Posted on Jan 27, 2023
Her ancestors survived the Holocaust. She returns to Germany to reclaim her identity
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https://www.npr.org/2023/01/27/ [login to see] /her-ancestors-survived-the-holocaust-she-returns-to-germany-to-reclaim-her-ident
Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Every year there are fewer Holocaust survivors still with us. But the trauma they experienced continues to reverberate through generations.
Today we bring you the story of a descendent of Holocaust victims.
Haley's ancestors were Holocaust survivors. But she's chosen to return to Germany anyway. We follow her journey to reclaim the things stolen from her family — an identity and a homeland. Why would someone return to a place of unspeakable trauma and what does it take for them to feel welcomed?
Memory Wars is a six-part series about how Germany has confronted its horrific past and whether America could ever do the same. Reported by Mallory Noe-Payne and featuring conversations with Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist Michael Paul Williams. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or NPR One.
Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Every year there are fewer Holocaust survivors still with us. But the trauma they experienced continues to reverberate through generations.
Today we bring you the story of a descendent of Holocaust victims.
Haley's ancestors were Holocaust survivors. But she's chosen to return to Germany anyway. We follow her journey to reclaim the things stolen from her family — an identity and a homeland. Why would someone return to a place of unspeakable trauma and what does it take for them to feel welcomed?
Memory Wars is a six-part series about how Germany has confronted its horrific past and whether America could ever do the same. Reported by Mallory Noe-Payne and featuring conversations with Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist Michael Paul Williams. Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or NPR One.
Her ancestors survived the Holocaust. She returns to Germany to reclaim her identity
Posted from npr.org
Germany
World History
Posted >1 y ago
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PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."Her work in reconstructing her family’s painful history was aided by her father’s younger brother, her uncle Herman, who also managed to escape Vienna. Other relatives in England shared letters and other documents with her decades after her father had died.
At an art show in 2007, Ms. Frostig met a survivor of the camp who pointed her to information on Jungfernhof. Eager to learn more, she traveled to the site outside Riga, finding an area littered with trash. She returned in 2010 and met with Ilya Lensky, director of the Jews in Latvia Museum, who helped with her research. The site was still a dump then, but when she returned again in 2019, she found a manicured public park and a sign that discussed the history of the grounds, which had once been a farm. Jungfernhof translates roughly as “maiden farm.” Only one sentence on the sign mentioned the concentration camp and it did not list its name.
In 2021, she arranged for geographers and students from Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Va., to use ground-penetrating radar, electrical resistivity tomography and other technologies to peer under the earth at Jungfernhof. They found evidence of an excavation of about 20 square meters, four to six meters below the surface — possibly the camp’s mass grave. Later research by scholars suggested that it may lie elsewhere but nearby.
On Thursday night, for strength and inspiration, Ms. Frostig said she slept with her remarks for her U.N. appearance tucked beneath her pillow. On Friday, at the podium, she tried to depict for the diplomats, invited guests and Holocaust survivors how her work in Latvia was fueled by her first visit to the tract where the camp once stood.
“This ground,” she said, “contained my grandparents’ bodies somewhere in an unmarked mass grave. It was a chilling moment. And it was also a moment filled with love and a yearning to be close to my grandparents, to protect them with my memory.”
..."Her work in reconstructing her family’s painful history was aided by her father’s younger brother, her uncle Herman, who also managed to escape Vienna. Other relatives in England shared letters and other documents with her decades after her father had died.
At an art show in 2007, Ms. Frostig met a survivor of the camp who pointed her to information on Jungfernhof. Eager to learn more, she traveled to the site outside Riga, finding an area littered with trash. She returned in 2010 and met with Ilya Lensky, director of the Jews in Latvia Museum, who helped with her research. The site was still a dump then, but when she returned again in 2019, she found a manicured public park and a sign that discussed the history of the grounds, which had once been a farm. Jungfernhof translates roughly as “maiden farm.” Only one sentence on the sign mentioned the concentration camp and it did not list its name.
In 2021, she arranged for geographers and students from Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Va., to use ground-penetrating radar, electrical resistivity tomography and other technologies to peer under the earth at Jungfernhof. They found evidence of an excavation of about 20 square meters, four to six meters below the surface — possibly the camp’s mass grave. Later research by scholars suggested that it may lie elsewhere but nearby.
On Thursday night, for strength and inspiration, Ms. Frostig said she slept with her remarks for her U.N. appearance tucked beneath her pillow. On Friday, at the podium, she tried to depict for the diplomats, invited guests and Holocaust survivors how her work in Latvia was fueled by her first visit to the tract where the camp once stood.
“This ground,” she said, “contained my grandparents’ bodies somewhere in an unmarked mass grave. It was a chilling moment. And it was also a moment filled with love and a yearning to be close to my grandparents, to protect them with my memory.”
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