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Chapman University in Orange recently honored the winners of its fifth annual Holocaust Art and Writing Contest - youngsters who for the most part know about this vital piece of human history only through textbooks. The students - middle and high schoolers from Southern California who competed in the categories of poems and essays - were compelled to research their subjects and provide sources for their information, then describe why their subject was particularly important or an inspiration. New this year, the event adds an art component. This year's prompt: "Conscience and Courage: Heroes of the Holocaust." Co-sponsored by the university and The "1939" Club, a Holocaust survivor organization, the one-day program was organized by two Chapman professors. They are Marilyn Harran, director, The Barry and Phyllis Rodgers Center for Holocaust Education and Stern Chair in Holocaust Education, and Jan Osborn, a professor of education. Harran is co-author of "The Holocaust Chronicle," a book that inspired this program. Some 150 entries were submitted for judging from nearly 70 schools. Orange County winners of the art competition are Paulina Phan of Lakeside Middle School in Irvine, Jonathan Juliani of St. Columban School in Garden Grove and Amy Segall of Tarbut V'Torah Community Day School in Irvine. Following are excerpts from local winners in the writing contest. The Mystery of Beauty Friedl Dicker-Brandeis By Zachary Yates Our Lady of Fatima Catholic School, San Clemente As a woman artist with a gift from above, She captured emotions, expressions, and love. Formally taught in art and design, Her own creativity began to shine. A knock on the door that quickened her breath, Spoke of a move to a camp of death. Torn from a life of canvas and paint, Her vision of teaching soon became faint. Puddles of tears and looks of dismay Longing for escape but forced to stay. With an eye for beauty, the children she drew Their youth and compassion changed gray into blue. Ignoring the sadness, she taught her gift, To the children whose spirits began to lift. Her works of art were never shown, They developed a talent on their own. No matter what faced with, she always found good She taught what God gave her, like everyone should. Focused on what was important in life She lived to paint in spite of strife. Sergeant Anton Schmid: The Model of Heroism By Rebecca Kuperberg Tarbut V'Torah Community Day School, Irvine The dictionary definition of heroism is "the qualities characteristic of a hero, as courage, bravery, fortitude, unselfishness." I think heroism would be more accurately defined if next to the written definition I saw the faces of the many people who rebelled against the Nazi regime or hid and saved the lives of the unjustly repressed peoples of the Holocaust. Because without heroes, heroism is only a word. As hare said, "Heroism is the self-devotion of genius manifesting itself in action." Without the courage and selflessness of a person such as Anton Schmid, heroism is only black ink on a paper but with an individual to embody it, heroism changes the world. Anton Schmid was drafted into the German army in 1938 and by 1941 was a sergeant stationed in Vilnius. When the Nazis arrived in Lithuania, Schmid witnessed the atrocious murders and mistreatment of thousands of Jews. But, unlike many, Anton Schmid could not simply watch and stand silent while these crimes were being committed. "You know how it is with my soft heart. I could not think and had to help them," he wrote in a letter to his wife, Stefi. In the late months of 1939, Anton Schmid decided to do as much as he could to help the Jews. In only a few months, he released prisoners from the Lakishiki jail, smuggled food into the ghettos and saved more than two hundred and fifty Jews by hiding them, giving them false identification papers, and assisting them in escaping. He hid them in houses under his supervision in particularly rough times and transferred some to safer ghettos. He also cooperated with the Jewish underground by giving them forged materials, allowing them to meet or stay in his home, and taking them to Warsaw and Bialystok in his truck. He was imprisoned in January of 1942, taken to trial in February, and executed on April 13, 1942 by the Nazis. In 1987 he was posthumously designated as "righteous among the nations" by Yad Vashem. His widow also received recognition at that time. Anton Schmid was a hero for standing up for a cause that he believed in regardless of its negative consequences. He saw an evil in the world and set out to destroy as much of it as he could. Although recognized as a hero and righteous man today, Anton did not see his actions that way. In the final letter he sent to his wife, he wrote: "I merely behaved as a human being." His humble nature and compassionate feelings toward all human beings made him not only a Holocaust hero but also a role model for any time. Anton Schmid is proof that an ordinary man with a feeling of kindness and hope in his heart can become a hero and affect the entire world... One Country, Many Heroes By Melissa Jones Acaciawood College Preparatory Academy, Anaheim An act of bravery, courage, and patriotism, Not one man, but many. They stood for what they knew was right, And did not fear Nazi terror. They rose up as one. A nation, unified; harmonious, Zealously working to protect their Jews, And keep them from becoming Nazi prey. Carefully, methodically, they harbored all their Jews. Privately, secretly, taken to the coast, They slipped away like grains of sand, Sifting out of the Nazis' grasping talons. To the shores of Sweden, where the hawk didn't haunt, Flotillas of small fishing boats delivered Jews to the sanctuary, Tucked away from piercing, carnivorous eyes. The soft, lapping water of the Baltic ferried them to safekeeping. To be like these people, sacrificing everything for their countrymen, Is heroic in itself. They did not submit to tyranny. Nearly all the Danish Jews, more than 7,200 of them, were saved. I am inspired by these people of Denmark. I strive to stand up for what is right. I know a hero is not born immediately, But cultivated little by little, with unwavering, resolute steps. Uniting with my countrymen in trying times, to do what conscience requires, I, too, can become a valiant, undaunted hero. They were the individual country that stood up for their countrymen. Individual spirits came together as one to rescue their Jews. These individual decisions impacted a nation. The Danes were a united hero. Simple Superwoman By Camilla Wade-West St. Anne School, Laguna Niguel How would you feel if your home, children, spouse and freedom were snatched away from you in an instant because of your religion? A person is often labeled and judged by his or her religion, skin color, race, sex, language and appearance. We are all human beings. One should not be treated differently from his neighbor because he looks or acts differently. "It is intolerable that the world's religions - founded on the values of love and compassion - should provide a pretext for the expression of hatred and violence." As Federico Mayor describes, people have been separated into groups based on their religions, yet we are all equal under the eyes of God. Many ordinary people became heroes of the Holocaust as they fought to save the Jewish people from devastating persecution. Irene Gut Opdyke was a heroine of the Holocaust who went through a great deal of adversity to help free Jews from Adolf Hitler and the Germans. Irene Gut Opdyke was born on May 5, 1922 in eastern Poland, a child who would one day show the courage of a lion as she risked her life to bring Jews to freedom. Irene describes how her mother taught her the most important lesson a mother can teach her child: how to love and care for other human beings. At the tender age of 16 she was sent to a Polish nursing school. When the Germans began to attack she volunteered to join the Polish army as a nurse. Irene was raped and beaten and left to die by Russian soldiers. Later on she was sent by the Germans to work in an ammunition factory. It was there where she would start her journey in saving the Jews. Irene was working near a Jewish ghetto where she witnessed appalling things: people being kicked, babies being thrown and shot in the air, even people buried alive. It was from then on that she vowed she would do something, whatever it might be, to change the lives for some of these terrified victims of the German attacks. When Irene was asked to be the German major's housekeeper she jumped at the chance. At last, she had a place to hide the 12 Jews who were in her care. She had also developed a system where she would warn the Jews of planned attacks set by the Germans and the news would be easily spread around so the areas could be evacuated. Through this she saved hundreds of lives... Oskar Schindler and the Key By Christine McNab Lakeside Middle School, Irvine As I boarded the school bus to Chapman University, I didn't know what to expect. And as I walked through the hall to the Holocaust meeting room, many questions filled my mind. I was there to hear Leon Leyson, the youngest survivor of Schindler's List, speak to a group of several hundred people. As I listened to him, his words about Oskar Schindler intrigued me. When the lecture ended, many students dashed for the food table. But my interest got the best of me. I waited in a fairly short line of photo takers and curious parents for my time with Leon Leyson. As I shook hands with him and talked with him, he inspired me even more to write my Holocaust essay on Oskar Schindler. But not only my essay, Leon Leyson inspired me, a little 12-year-old girl, to become more like Oskar Schindler. And that would be an extraordinary task, considering what an amazing man Oskar Schindler was. Oskar Schindler was born into a Catholic family in the Sudetenland. As an adult, he became a German industrialist and joined the Nazi Party to help make his fortune. He moved to Krakow after the German invasion of Poland in 1939 and took responsibility for an enamel kitchenware factory just outside of a Krakow ghetto. He hired many Jewish workers from the ghetto. As Oskar Schindler's enamel factory moved from place to place, he was prepared with a list of all of his workers that would be joining him in each more. By means of this list, and bribery of German officials, he protected his workers... Oskar Schindler risked his own life to help protect, and save, the Jews from the Nazis. He knew that the killing of millions of innocent Jews by the Nazis was wrong. He could have just looked the other way, but no, he didn't just sit there thinking about it, he did something. His bravery helped him save over a thousand Jews. Every life is important, and one person can make a difference... We all have the choice to do the right thing or the wrong thing, to be brave or to look the other way. Therefore, I want each of us to think about the following words and place them in our hearts: I will be a person of conscience and courage. I will know what is right and what is wrong. I will have the bravery to stand up for what is right. And by combining these qualities, I know that I can and will make a difference in the world. The Garden of Hope By Chelsea Redmon Stacey Middle School, Westminster The 'Holocaust of Horror' held no one safe from its bearer Even the innocent children suffered needlessly in terror. Many ran to escape, while others stayed to fight the cause. For heroes' hearts nurtured from love will ask for no applause. Buried in a secret garden deep inside a glass jar, The concealed names of precious souls once branded by a star. Identities were coded so as not to discriminate. Twenty-five hundred names were placed in an elusive state. A doctor's daughter who was not Jewish by her own creed, Never judged a person's worth in life, as if they were a breed. She kept her secret garden from all who ventured near, To journal the families of children who had escaped the fear. To voice promised secrets that never were to be spoken. She endured being tortured - her legs and feet both broken. She would have discarded her life freely rather than speak any name, Of those she helped to freedom or where to place the blame. Her garden of hope grew from the love she held inside, In knowing life will have answers if faith is applied. Irena Sendlerowa's garden had nourished the rebirth In the lives of so many, she brought back their self-worth. |
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