At this time of rising antisemitism, 75 years after the end of World War II and the Holocaust, this program highlights acts of courage by several rescuers including Sir Nicholas Winton who saved children from Czechoslovakia and Chiune Sugihara who gave Japanese visas to Lithuanian Jews.
Righteous Among the Nations is an honorary title bestowed by Yad Vashem (The Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem) on behalf of the State of Israel upon non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis. The stories of these and several other rescuers will be presented.
Presenter: Judith Schumer was born in Shanghai, China in October, 1945 - two months after the end of the war with Japan. Her parents survived the Holocaust by first escaping to Lithuania from Nazi-occupied Poland and then getting a special visa which enabled them to get out of Eastern Europe and travel first to Japan and then to China. They spent the war under Japanese occupation in Shanghai and were finally able to get visas to the United States in 1948. In New York, her father, a Yiddish journalist, eventually became the editor of the Yiddish newspaper, The Jewish Daily Forward.
In 2012, Judith published a book about her family’s escape and survival titled Esther’s Journey - A Holocaust Memoir. In 2015 she published a biography of a Holocaust survivor titled In the Presence of my Enemies. Judith was a teacher for 35 years in NY and NJ. She and her husband live in Berkshire County and Reno, NV where she is the Chairperson of the Governor’s Advisory Council on Education Relating to the Holocaust. She is also a member of the Northern Nevada Holocaust Education Task Force.
This free program is part of the Federation’s Connecting With Community Series.