Holocaust Remembrance set for Davenport
The Quad Cities Yom HaShoah Holocaust Remembrance will be held at 7 p.m. Sunday, May 5, at Galvin Fine Art Center, St. Ambrose University, Davenport, according to a news release.
The program is free and open to the public.
This year’s speaker is Sol Nayman, a Holocaust survivor from Poland. He was born Nov. 5, 1935, to Yudel Najman and Sore Roize Rosenberg; his older sister Mania was born in 1928. When the war came in 1939, simple, everyday life in their village was turned upside down.
The family was fortunate to escape to the forest, where they saw the Wehrmacht’s trucks and troops roll through and destroy what was in their path. From there the Naymans managed to trace a path to the east, eventually making their way to the Soviet Union (USSR).
Once in the USSR, they had to deal with the wartime conditions in that nation, and they were forced into the vast reaches of Siberia, where Sol’s parents toiled away for many years. As the war drew to a close, they made their way back to the west, to Ukraine and eventually Germany itself, where they found themselves in the Wetzlar Displaced Person Camp. Here life slowly came back to a state of relative normalcy, and after several years the family managed to emigrate to Canada.
Nayman attended school, where he excelled, setting him on a path for success in later life. Now retired, he is active in Holocaust education, and a participant in the March of the Living.
The program will also include recognition of the winners of the 2024 Student Holocaust Essay and Visual Arts contests.
The remembrance will be presented by Yom Hashoah Committee of the Quad Cites, the Jewish Federation of the Quad Cities, Temple Emanuel, Congregation Beth Israel, Churches United, Augustana College, St. Ambrose University and Eastern Iowa Community College.
For more information, call 309-793-1300.
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