarova about his plan to rent another farm for this purpose, because the two to which he had transferred the Jews, the Miltiņi and the Mežamaki khutors, could not take in such a large number of people. In March 1944, Lipke carried out his plan and rented an additional khutor, called Resni, also near Dobele. Dagarova agreed to manage the farm, together with Marija Keller (b. 1902) who came for that purpose from Rīga with her sons, 12-year-old Arnold and six-year-old Henrich. Marija was well acquainted with Lipke, and upon his request had sheltered the Jews in her apartment until she was in danger of arrest. Dagarova and Marija knew very well that the farm work on the khutor was only to camouflage its real purpose, which was to look after the Jews who were hiding there. Within five days after they got to the farm, they built a hideout under the floor of the house, and in May 1944, Lipke brought a group of Jews from Rīga, including Dagarova’s husband, David Epshtein. Together with him were Max Wagenheim, the brothers Zalman and Isaak Drizin, Harry Icigson and Herman Noim. They all hid in the hiding place, and until August 1944, were cared for by the two women and Arnold Keller. That same month, while the battles raged, the Red Army liberated the area from the Germans, and theJews hiding on the farm left. Dagarova and Marija remained at Resni and found themselves in the battle zone. During an air raid Arnold Keller was killed. After the war, Marija and her younger son came back to Rīga. Aleksandra Dagarova also returned to Rīga, divorced her husband, and married Herman Noim, one of the Jews whom she had saved. On February 22, 1995, Yad Vashem recognized Aleksandra Noim, Marija Keller and her son, Arnold Keller, as Righteous Among the Nations.