The Simon Wiesenthal Center Museum of Tolerance is a unique experiential Museum dedicated to preserving the memory of the Holocaust A.. and to fostering tolerance THE MUSEUM OF TO LER ANC E through educational outreach, community involvement and social action. MUSEUM HOU RS

Weekdays 10:00 a. m. - 5:00 p.m: *(early close at 3: 00 p.m. on Fri days November - March)

Saturday CLOSED

Sunday 11 :00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Call for special holiday and programming schedules. When planning your visit, please note th at each of th e three main exhibits takes approximately one and a half hours.

"Hope lives when people remember" -Simon Wiesenthal Simon Wiesenthal Center· Museum of Tolerance

9786 West Pico Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90035 310.533.8403 www.wiesenthal.com www.muse um oftoleran ce.com www.facebook.com/museu moftolerance www.twitter.com/ musoftolera nce Persecution of Jews began immediately, Toward the end of the war, as the Germans were properties were confiscated and Jews were forced to retreat from Eastern Europe, Gitta was ordered to register with the authorities. People transported to Braunschweig, a forced labor camps in disappeared. In 1940 to avoid a similar fate , Germany. Gitta Nagel Abisz, Gitta's father and her older brother Yankel were smuggled through the forest into In April 1945, Gitta, together with other inmates, were neighboring Slovakia. Relatives provided Abisz pushed into cattle cars. They traveled for two weeks and Yankel with hiding places. Gitta, her with no food, water or sanitation, headed toward an mother and younger brother stayed behind unknown destination. Many died from starvation and and struggled to survive. When the suffocation and others were weakened from disease persecution of Jews in Poland had become and malnutrition. Finally, the cattle cars stopped and unbearable, in the spring of 1941, Gitta, her the doors were opened. Having learned that the war mother Esther and her brother Nathan were was over, the guards told the inmates that they were also smuggled into Slovakia. A Christian in Denmark. The dead bodies were unloaded and, forester, who could smuggle two or three among them was Gitta who weighed 57 Lb ., too weak people at a time, assisted them. Half of the to even sign that she was alive. With strenuous expensive fee was paid in advance and the efforts, she pulled herself up and away from the dead second half was paid upon safe arrival in bodies. Sick with tuberculosis and a collapsed lung, Slovakia. Mordechai had to remain behind with Gitta was shipped to Sweden to a hospital for their grandmother, Sara Nagel, and planned to treatment and recuperation. Two years later, in 1947, join the family later. In the summer of 1941 sixteen year old Gitta immigrated to the United States. Germans raided the family home, in Krosno. A few weeks later her brother, Yankel arrived and he Sara, the grandmother begged the German and Gitta were reunited . Gitta's parents, brothers and officer not to take her. She asked, "What good grandparents perished in the Holocaust. Gitta's is an old woman?" the German replied with a current name is Gloria Ungar. Gloria continues to shot that killed her in front of Mordechai. make her home in Los Angeles where she is a Mordechai was taken away and never heard museum guide on the staff of the Museum of Born September 9, 1930 from again. Gitta and her family, hid in different Tolerance. Gitta was among the few Jewish Krosno, Poland places in Slovakia, eluding capture by the children who survived the Holocaust. One and a Gitta, born on September 9, 1930, in Krosno, Germans for almost four years. On her half million Jewish children were murdered by the Poland, was the daughter of Esther (nee fourteenth birthday (1944) Gitta and her family Germans and their collaborators. Dereszewicz-Spira) and Abisz Nagel. She had were caught and sent to the Auschwitz two older brothers; Yankel, born December 7, concentration camp in Poland. 1923, and Mordechai, born 1925; and a younger Upon arrival, Gitta went through the selection SUR V I V 0 I~ S 0 r T H r brother Nathan, born 1932. Jews in Krosno by Dr. Josef Mengele. Mengele automatically were engaged in small businesses and trade, sent to the gas chamber children under Si H ~ O ' AWH such as weaving, tailoring, and shoemaking. fourteen who he deemed unfit for labor. 'j I ;.; lJ A:. ! I I.. <", R ... f ', ', LJ " .) ,\ I I e ;... ,- , Antisemitism and economic boycotts were Mengele mistook Gitta who just turned Museum Of Tolerance. common. Before World War II , 2,500 Jews lived fourteen for an older girl and her life was in Krosno, with almost 6,000 more living in the spared. In December 1944, Gitta was surrounding areas. Gitta's father, Abisz, was a deported from Auschwitz to Bergen-Belsen successful businessman and the family lived a concentration camp, in Germany. comfortable life. However, it all ended in September 1939 with the German invasion of Poland.