Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 43, No. 39, Ed. 1 Thursday, September 28, 1989 Page: 2 of 32
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2 TEXAS JEWISH POST, THURSDA Y, SEPTEMBER 28, 1989 NEW YEAR ISSUE
Thousands of Holocaust Artifacts Given
To U.S. Holocaust Museum by Poland
WASHINGTON, D.C.—
The objects are common
place. Laid out along the
edge of a barrack are
2,000 pairs of
shoes—many in children’s
sizes. Other objects in-
clude a three-tiered bunk;
a score of striped pajama-
like uniforms; children’s
toys, eating utensils, some
pieces of lumber that once
formed a wall, a pole
through which barbed wire
ran, a prayer shawl and a
couple of metal canisters.
They are common place.
And yet they are haunting.
For these objects are the
few material remnants of
the Auschwitz and
Majdanek death camps.
From the remnants of the
last remaining wall of the
Warsaw Ghetto come
some bricks—even a little
rubble. When incor-
porated into the per-
manent exhibition of the
United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum, they
will help visitors under-
stand how the everyday
lives of millions of people
not unlike themselves were
suddenly transformed into
a state of degradation,
terror and death.
Altogether, 42 separate
categories of objects were
transferred to the United
States Holocaust
Memorial Museum on
August 20-21 in an un-
precedented action by the
Polish government, its
state museums at Ausch-
witz and Majdanek and
the City of Warsaw. Most
of the objects were left
behind by victims sent to
the gas chambers. They
are the last remains of the
millions murdered in these
places of infamy. The
lumber formed part of a
barrack wall at Birkenau,
used to house Hungarian
Jewish women, and the
rubble was taken from a
Warsaw park in the heart
of the ghetto plowed un-
der by the Nazis after the
ghetto was completely
destroyed in June 1943.
These artifacts, together
with a railroad car used to
transport Jews from War-
saw to Treblinka, will
form the core of that
segment Museum’s per-
manent exhibition that
deals with the concen-
tration camp experience.
Along with a wide variety
of other personal
memorabilia from sur-
vivors and liberators, they
will give a unique charac-
ter to the United States
Holocaust Memorial
Museum.
The presentations were
made at the camp and
ghetto sites to a special
delegation of the United
States Holocaust
Memorial Council that
was led by Council
Chairman Harvey M.
Meyerhoff and included
former U.S. Ambassador
to the United Nations
Jeane J. Kirkpatrick,
former Senator William
E. Brock III, R-Tenn.,
and columnist George
Will. The cost of the trip
was underwritten by a
private grant.
The transfer of the ar-
tifacts from Auschwitz
and Majdanek was the
culmination of ten years
of hard work by Miles
Lerman, chairman of the
Council’s International
Relations Committee.
General Roman
Paszkawski, Chairman of
the Polish Council for the
Protection of Memory of
Combat and Martyrdom
spearheaded the Polish ef-
fort of cooperation.
Agreements were also
signed with the director of
the State Memorials at
Auschwitz and Majdanek,
Kazimierz Smolen and
Edward Dzjadosh. They
were implemented with
the guidance and
cooperation of Polish
Minister of Culture
Aleksander Krawczuk.
At Majdanek, two
thousand pairs of
children’s shoes were laid
out for the visiting
delegation. Lerman
recalled. “I stood at
Majdanek and picked up
the shoes of a young child.
As hard as I am, it ripped
out my guts. I can never
adjust to the fact that
those children were mur-
dered.”
Others in the delegation
included Gerald Green-
wald, vice chairman of
Chrysler Corporation;
Jack Tramiel, an Ausch-
witz survivor—returning
to the site for the first time
in 44 years—and chairman
of Atari Corporation;
Albert Ratner, chairman
of Forest City Enterprises;
and Conrad M. Black,
chairman of Hollinger,
Inc.
At Auschwitz, the
delegation was joined by a
U.S. Senate Foreign
Relations Committee
delegation headed by Sen.
Aian Cranston, D-Cal.,
which included Sen. Paul
Sarbanes, D-Md.; Sen.
Charles S. Robb, D-Va.;
and Sen. Bob Graham, D-
Fla.
At each site, the
delegation paid tribute to
the victims of the
Holocaust by laying
wreaths and reciting
memorial prayers.
Artifacts attesting to the
brutality of the Holocaust
as well as those demon-
strating the cultural
heritage of the victims are
coming to the Museum
under an overall formal
agreement, signed in
August 1987, between the
Council and the Main
Commission for the In-
vestigation of Nazi War
Crimes in Poland and a
subsequent agreement in
May 1989 between the
Council and the Polish
Council for the Protection
of Memory of Combat
and Martyrdom.
In accepting the
materials from Majdanek,
Meyerhoff assured the
director of the Museum
there, Edward Dzjadosh,
that ‘‘a pilgrim to
Washington will have the
opportunity not only to
see the Moon Rocks of
outer space, but also the
shoes of Majdanek, the
abyss of human existen-
ce.” Said Meyerhoff:
“We come face to face
with the anti-holy, the an-
ti-beautiful, the anti-
sacred. We face the world
of Majdanek.”
Summing up the trip,
Lerman said: “We have
come to the end of a short
journey, short in the
number of days and
hours, but intense beyond
belief. In 72 hours, we
have journeyed to War-
saw, Auschwitz,
Majdanek and Treblinka.
We have traversed time.
We have moved from the
world of today into the
world of darkness. We
have stepped into the
kingdom of death.”
“Our memories must in-
corporate these worlds
and translate the reality of
Auschwitz, Majdanek and
Treblinka to the American
visitor.”
A A brick from the last remaining wall of the Warsaw Ghetto is extracted by Holocaust Council Chairman
Harvey M. Meyerhoff, right, for placement in the permanent exhibition of the United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum. He is assisted by an unidentified Polish official.
50
Years Ago
Editor's Note: Fifty years
ago, on September 1,
1939, the Germany Army
invaded Poland, thus
launching World War II.
Simultaneously, another
Nazi act of aggression, the
war against the Jews and
other hated minorities,
was intensified. Here are
the major events as the
tragedy of the Holocaust
unfolded in October,
1939, 50 years ago:
October 6, 1939—Hitler
announces to the
Reichstag that Jews and
Poles residing in the areas
of Western Poland an-l
nexed by Germany will bej
expelled to the East. A1
formal expulsion order is
issued by Himmler on
Oct. 30.
October 8—The first
ghetto in Nazi-occupied
Poland is established ini
the town of Piotrkowl
Trybunalski in central
Poland. This was in
response to the order,
issued by Security Police
Chief Reinhard Heydrich
on Sept. 21, for the
creation of Jewish ghettos
in Poland.
October 9—The German
Interior Ministry issues a
circular requiring man-
datory reports on in-
stitutionalized patients in
German hospitals ant
sanitoria. This followe:
Hitler’s Sept. 1 ordei
authorizing the ad-
ministration of “mercy
killing of the in-
stitutionalized incurably
ill,” the so-called
euthanasia program in
which thousands of tha
handicapped were gassed
to death, creating a
precedent for Treblinka
and other mass killing cen-
ters.
October 12 — Hitler
issues an orden
establishing a civil adf
ministration, called the
General Government in
the unannexed areas of
Poland conquered by
German forces. This
territory will become the
destination for Jews ex'
pelled from the annexe
areas of Poland.
October 12-17—The first
deportations of Jews from
the Austrian capital of
Vienna and from the city
of Moravska-Ostrava ii|
occupied Czechoslovakia
are carried out. ThesJ
see HOLOCAUST page 30
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Wisch, J. A. & Wisch, Rene. Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 43, No. 39, Ed. 1 Thursday, September 28, 1989, newspaper, September 28, 1989; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth754902/m1/2/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .