22 Adar 5769
I am currently in residence at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. A friend of mine, Monica Katz, gave me the names of her grandparents and great grandparents to see if there were any records on them. Since they were from Austria the documentation is pretty complete. [It's much harder -- though not impossible -- to find information on family members from Poland or Russia.]
Yesterday I went into the Survivors Registry division of the Museum to find out if they had found anything. Megan, the researcher working on this project, showed me what she had, which includes deportation lists, emigration files, and a cremation card from Terezin for Monica's great grandmother, Fanny Winkler.
She printed out a copy of the card for me and, as I was walking back to my office, I noticed that the cremation date was March 17, 1944. Yesterday.
I looked up the equivalent date on the Hebrew calendar and it was the 22 of Adar, which began last night and continues through today until night. And, it turns out, her great great granddaughter Caroline's birthday is Adar 22.
So last night and today Fanny Winkler's great grandchildren in Atlanta and Montreal and great great grandchildren in New York, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Montreal and many other places were able to mark her death. This morning her great great granddaughter, Meira, was in synagogue saying kaddish for her.
All for the first time in 65 years.
May her memory be for a blessing.
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3 comments:
I have been reading your blog for some while now. I very much appreciate the perspective that you bring to issues that I'm concerned about, specifically, Jewish-Christian relations. Also, I am finishing up my masters (M. Div/MA in Religion) and have become very interested in the PhD program at Emory.
That is all really just a brief introduction, but my specific reason for commenting is related to this immediate post. I spent some time at the Holocaust Museum in October with my late professor, Dan Goodman, on the topic of Jewish-Christian Relations in America. We were also fortunate to be able to meet and talk with Victoria Barnett. I even toyed around with the idea of applying for an internship there. I am quite fascinated by Jewish-Christian relations, especially during and post-Holocaust. Your post today has reminded me of my great respect for the USHMM and the work that they do.
And bless Monica and her family for holding their Fanny in their hearts and memories, and you for serving as a messenger bridging gaps and recovering data of the most personal kind.
I don't know where I should post this news, Prof. Lipstadt, but Ward Churchill was fired this morning. I just caught the end of the story about it.
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