by George J Elbaum

The Holocaust Center for Humanity Survivor Encyclopedia project features survivors and eye-witnesses who live or have lived in Washington State.  They challenge us to understand history through personal narrative – to see complex human beings behind the facts. Their stories inspire us to recognize human fragility and resilience and the difference that each one of us can make.

The Survivor Encyclopedia is an ongoing project, so new entries are continually being added.  Whereas I do not live in Washington State, my son does and therefore I’ve been a frequent visitor for 25 years.  In fact, it was on a visit to the Holocaust Center (under its previous name) in 2010 that I first learned the guiding principle for my talks: the audience should be old enough to understand, yet young enough to have an open mind.  It was also the Holocaust Center that arranged my very first talks in high schools (Seattle’s Alternative School No.1 and Tacoma’s Charles Wright Academy) in October 2010, and has been arranging my talks ever since for my visits to Seattle.  It was therefore not surprising that the Holocaust Center asked me to give my testimony for its Survivors Encyclopedia, and March 10, 2023 I experienced a 4-hour emotional roller coaster ride across my Holocaust childhood and the subsequent post-war years.  My gentle expert interviewer was Marcy Bloom, with Domenick Dellino providing the audio-visual recording.