| In recent years there has been growing public interest in the life stories of people who helped persecuted Jews during the National Socialist dictatorship. Inspired by the association “Against Forgetting - for Democracy”, between 1997 and 2002 a comprehensive research project, “Rescue of Jews in National Socialist Germany 1933-1945”, was carried out under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Benz at the Center for Research on Anti-Semitism at the Technical University of Berlin. Films like “Schindler’s List” and numerous publications have also heightened interest in this topic.
During the Nazi era, mainly blind and deaf Jews were employed in a workshop under the protection of the brush manufacturer Otto Weidt (1883-1947). The Museum Otto Weidt’s Workshop for the Blind at 39 Rosenthaler Straße in the Mitte district of Berlin developed out of a student project at the University of Applied Sciences (FHTW) Berlin and the exhibition “Blind Confidence”. Inge Deutschkron, a contemporary witness and journalist, played a major role in this development.
In 1999, following an initiative by the German Government Commissioner for Cultural and Media Affairs, Michael Naumann, the government assumed responsibility for the Museum. From that time on there were considerable efforts - including by the then German president, Johannes Rau - to achieve further commemoration in Berlin of helpers and people in hiding in Nazi Germany.
In 2004 the building at 39 Rosenthaler Straße was purchased with funds from the German government and the Klassenlotterie Foundation Berlin. The purchase was made with the specific purpose not only of expanding the Museum Otto Weidt’s Workshop for the Blind, but also of establishing a central “Silent Heroes” Memorial Center. In April 2005 the German Resistance Memorial Center was given responsibility for planning the content and organization of this new museum. Initially in 2006 the permanent exhibition in the Museum Otto Weidt’s Workshop for the Blind will be revised and enlarged. The “Silent Heroes” Memorial Center will be realized in 2008.
Meanwhile a permanent exhibition is being prepared, based on the research results of the Center for Research on Anti-Semitism and in cooperation with this Center. The exhibition will tell the story of the people who helped Jews persecuted during the Nazi era. It will show the persecution and the desperate situation of Jews facing the threat of deportation, as well as the actions and motivations of the men and women who helped them. And it will document not only successes in saving Jews, but also attempts that failed.
The example of the helpers often described as “silent heroes” shows that even under the conditions of the Nazi dictatorship and the Second World War, individuals were still able to make their own decisions to protect persecuted people from mortal danger. After 1945 the great contribution of these people was not adequately acknowledged either in East or West Germany.
The project is compiling a collection of reports, photographs and documents, and is recording oral testimonies of these events during the Nazi era.
|
