March 2009 Archives

Hanover, NH: Hope and Remembering: Honoring and Healing, a four-part film/discussion series, continues on Thursday, April 2, featuring Telling Their Stories - NH Holocaust Survivors Speak Out. The film, the third in this series, provides insight into the lives of four Holocaust survivors who eventually settled in New Hampshire, after many perilous journeys to escape the Nazis. Telling Their Stories... will be shown on Thursday, April 2, at 7 pm at the Roth Center for Jewish Life in Hanover, NH. Thomas White, Educational Outreach Coordinator at The Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies at Keene State College, will facilitate the discussion. The series is proudly sponsored by the Upper Valley Jewish Community - supporting education and life-long learning -and Dartmouth Hillel. The public is invited and educational materials will be available.

Telling Their Stories - New Hampshire Holocaust Survivors Speak Out shares the stories of four Holocaust survivors during WWII Europe and the paths that brought them from their home countries of Germany, Poland, and Hungary to New Hampshire. Stephan Lewy, from Germany, lived many years in orphanages in Germany and Paris, escaped from France in 1940, and served in Patton's Army as a "Ritchie Boy." Joseph Regensburger lived with his grandparents for several years before escaping Germany to reunite with his family in France. He served in the French underground and eventually escaped to Switzerland where he and his family were interned. Ruth Segal, from Poland, hoped to study medicine in Switzerland, but was prevented from leaving when the Germans invaded Poland. She eventually escaped with the help of "Righteous Among the Nations" Japanese consul Chiune Sugihara via the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Much of her family that was left behind died in Treblinka. Anna Berkovits Klein, from Hungary, was forced, along with her family, to move into a Jewish ghetto, the first of many moves from ghettos to barracks to concentration camps, including Stresshof and Bergen-Belsen.

These four survivors tell stories that are remarkable and move viewers on many levels. They have wrestled with many difficult issues and speak openly about them throughout the film. Anna Klein states, "After the concentration camp I didn't want to hear anything about any kind of religion or God...My God, as I knew him as a child, was a caring God and this God abandoned me...until I met my husband and he pointed out to me that God didn't do this to us, people did. And then I made my peace with God." Ruth Segal remarks, "I miss my family. I wish they were alive...I resent even seeing young Germans...the guilt is their fathers...When I see young Germans I say to myself: Where are my brother's and sister's children? Why aren't they here?" Issues and conflicts such as these touch not only the survivors' lives, but often reach into the lives of the film's audiences.

This film by NH filmmaker David DeArville was produced by Robert Spiegelman and Fred Wolff in association with the Cohen Center for Holocaust Studies.

Telling Their Stories - NH Holocaust Survivors Speak Out is being presented on Thursday, April 2, at the Roth Center for Jewish Life, 5 Occom Ridge, Hanover, NH, beginning at 7 pm.

Admission is free.

For more information about this event or the film series, contact Carole Clarke at uvjc@valley.net or   603-646-0460        .

 Further information about the series sponsors is available at:

• The Upper Valley Jewish Community (http://www.uvjc.org)
• Dartmouth College Hillel (http://www.dartmouth.edu/~hillel).

The Opening Worlds Series, a monthly presentation and discussion series designed to help raise community awareness about local, state-wide, national, and global issues and activities, will begin on Tuesday, March 24, at The Picker Building in Dover. The series is sponsored by Awareness UNlimited and will be held on the fourth Tuesday evening of each month. The public is cordially invited to attend these events.

Erin Kennedy, founder of HopeCraft (www.hopecraft.org), launches the series with a presentation about this NH 501(c)(3) non-profit organization working to empower women in Africa. Many of the women are affected by HIV/AIDS and are often left to support children on their own. The women create beautiful jewelry, baskets, textiles, and horn products, but lack a viable local market. HopeCraft transports the crafts to the United States and sells them at local craft fairs and home sales, returning proceeds to help the women and the craft cooperatives in which they work. After two years of successful operation, HopeCraft has raised over $50,000 through the sales of crafts.

Ms. Kennedy works in the US in an administrative capacity for Nyumbani, Kenya's first facility for HIV positive abandoned children. While visiting Nyambani and its community outreach program in the slums of Nairobi, the need for income generating projects quickly became apparent. Ms. Kennedy founded HopeCraft in May 2006 with the help of five Seacoast NH women. Using fair trade standards and micro-credit lending, HopeCraft is helping these poor women help themselves.

The Opening Worlds Series is being presented by Awareness UNlimited of Dover, NH. Awareness UNlimited is a non-profit organization providing consulting, organization, and production services to individuals and groups interested in developing programming which best addresses their awareness and diversity needs/desires. Additionally, Awareness UNlimited also sponsors events designed to help connect people and provide pro-active opportunities to address the many and wide-ranging diversity and tolerance issues that touch people on a daily basis. Awareness UNlimited believes that raising awareness about these issues and putting faces to them makes a difference and helps steer the world away from conflict and misunderstanding.

The Opening Worlds Series: HopeCraft presentation takes place on Tuesday, March 24, from 7:30-9:30 pm in the Third Floor Conference Room, The Picker Building, 2 Washington St., Dover, NH. Admission is free. For further information, please contact Deb Barry, Awareness UNlimited Executive Director at: deb@awareness-unlimited.com or                603-520-2933        .