BY DAVE BENJAMIN
Staff Writer
They came to tell their stories. More than 20 Holocaust survivors met with Howell High School students on Oct. 26 as the teenagers captured a piece of Holocaust history.
“About six months ago the New Jersey Holocaust Commission made a commitment to try to introduce different programs to bring survivors and students together,” said Paul Winkler, director, New Jersey State Holocaust Commission. “There have been activities called ‘Adopt a Survivor,’ a prom for survivors, bar mitzvahs with survivors, and then I got a phone call one day from this wonderful art teacher [Doreen Schwartz-Weitz], who said she had an idea to draw the portraits of survivors. When I thought about it, I thought it was something wonderful. That’s why we’re here today, to begin a project.”
Winkler said the young and the old need to be brought together to find out things that are inside, things that need to be shared.
“We have to step back and see people as human beings,” Winkler said, adding that he understands it is difficult for the survivors to share their stories. “Today [the students] will learn [firsthand] about the Holocaust and the genocide.”
“The program is called Portraits of Survivors,” said Schwartz-Weitz, artist and teacher. “Last April I contacted Dr. Winkler, who was looking for programs that would involve students one-to-one with survivors.”
DAVE BENJAMIN Clockwise from top — Howell High School art students Jeanine Andrews, Nicole Hines and Lauren Mastrodonato sketch their portraits of Lola Kline, as Colleen MacCutch-eon records the story of Kline’s survival during the Holocaust era. Teacher-artist Doreen Schwartz-Weitz said that when she opened the book “Degenerate Art,” she was shocked to learn that Adolf Hitler considered the work of Pablo Picasso to be degenerate. Walter Schwarz (r) tells his story of survival to Gabriel Raffele and Amanda Rossman. Schwartz-Weitz said the plan was to have the survivors meet students who would record their stories, while art students would draw, and eventually paint, a portrait of each survivor.
“This is a very special event for us,” said Principal Zina Duerbig. “We know we’re at a time in life where it’s very precious to have survivors in the school who are able to share their stories.”
Duerbig said that in studying the Holocaust the one thing she learned and has carried with her is the idea that the strength of a survivor is in telling the story.
“That’s when you know you’ve won, because you’re here and you can tell your story,” the principal said. “It was about 10 years ago that I met Fred Spiegel and he’s very special to me. Fred gave me a copy of his book, ‘Once the Acacias Bloomed: Memories of a Childhood Lost.’ I will read it and then put it in our school library, so that all of our students will have the opportunity to read this book as well. Mr. Spiegel is here today.”
Over the next hour students heard the survivors tell their stories. Some students took notes, while others sketched portraits of the survivors in preparation for painting.
Eva Weiner was one person who came to share her story.
“My parents were both born in Poland. They traveled with their respective families through Europe to escape the problems of World War I. Somewhere around 1914 they left Poland and both happened to end up in Berlin, Germany,” she said.
Weiner said her parents grew up in Berlin and as young children they went to school and that’s where they met and eventually got married.
“Living in Germany was good,” said Weiner. “My father’s family had a bakery in Berlin and he was one of eight children. My mother was one of four children and she became a seamstress. They met and they married, and one year later I was born.”
Weiner recalled when, in 1976, the book “Voyage of the Damned” came out. It was a book to which her family had contributed. She said, “When the book came out, all the stories were so real, because my father had already told us these stories…”
Edith Schlussler told the students “there were people with all of their belongings in shopping bags, bringing them to the Nazis. [My mother] decided right then and there that if they wanted it, they’re going to have to find it. She didn’t get on line with her belongings. She came back home. That was a very dangerous thing to do. If they discovered that, she would have been shot on the spot.”
Schlussler said her mother spoke English and wrote a letter to an employment agency in London and asked if they could get her a job as a housekeeper and instead of money she would like to have her child with her.
“All that happened in November,” said Schlussler. “The [family] store was taken away and I was thrown out of school. By April 1939 my mother and I were able to leave Austria and we went to England. All
communication [with the family in Austria] was cut off…”
Gerard Blumenthal recounted how “we were put in a concentration camp near the French Pyrenees mountains near the border of Spain. It was cold. The water was frozen. We couldn’t wash. The sanitary conditions were very bad. There were no toilets. The only thing you had were ditches around the camp.”
Blumenthal said he spent 14 months in that concentration camp.
“Finally I was removed by a Jewish organization [which] helped children,” he said. “They must have had some help from people in the French government. In France there were people who were against the Nazis and people pro-Nazi, but you never knew who was for or against.”
Blumenthal said he was sent to a home for children, which was run by American Quakers, in the southern part of France.
“I was 11 years old and very angry,” said Blumenthal. “I beat up one of the counselors and then I ran away fearing punishment. I came back three days later and found nobody there. The home was empty.”
He asked around and said he was told the French police did the dirty work on behalf of the Germans.
“I found out later on that the Quakers and the children were sent to Aushwitz” concentration camp, Blumenthal said. “For the next year or more I wandered through the countryside of France eating grapes or [pig] corn. I kept moving for fear. I followed the Rhone Valley and through the French Alps and was [finally] met by the French resistance…”
A great deal of planning went into the program, including a two-day lecture and discussion with the students by Howell High School social studies supervisor Stan Koba. The lecture prepared the students from a historical perspective. Also involved in the program were supervisors Dan Green and Gary Wojcik. The Brookdale Community College Holocaust Center, Lincroft, and Executive Director Dale Daniels are partners in the program.
“At the Holocaust center we know from many years of experience that the best teachers, the master teachers, about the Holocaust and about fighting hate, discrimination and prejudice are the survivors,” Daniels said. “This is a truly unique experience. It is a chance to touch history.”
“It’s truly amazing because most of the survivors are very old at this point and in another few years we may not have anyone left except through tape,” said Duerbig. “Doing portraits will keep them and their stories memorialized forever.”
Senior Devin Ascione said, “It was very informative. You know, all of them aren’t going to be around in a few more years. So we have to let everybody else know about their story of survival.”
Junior Emily Todd said, “I really felt like I’ve connected with this man (Paul Fleisher) and I’ve learned so much about the Holocaust that I didn’t know before. It was a personal experience, rather than a textbook experience.”
Emily said she wished others could have the same type of experience.
“You learn much more about the Holocaust,” she said. “I hope this doesn’t sound too corny, but it can almost change your life. It was a good experience.”
The students and survivors expected to participate in a luncheon on Nov. 10. Work will continue on the portraits of the survivors.