Holocaust :The Effects Are Still Being Felt Today

The Holocaust began in the 1930s and ended in 1945, but the effects are still being felt today. The memories of the tragedy are still very real to victims as an area remembrance conference reaches its 30th year.

The video and pictures from the Holocaust are in black and white, but the images are still very vivid for survivor Joanna Gartenhaus.

A total of 11 million people died during the Holocaust; 6 million of those were Jews. Gartenhaus said her grandfather died at a camp in Czechoslovakia. He made it three years there. Gartenhaus was only six then.

"For the first 20 years of my married life I refused to speak German,” said Gartenhaus. “When the nightmares passed I started speaking German again.

Gartenhaus said the nightmares came back when she returned to Germany to visit. Gartenhaus said she looks forward to speaking at area schools to help students remember the tragedy she had to deal with so many years ago.

Gartenhaus will be taking part in the Greater Lafayette Holocaust Remembrance Conference, now in its 30th year. Chairperson Susan Prohofsky said it is getting more and more difficult getting younger generations..

"I do not know if they are not interested or they just do not understand or they do not have the time, but we are not getting young people involved,” said Prohofsky.

* April 3. 3:00 p.m. Stewart Center, Room 214. “The Propaganda of the Holocaust.” Randall Bytwerk, professor of communication arts and sciences and department co-chair at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Introduction by Rebekah Klein-Pejšová, assistant professor of Jewish studies and history at Purdue.

* April 3. 4:00 p.m. Stewart Center, Fowler Hall. A commemorative concert, “Remembering the Warsaw Ghetto with ‘The Pianist’: Concert Commemorating the Holocaust Through the Musical Legacy of Wladyslaw Szpilman.” Performed by the faculty of the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University: Prof. Edward Auer, piano; Prof. Halina Goldberg, narrator; and others.

* April 3. 6:00 p.m. Purdue Memorial Union, 2nd floor, the Anniversary Drawing Room. Kosher dairy dinner buffet, with conference speakers and conference committee. Open to the public. RSVP by Wed., March 30, to sue@glhrc.org. Cost is $20 for adults and $3 for students, payable by check to GLHRC at door or mail check to GLHRC, PO Box 3763, W. Lafayette 47996. For more information, call 765.463.1980.

* April 3. 7:30 p.m. Krannert Auditorium. “Holocaust Survivors and Liberators.” Survivors Robert Melson and Anatole Kurdsjuk; Liberator LeRoy Carson. Moderated by GLHRC committee member Arne Kvaalen, professor emeritus of art, Purdue.

* April 4. 9 a.m. Hillel Foundation, 912 W. State St., West Lafayette. Tippecanoe County Religious Leaders and University Religious Leaders Breakfast, a conversation with Jacobs, Bytwerk and Kurdsjuk. Moderated by Joseph Haberer, professor emeritus of political science, Purdue.

* April 4. 8 p.m. Krannert Auditorium. “Comparing Nazi Propaganda to Today’s Media Coverage of Islamophobia.” Randall Bytwerk, professor of communication arts and sciences and department co-chair at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Erik C. Nisbet, professor of communication, Ohio State University, Columbus.

* April 5. 2 p.m., West Lafayette Public Library, 208 W. Columbia St. Photo exhibit opening: “Pictures of Resistance: The Wartime Photography of Jewish Partisan Faye Schulman.” Tour led by Bruce Bramlett from The Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation. Exhibit is open during the library’s regular hours. Exhibit closes on April 22.

* April 5. 4-8 p.m. Teaching “Defiance,” a workshop for middle-school teachers. Help students in critical thinking about history, leadership and ethics. Presented by The Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation. Registration required by April 2. See website for details: www.glhrc.org. Box dinners donated by Roger and Cathy Bauer of SUBWAY/Bauer, Inc. of Lafayette.

* April 5. 7 p.m. Hillel Foundation, 912 W. State St., West Lafayette. Showing of “A Film Unfinished." 2010. 88 min. Silent film. Portrays the people behind and before the camera in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942 Poland, exposing the extent of the Nazis’