Holocaust

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

My God... watching a documentary about Berlin and they touched on the Holocaust. A survivor was interviewed, an elderly lady, who hid for much of the war but was captured and interred for the final year. She described how her family was wiped out and how people in the camp wore the striped pyjamas, how they had no idea where people disappeared... As they said, this was the most despicable, evil, horrific event in human history. And it's up to us never to forget it.

 

[holden]

I'll never forget my day with Holocaust survivors when I was in high school.

I went to Catholic school. A local college was hosting a symposium with Holocaust survivors. We got to sit with many survivors and hear their stories.

It was a powerful and heart-wrenching day.

 

[Planogirl]

My Dutch grandfather was a soldier and was sent to a POW camp. He and one aunt were the only members of his Jewish family to survive.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

My Dutch grandfather was a soldier and was sent to a POW camp. He and one aunt were the only members of his Jewish family to survive.

(((hugs)))

 

[monsterkitty]

We used to have a survivor come in and talk to our 8th graders. He was sent to Auschwitz in his late teens. He was the only survivor in his family.

One year, one of my 8th graders in orchestra asked if her grandma could come in and speak as well. Her grandmother, who strangely enough, lived 2 houses away from by DH when he was growing up, was German but worked with the resistance. While one of her older brothers was a Nazi, the rest of the family was not. She said they actually hid a Jewish family in their house for a few months while her brother was there.

Unfortunately, I was never able to listen to the survivors because I was teaching at the time they were there.

 

[BadPinkTink]

A few years ago I visited The Museum of Tolerance in LA and managed to go to a talk by Holocaust survivor Renee Firestone.

It was one of the most memorable experiences of my life.

Afterwards I went through their Holocaust exhibition, which is an extremely tough watch. At the end there was an elderly gentleman volunteer who was greeting visitors and answering questions about the exhibition. I stopped to listen to him talk. He introduced himself as Fred Page and at first he was talking about general things to do with the exhibition and The Holocaust. But then he started to tell us his story and about his family connection to The Holocaust. He started talking about his dad, and then amazingly told us, that his dad was Poldek Pfefferberg who was also known as Leopold Page. Poldek Pfefferberg worked in the enamelware factory owned by Oskar Schindler, and was one of the people saved by him. After the war he moved to LA and wrote up the story of Oskar Schindler and tried to get it published but no one was interested. Eventually in 1980 he met Thomas Keneally the writer, who finally agreed to write the book which became Schindler's Ark.

When Steven Spielberg eventually made the film Schindler's List, Poldek Pfefferberg was one of the main consultants on the film and was Steven Spielberg's guest at The Oscars when the film won 7 Oscars.

I feel so honoured to have met not only Rene Firestone but also the son of Poldek Pfefferberg.

​

 

[robinb]

My Dutch grandfather was a soldier and was sent to a POW camp. He and one aunt were the only members of his Jewish family to survive.

My DH's aunt was sent to six concentration camps. She was also living in Holland before she was picked up and she also was the only person in her immediate family to survive.

 

[CdnCarrie]

I can't imagine what those people suffered through. We have the Human Rights Museum (National museum) in our city and it's heartbreaking to tour.

 

[Nora03]

People wondered why the world allowed this to happen. We’re all watching the horrible atrocities in the Ukraine right now, and what are we doing? It’s heartbreaking!

 

[rowan1813]

As a history teacher, I have had the privilege of meeting and listening to a few Holocaust survivors but a few years ago I got to meet Eva Mozes Kor. Her and her twin sister Miriam, were survivors of Mengele's twin experiments and it was amazing to listen to her story and her journey to forgiveness.

On a separate but related note, I teach World History and we are currently in the middle of WWII and the Holocaust. Everything going on with Ukraine has incredibly disturbing parallels to events from 80 years ago. This morning on CNN, my students and I watched an Ukrainian Holocaust survivor tell her story of being forced from her home for a 2nd time. Then just now, we watched video footage of bodies being found in the street, shot execution style and a mass grave being discovered as Russian forces withdraw from Kyiv and other locations to "reposition". My kids and I just want to know - when does it end? When does humanity stop treating each other this way? I know history repeats itself, but I wasn't expecting this.

 

[Neapolitan Ice Cream]

People wondered why the world allowed this to happen. We’re all watching the horrible atrocities in the Ukraine right now, and what are we doing? It’s heartbreaking!

I completely agree!

 

[WebmasterMaryJo]

A few years ago, one of the movie channels showed a documentary called "Paper Clips." Here is a link to it - https://oneclipatatime.org/paper-clips-project/

This is from the link:

In 1998, something amazing happened in the town of Whitwell, a small rural community of fewer than 2,000 people nestled in the mountains of Tennessee.

Whitwell Middle School principal Linda Hooper asked language arts teacher Sandra Roberts and associate principal David Smith to begin a Holocaust education class that would be the basis for teaching tolerance and diversity in a voluntary after-school program. When the students, mostly white and Christian, struggled to grasp the concept and enormity of the six million Jews who died during the Holocaust, they decided to collect six million paper clips – one for each soul who perished.

Why paper clips? The students’ research found that Norwegians wore paper clips as a silent protest and symbol of resistance against Nazi occupation during World War II. It was this simple idea that eventually, and quite unintentionally, turned into a worldwide phenomenon, drawing international media attention and letters of support from literally every continent.


The “Paper Clips Project” extended over several years and in 2001 the school dedicated a Children’s Holocaust Memorial, which includes an authentic German railcar filled with a portion of the more than 30 million paper clips they eventually collected. A moving documentary, entitled Paper Clips and originally released theatrically in 2004, captures how these students responded to lessons about the Holocaust and how a committed group of children and educators provided hope and inspiration to countless others around the globe.

To book an official tour of the Children’s Holocaust Memorial at Whitwell Middle School, please email Linda Hooper directly at whitwelltraveler@gmail.com. For more information on the Children’s Holocaust Memorial, please visit the Whitwell Middle School web site.

-------------

Looks like you can watch it on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Paper-Clips-Whitwell/dp/B001KK4SNO