Born Jewish in Czechoslovakia and persecuted by the Nazis, Charles Heller helped Dickinson College remember the Holocaust. On April 7, 2013, Heller spoke at the Anita Tuvin Schlector Auditorium for the Holocaust Remembrance Day, or Yom HaShoah, sponsored by the Asbell Center for Jewish Life.
Missy Reif, Pincus Engagement Intern and organizer of Holocaust Memorial Day, stated “Mr. Heller will provide a very interesting perspective on the Holocaust based on his own experiences. Too often, people forget that groups other than Jews (including Catholics, socialists and communists, intellectuals, the mentally disabled, and Roma ethnic groups) were persecuted during the Holocaust.”
The event began with an introductory prayer by Rev. Charles Brophy of the First Lutheran Church and the Hebrew song “Eli, Eli”. The presentation entitled “Prague, My Long Journey Home” followed Heller’s life story as a child during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia to his assimilation as an American and his recent rediscovery of his Jewish roots. Heller explained that he was the product of a Roman Catholic mother and Jewish father, so when the Germans attacked, his extended family completely disappeared. He and his mother escaped to a farm in the country, hiding, while his father escaped south. When he asked where his father was, he was given the answer, “Your father is fighting against the Germans,” which formed a sense of pride within Heller. After the war, his father encouraged him to assimilate into the American culture and to adopt the United States as his home country ; his father’s motto was “forget everything.” After his father’s death, Heller began the process of rediscovering his roots and family, realizing that, “by denying my roots, I wasn’t truly mourning my family.”
The Asbell Center hosted a Candlelight vigil on Britton Plaza and the steps of Old West on Monday while reading the names of those who died in the Holocaust. Another event on Tuesday, April 9, was sponsored by Achim and is a silent “Walk to Remember” from 12:00pm-1:00pm.
