Students will tell the stories of four Holocaust surviors during the Henry Ricklis Holocaust Memorial Committee’s Yom Hashoa program, which will be held 1:30 p.m. May 7 at the Monroe Township High School.
By: Leon Tovey
MONROE Megan Teller remembers being struck by how small Frida Herskovitz is.
Megan, a tall, athletic 16-year-old who plays soccer and lacrosse, still shakes her head in awe at what tiny Frida endured in the Auschwitz concentration camp more than 60 years ago, when she was not much older than Megan is now.
"It just really struck me," Megan said Tuesday. "How these people that went through all of that, they weren’t physically strong, but…"
"But they still survived it," Angela Lenzo said.
Megan and Angela, both sophomores at Hightstown High School, are two of five students who will tell the stories of four Holocaust survivors all of whom are Monroe Township residents at the Henry Ricklis Holocaust Memorial Committee ‘s annual Yom Hashoa observance on May 7.
The five students Megan, Angela, Jenna Lichtenstein and sisters Danielle and Madalyn Dolan met their survivors through Hightstown High School’s Adopt-a-Survivor Program, which is sponsored by the Second Generation Holocaust Education Fund and the Ricklis Committee.
The program pairs high school students with survivors of the Holocaust, with the goal of teaching the students the survivors’ stories so that the students will be able to tell those stories in 2045, the centennial of the liberation of Auschwitz.
But when the five girls met Tuesday to rehearse for the May event at Applegarth Middle School (which just happened to be the official international Holocaust Remembrance Day), none of them was thinking that far ahead.
All five said they were looking forward to the May event; they said the experience of meeting their survivors had been surprising in a number of ways and that they’re looking forward to sharing that experience, that surprise, with others.
Angela, who adopted Esther Clifford last year, said she was surprised when she learned that Ms. Clifford was never sent to a concentration camp, but spent years in hiding and on the run from the Nazis before escaping to England.
"I wasn’t expecting that," Angela said, noting that much of her from-the-textbook Holocaust education focused on the camps. "It was a different story, but still so horrible, the things that happened to her and how she lost her family."
For Danielle and Madalyn, the most surprising thing was just how open their survivor, Sol Lurie, was with them. Madalyn, a senior at HHS, adopted Mr. Lurie last year, while Danielle, a sophomore, has adopted him this year.
"I cried a lot," Madalyn said of her response to Mr. Lurie’s recollections of the Nazi occupation of Lithuania and his time in three of the most notorious camps, Dachau, Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald.
Jenna Lichtenstein, a senior at West Windsor-Plainsboro South High School who joined AAS after reading a newspaper article about the program, said she was struck by the "down to earth" nature of her survivor, Judith Sherman.
"I was expecting this shrewd, tough old lady," Jenna said. "But she was so nice, so likeable, considering all she went through, it’s just amazing."
Mr. Lurie, Ms. Herskovitz, Ms. Sherman and Ms. Clifford all have honed their storytelling abilities over the years, giving hundreds of interviews and speeches but the five AAS students said they’re not intimidated by the prospect of telling those stories in front of the people who lived them.
Nor should they be, Mr. Lurie said Monday.
"These kids are fantastic," he said. "When you talk to them they really ask questions and listen.
"It will be very gratifying to hear (them tell the stories)," he added.
Ms. Herskovitz agreed.
"We want that it shouldn’t be forgotten," she said last week. "And 2045 is a long time away, and I think these kids know and can tell other people that we are all human beings and we shouldn’t hate. We shouldn’t waste our time being miserable. We should be happy instead."

