Buck Lake Elementary School fourth-grade student David Wygodski sat attentively in a shirt and tie at Temple Israel on Sunday, listening to his grandmother’s story of living through one of the greatest tragedies of all time.
(Photo: Joe Rondone/Democrat)
“I feel it’s my duty to make sure that the evidence be kept alive so the terrible truth will not be forgotten or erased,” said Mary Wygodski, a Holocaust survivor and the keynote speaker at Temple Israel’s observance of Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day, which was Thursday.
The service honored students who won the Holocaust Education Resource Council’s (HERC) essay and art contests. There were 18 winners, including David Wygodski, who took second place in the elementary essay category.
The crowd sat captivated as the Poland-born Mary Wygodski, who now lives in St. Petersburg, told of going through three concentration camps, each one with a new tragedy, unbearable working conditions and poor food.
She was separated from her family as a teenager in 1943. She would never see them again. She was taken to a Latvian work camp by boxcar, then to a death camp in East Russia and finally to an ammunition factory in Germany.
On one occasion, she was in line to be put into a gas chamber, but avoided entering when the shower filled up.
“Though I have endured the inhumanity of the concentration camps,” Wygodski said, “I did not allow fear and loss to destroy my dreams. Love and hope have helped me to rebuild my lost life.”
Yom HaShoah is a day for people to remember those who suffered and died in the Holocaust. School teachers instructing kindergarten through 12th grade incorporate the essay and art contests into their Holocaust lessons each year. This year’s prompt was “liberation.” Students were asked to explore what the liberators knew and what can be learned from them.
“They learn so much about life, humanity and about understanding,” said Barbara Goldstein, president of HERC, a Tallahassee nonprofit. “It’s so much more important than we realize for them.”
Having voices like Wygodski’s are important as members of the generation who lived through the Holocaust become fewer, Goldstein added.
“To actually talk to a real survivor, that makes such a difference,” she said. “It’s so important now to just remember their stories.”
Temple Israel Rabbi Jack Romberg highlighted recent acts of cultural and religious discrimination and asked the audience to use Yom HaShoah to remember those injustices.
“It is not just about the Jewish community. It is not just about ourselves,” he said. “It’s about understanding the tragedy that happens if we allow oppression and prejudice to gain too much of a foothold.”
2015 Holocaust Remembrance Campaign
In April and May of 2015, the Holocaust Education Resource Council (HERC), in partnership with the Democrat, is reminding Tallahassee of the past by bringing pictures into their present lives.
Numerous photographic exhibits are located throughout our community that depict significant images of the Holocaust as they appear today. The goal is to teach our young and old that it’s never too late to learn and never too late to change.
The photos were taken by Nikki Allen, a former seventh- and eighth-grade social-studies teacher at Fort Braden School. She took the photos in 2008 while attending a Summer Seminar Program on Holocaust Studies in Poland.
Click on the link and scroll through the photos and see where they are being displayed in the community.
Holocaust Education Resource Council 2015 Essay and Art Contest
Art winners
Elementary
First – Anthony Ortiz, FSUS
Second – Mary Lengacher, FSUS
Third – Michael Rubin, FSUS
Middle
First – Resh Meck, Fairview
Second – Antonio Davis, Cobb
Third – Sara Wallace, Wakulla Christian
High school
First – Jackie Golabek, JPII
Second – Rick Bessey, JPII
Third – Jessica Milam, FSUS
Essay winners
Elementary
First – Teresa Morgado, Cornerstone
Second – David Wygodski, Buck Lake
Middle
First – Skylah Rault, Cornerstone
Second – Amorenna Tillman, Cobb
Third – Cattie Li, Deerlake
High
First – Nicole Buford, Maclay
Second – Chikodi X., Leon County Virtual School
Third – Temi Omotsyo, Maclay