The Nathan & Esther Pelz Holocaust Education Resource Center FALL 2015 NEWSLETTER ‘I simply had to flow with the Stream’: The Story of Lee Marnett he Holocaust survivors who take part in HERC’s Speakers’ Bureau with him to Milwaukee the rich and colorful often speak to young people about the horrors of the Holocaust and world of his ancestors. If you wonder how T their testimony lights the way for future generations. They are, after unique that world was, consider how many all, those who had a first-hand experience of the destruction of European members of our community under the age of Jewry during World War II, the ones who can stand in front of a class and 60 are capable of beginning a sentence in encapsulate it all in one sentence: “I was there.” Fewer of these students are English, demonstrating meaning with a quote aware of the other “torch” that each Holocaust survivor was compelled to from the Bible in the Hebrew Ashkenazi carry in the wake of the war: to keep alive the memory of the central and pronunciation, then effortlessly shifting to eastern European Jewish way of life, the unique civilization that went up in another comment in Polish or Yiddish, and, smoke through the chimneys of the death camps, that lay buried in the finally, concluding the sentence with a good scores of mass graves scattered over eastern Europe. joke in Russian. Lee Marnett can easily pull this off, not only because of who he is as an Lee Marnett The Holocaust was, after all, a twofold destruction – of the people and their individual, but also as a result of the unique culture, of men and women, the children and the elderly; and at the same milieu in which he was reared. Can these two time – of their traditions, lore, language, literature, food, and more. When I ever be separated? I truly doubt it. met with Lee Marnett for the first time, about a year ago, and listened to him offering a brief testimony at the BBYO teen program that precedes the Lee’s childhood memories are somewhat unclear, but this shortcoming Yom Hashoah community service, I immediately noticed his rare ability to embodies his experiences. As a teenager who came to Milwaukee after capture both legacies. He shared with the younger generations the horrors losing his mother in the Vilna Ghetto during the war and his father in a DP of the Holocaust and embodied in his language, accent, expressions and camp after the war, Lee did not have the fortune to be surrounded by jokes something of the flavor of the bygone world of the Litvakes – the adults who could help him preserve the precious memories of his Jews of Lithuanian descent. Born in the “Jerusalem of Lithuania,” in the city childhood. On the one hand, some memories of these bygone days he can that was given many different names by its different inhabitants (Vilne in Yiddish, Wilno in Polish, and Vilnius in Lithuanian), Lee Marnett brought CONTINUED ON PAGE 7 RSVP by November 6th to [email protected] or 414-963-2710 1 From the Chair opefully you are all enjoying the final quarter of 2015. As the new Chair beloved dad Arthur of blessed memory and her of the Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education Resource Center I amazing mother Rose. Betty has served HERC H am so pleased to share that much has been accomplished under the since its inception. Her leadership has guided direction of Dr. Shay Pilnik, Executive Director of HERC, Betty Chrustowski, the the organization with compassion, dedication, immediate past Chair, our Coordinator Brittany Hager McNeely and our and an unparalleled commitment. On behalf of marvelous Holocaust survivor speakers, volunteers and educators. Together our HERC and our entire community I thank Betty organization was able to serve 18,000 people throughout Wisconsin, the for her tireless leadership and look forward to majority of them middle and high school students. Together we have shared working with her to continue what she so the lessons painfully learned from the incomparable horrors of the Holocaust. brilliantly designed. Together, HERC’s mission – to build a society resting on the values of tolerance and diversity, dignity and respect toward all human beings – is shared Lastly, I would like to invite you to join us on Bev Greenberg throughout our state and beyond, and in so doing will make our world a better Wednesday, November 18, 2015 for our major place in which to live. Our precious survivors, our enlightening educators, and event A Night to Remember. This year’s event honors the dedication and our dedicated volunteers and staff, TOGETHER will continue to educate about extraordinary volunteerism of Don Layden & Bruce Peckerman. The evening will what happens when bullying, hatred, violence, and intolerance become be held at the Marcus Center for Performing Arts and will include dinner as well accepted behaviors. Watching the recent murders on our college campuses, the as the Milwaukee debut of the one-woman theatrical performance Etty. I want to march of Syrian refugees, murders within our churches, schools and movie thank the Chairs of this event, Joe Peltz and Mark Brickman, who along with Betty theaters, and violence in our own city, tells us all how important HERC’s Chrustowski and many others have worked tirelessly to plan A Night to Remember. message is and how needed our organization is in today’s world. We need to be familiar with some of the most difficult chapters in our history, or we are I am so proud to be HERC’s Chair and hope I will meet the high standards set doomed to repeat it. To that end, this year our goal is to reach over 20,000 before me by past HERC Chairs Bill Appel, Harry Pelz, and Betty Chrustowski. people in more Wisconsin communities than ever before. To that end, we need Together with our survivors, staff and volunteers, and educators, we will make more volunteers, educators, and donors to help us accomplish our mission. a positive difference in the lives of many. Betty Chrustowski once told me that the most powerful lesson she took from Warmly, the Holocaust can be summarized in two words – strength and life. These two words embody HERC’s mission to help build a strong community and to establish a vibrant Jewish life here in Milwaukee, in the wake of the Holocaust. Betty has learned the lessons of the Holocaust firsthand from her Bev Greenberg UPCOMING EVENTS Tuesday, November 3 Sunday, December 13 Saturday, January 23, 2016 Holocaust Book Club: “Holocaust Holocaust Film: “The Third Half” Holocaust Memorial Concert Representations in History: An 1 pm I Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC 7 pm I Congregation Shalom Introduction” Community Hall Join the Bel Canto Boy Choir for an evening of 7 pm I Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC Reading Room The Third Half is a story of several people gathered remembering the Holocaust around the most important thing in the world – Instructors & Authors: Dr. Daniel Magilow & Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education football, in the most turbulent time of the world’s Resource Center, Bel Canto and Congregation Shalom Dr. Lisa Silverman history – Second World War. “Holocaust Representations in History” is an introduction to Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education NOVEMBER critical questions and debates surrounding the depiction, Wednesday, January 27, 2016 Resource Center and Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC chronicling and memorialization of the Holocaust through Holocaust Book Club: the historical analysis of some of the most provocative and significant works of Holocaust representation. Sunday, December 20 “The Zookeeper’s Wife” 7 pm I Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education Holocaust Stories: In their Honor Reading Room Resource Center, Sam and Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Featuring Albert Beder Studies and Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC Instructor: Dr. Neal Pease 10 am I Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC Community Hall After their zoo was bombed, Polish zookeepers Jan and Sunday, November 8 Antonina Zabinski managed to save over three hundred Kristallnacht Commemoration Future programs in this series will feature: people from the Nazis by hiding refugees in the empty 4 pm I Jewish Home & Care Center Rubenstein Pavilion Tauba Biterman: animal cages. Join community members in an interfaith commemoration February 28, 2016 Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education of Kristallnacht. Nate Taffel: Resource Center and Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education April 17, 2016 Resource Center and Jewish Home & Care Center Raye David: Thursday, February 25, 2016 July 17, 2016 Wednesday, November 18 Holocaust Book Club: “Perfidy” Co-sponsors: Nathan and 7 pm I Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC A Night to Remember honoring Esther Pelz Holocaust Reading Room Education Resource Center Don Layden & Bruce Peckerman Instructor: Dr. Shay Pilnik and Harry & Rose Samson featuring Etty Family JCC In the Kastner affair, as it is known, a seemingly 6 pm I Marcus Center for the Performing Arts insignificant refugee from Hungary accuses an important Bradley Pavilion Monday, December 21 member of David Ben Gurion’s Mapai party of FEBRUARY In addition to recognizing our special honorees Don Layden collaborating with the Nazis during the murder of and Bruce Peckerman for their dedication to HERC, A Night Echoes of Auschwitz: Feminist Jewish Hungarian Jewry. to Remember will feature the Milwaukee debut of Etty, a Activism in Post-Dictatorship Argentina Co-sponsors: Nathan and Esther Pelz Holocaust Education one-woman theatrical play based on the diaries and letters 7 pm I Jewish Museum Milwaukee Resource Center and Harry & Rose Samson Family JCC of Etty Hillesum, a young Dutch Jewish student who was Dalia Wassner from The Hadassah-Brandeis Institute deported to Auschwitz during the Holocaust.