source: YouTube

Le 13 avril 1945, les soldats américains de la 80ème Division arrivent au camp de concentration de Buchenwald (Allemagne) afin de libérer les prisonniers juifs qui y sont détenus. Les soldats obligeront les habitants de la région à visiter le camp pour qu’ils voient les horreurs qui y avaient été commises.

photo: (inconnu)

Le sénateur Alben William Barkley, du Kentuky (États-Unis), membre de la commission d’enquête parlementaire sur les atrocités nazies, vient en personne voir les preuves dans le camp de concentration de Buchenwald, le 24 avril 1945.

photo: (inconnu)

photo: H. Miller

Prisonniers juifs réduits à l’esclavage, du camp de concentration de Buchenwald, près de Iéna (Allemagne), photographiés au moment de la libération de ce camp par les troupes américaines de la 80ème division. Les prisonniers vivaient à trois par case. Le septième homme au second rang est Elie Wiesel, qui a consacré le reste de sa vie à l’étude de la Shoah.

photo: Jules Rouard

Une évasion ratée. Les Nazis l’ont laissé aux barbelés et l’ont laissé y mourir. Photo prise à la libération du camp.

article sur Buchenwald dans Wikipédia (en français) ici
article sur Buchenwald dans Wikipedia (en anglais) ici
article sur Elie Wiesel dans Wikipédia (en français) ici
article sur Elie Wiesel dans Wikipedia (en anglais) ici

Het boek Ieder het zijne. Frans Emiel Vandenbergh en andere Mollenaars in de Duitse concentratiekampen is uitverkocht. De laatste exemplaren gingen de deur uit tijdens de tentoonstelling ‘Beelden uit Buchenwald’ in cultuurcentrum ‘t Getouw in Mol. In totaal vonden 500 boeken een lezer, wat deugddoend is.

Het belangrijkste is en blijft dat we het laatste levensjaar van onze pater familias in kaart hebben kunnen brengen en op die manier ook kunnen overleveren aan de komende generaties. Het verleden begrijpend om de toekomst te vormen.

Emiel Vandenbergh (°1953) en Emiel Vandenbergh (°2003), de twee naamgenoten van grootvader

E’ stato pubblicato sul Corriere della Sera un articolo di Giorgio Dagnino, zio, fratello di mia madre, che nella sua semplicità costituisce un ricordo storico pieno di pathos e sentimento.

Ritengo bello riprendere anche qui l’articolo, e non solo per ragioni personali legate alla storia di chi mi ha trasmesso il dono della vita, ma proprio come testimonianza di valori (come il senso della Patria  e dell’onore, del dovere e della famiglia) del che oggi, troppe volte, sembrano essere andati perduti.

Andrea Macco

Dall’incubo russo a Buchenwald L’orgoglio di un “classe ‘17”

Santo Dagnino non volle la pensione di guerra. Ripeteva: “Ho fatto solo il mio dovere”. Il ricordo del figlio Giorgio

Mio papà, Santo Dagnino, un classe ‘17, reduce di Russia, si definiva socialista e mai lo sentii dire anti-fascista. Andava orgoglioso del suo “obbedisco” alla chiamata dell’Italia a compiere il suo dovere e del suo “no” a Mussolini e alla dittatura dopo l’8 settembre. Mio padre è sempre e comunque stato un “anti-guerra”.

Ricordo i suoi occhi lucidi e fieri mentre ci raccontava delle sue peripezie per il “no” dopo l’8 settembre e tutto quello che ne venne dopo, Buchenwald compreso. Eppure quei silenziosi eroi l’hanno pagata anche dopo. Mio padre perchè non “dipendente statale” non si vide mai riconosciuti i famosi 7 anni di bonus che invece altri ricevettero.

Nel 1977 dovette andare in pensione (da sessantenne) con solo 30 anni di “marche” quando la minima era ancora a 35 anni. Mai chiese niente, non volle (e io e la mia famiglia seppur a denti stretti rispettammo sino alla fine la sua decisione) domandare la pensione di guerra. Eppure partì di leva nel 1938 e per varie ed alterne vicende ritornò solo a 1946 inoltrato in Italia dove aveva madre e due sorelle gemelle. Suo padre (mio nonno) era morto di broncopolmonite nel 1939 quando la pennicillina era solo un lusso per pochi.

Mio padre diceva sempre “ho fatto il mio dovere”… il cuore e altro per la Patria. Questa è la sua eredità di cui ancora oggi vado fiero e orgoglioso, un insegnamento che ha forgiato e segnato positivamente il mio modo di essere uomo (53enne): Grazie Papà che da lassù mi segui riempiendomi ancora oggi gli occhi di lacrime per la tua non più presenza fisica vicino a me. Giorgio Dagnino

Giorgio Dagnino
13 novembre 2009 – il Corriere della Sera

Na de derde druk (oktober 2009) is er nog maar een tiental exemplaren beschikbaar van het boek Ieder het zijne. Frans Emiel Vandenbergh en andere Mollenaars in de Duitse concentratiekampen. De laatste exemplaren zijn nog te verkrijgen op de tentoonstelling Beelden uit Buchenwald in cultuurcentrum ‘t Getouw, Molenhoekstraat 2 in Mol. De expo loopt van 7 tot 29 november 2009 en is elke dag gratis te bezoeken tussen 13.30 en 16.30 uur. Een vierde druk van het boek wordt niet overwogen.

Aachen – Eine Provokation im KZ Buchenwald plant möglicherweise die Neonazi-„Kameradschaft Aachener Land“ (KAL).

Sie organisiert nach eigenen Angaben eine „politisch inkorrekte Fahrt nach Buchenwald“ am kommenden Samstag. „Jedem sein Fotoshooting am 7.11.“, heißt es vor dem Hintergrund eines Fotos, das den Eingang zum KZ zeigt, auf der Homepage der KAL.

Anlass für die Aktion sei „die wirbelnde Aufmerksamkeit gegenüber einem regionalen Aktivisten, der sich hat in Buchenwald fotografieren lassen“, schreiben die Neonazis aus dem Raum Aachen: „Jetzt soll jeder die Möglichkeit erhalten, sich provokant in Szene zu setzen und dabei für das Fotoalbum zu Hause sich ablichten zu lassen.“ (ts)

In het Molse cultuurcentrum ‘t Getouw loopt van 7 tot 29 november 2009 de tentoonstelling met als titel ‘Beelden uit Buchenwald’. De expo is opgebouwd rond tekeningen van Georges Despaux. Deze Fransman werd op 1 februari 1944 aangehouden en op 14 mei van daztelfde jaar arriveerde hij in het Kozentrationslager Buchenwald, na te zijn gedeporteerd vanuit Auschwitz. Despaux verbleef dus in Buchenwald in de periode dat ook grootvader en andere Mollenaars er vertoefden. Despaux tekent in het kamp op stukjes klad- en afvalpapier meer dan honderd indringende portretten en schimmen van medegevangenen, scènes uit het dagelijkse kampleven, de barakken, de latrine, … Despaux had het geluk te worden bevrijd uit Buchenwald op 11 april 1945 en hij slaagde erin de tekeningen te bewaren.

De tentoonstelling is gratis te bezoeken, alle dagen tussen 13.30 en 16.30 uur. Cultuurcentrum ‘t Getouw is gelegen in de Molenhoekstraat 2 in Mol.

THE TERM “SEXUAL REVOLUTION” has become such a cliché in recent decades that it is hard to imagine that it ever had a tangible meaning. And yet, the transformation of global sexual mores that picked up steam in the 1960s really did transform society in ways we are still trying to understand. But how did it get started? Despite the theoretical writings of Sigmund Freud and the prophets of free love, this social and cultural earthquake frequently had humble beginnings. In Central Europe, for example, the true sexual revolution was touched off by the teenage sex advice column of Dr. Sommer, which is marking its fortieth anniversary this month.

When Europe was “moral”

Today it is difficult to conceive that the hedonistic Europe consistently denounced by the American Right – who delight in pointing their fingers at the excesses of the likes of Roman Polanski or at the “green” brothels of Berlin – was once as straight-laced as the Oral Roberts University campus, at least in the way it brought up its youth…

Continued…

De afgelopen weken hebben verschillende mensen me aangesproken over het boek ‘Ieder het zijne’. Meermaals werd de suggestie gedaan om een bezoek te brengen aan de voormalige kampen Buchenwald en Laura. Alleen is de vraag: bestaat er voldoende interesse vanuit Mol om een dergelijk initiatief te ontwikkelen? Mensen die potentieel geïnteresseerd zouden zijn, kunnen een reactie achter laten. Het idee bestaat erin om in de periode april 2010 gedurende een tweetal dagen met de bus naar Weimar, Buchenwald en Laura af te reizen.

The Siedlce Ghetto

Siedlce was occupied by German troops on 10 October 1939. Before WW2 around 50% of the town’s 30,000 inhabitants were Jewish. A few days after the Nazis had occupied the city, on 15 November 1939, they began to arrest Jews.

After gathering them together in a prison, the following day they were marched to Wegrow. There, during the night, around 50 of those arrested managed to escape from the market square, including Hercel Kave and his father. The others were conducted to Ostroleka.

From the beginning of the occupation, the Germans turned their entire propaganda machinery on Polish society in order to justify their murdering of the Jews. For this purpose they made use of posters with texts such as “Typhus, spotted fever, is one of the most dangerous of diseases, often fatal. Typhus is very contagious and therefore it can spread quickly and easily into serious epidemics. In the Generalgouvernement it is widespread, particularly amongst the Jews.”

On Jewish holydays German soldiers entered synagogues, beat the Jews who were praying there, tore off their liturgical garments, and fired at those who tried to escape by jumping out of windows. Josef Rubin died thus, on the seventh day of Sukkot.

From the beginning of the occupation the Germans plundered Jewish shops and homes. At the end of November 1939, soldiers entered the synagogue and the Beit Hamidrash (House of Prayer), and threw out the Torah scrolls. In a frenzy of hatred they ripped them apart and trampled on them.

During the night of the 24 – 25 December 1939, the Nazis set fire to the synagogue, homeless Jewish refugees who were inside died in the fire.

At the end of November 1939, the Germans ordered the formation of a Jewish Council – the Judenrat. It included: Icchak Nachum Weintraub – chairman; Hersz Eisenberg – deputy-chairman; Herszl Tenenbaum – secretary, responsible for liaison with the Gestapo; Dr Henryk Loebel – health division; M. Czarnobroda – treasurer; M. Rotbejn – employment division; J. Landau, lawyer – social assistance; A. Altenberg – supplies division; L. Grinberg – legal assistance; R. Leiter – general matters.

There were 25 Judenrat members in all. “The members of the Jewish Council were, in general, recognized Jewish leaders, to whom the Nazis gave enormous power until the moment when they, too, were deported.”

The Council managed Jewish property and manpower, and drew up “transport lists” (lists of persons destined for extermination camps). A Jewish police force kept order, wearing as insignia caps of office, nightsticks, and special armbands with the inscription “Jüdischer Ordnungsdienst“. There were around 50 of them. Gewisser stood at their head. There was also the Sanitätsdienst – the Sanitation Service. Its purpose was to maintain cleanliness in the apartments, courtyards, and streets of the Jewish quarters.

After the closed ghetto was instituted, the functionaries of the Sanitation Service became part of the Health Division of the Jewish Council. In addition to their previous duties, its members were ordered to assign living quarters for Jews who moved to the already overcrowded ghetto. The Judenrat also had an employment office (Arbeitsamt), whose director was Izrael Friedman.

The chairman of the Siedlce Judenrat was a man of already advanced age: Weintraub who was a worthy local social and political activist. For many years he had been at the head of the Zionist movement and the religious community. He kept a diary in which he recorded the important events of the town, as well as stories, told to him by Jewish elders.

Unfortunately nearly all these writings have been destroyed. What has been saved is only that which he had published in the press in the interwar period. The function of chairman of the Judenrat was filled not by Weintraub, but by Dr Henryk Loebel. Emil Karpinski remembers that “people fought each other, literally fought, gave bribes, and used every possible means to get a position in the Judenrat or the Jewish police.”

By December 1939, the Judenrat was already ordered to make a “contribution” of 20,000 zlotys. In 1940, from spring to winter, the Siedlce Jews were used for land reclamation work on the Liwiec River. Workers, divided into 15 person groups, worked under Polish direction.

The Germans had overall supervision of the labour, and the workers were supervised by SS-men, who controlled the progress of the work. Around 1,500 Jews left the ghetto every day and went to the jobs to which they had been assigned.

In April 1940, the Germans carried out the registration of all Jewish men between 16 and 60 years of age, and in November 1940 a census of Jewish people was conducted for those streets on which they were most numerous.

Read more here: http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ghettos/siedlce.html

The Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

www.HolocaustResearchProject.org

Copyright Carmelo Lisciotto H.E.A.R.T 2009

At the end of WWII, impending Allied victory was sobered by the grim facts of the atrocities which allied troops were uncovering all over Germany. Margaret Bourke-White was with General Patton’s third amy when they reached Buchenwald on the outskirts of Weimar. Patton was so incensed by what he saw that he ordered his police to get a thousand civilians to make them see with their own eyes what their leaders had done. The MPs were so enraged they brought back 2,000. Bourke-White said, “I saw and photographed the piles of naked, lifeless bodies, the human skeletons in furnaces, the living skeletons who would die the next day… and tattoed skin for lampshades. Using the camera was almost a relief. It interposed a slight barrier between myself and the horror in front of me.”

LIFE magazine decided to publish these photos in their May 7, 1945 issue many photographs of these atrocities, saying, “Dead men will have indeed died in vain if live men refuse to look at them.”

Nachdenklich hat die Oma-Mama das Buch “Sarah´s Schüssel” zugeschlagen. Ein Buch, das das Prädikat “muss man gelesen haben” ohne Wenn und Aber zugesprochen bekommt. Ein Buch, was traurig macht und zum Nachdenken anregt. Ein Buch, das erinnert – an die Zeit von Massenvernichtung und Konzentrationslagern. Ein Buch, das erzählt, das auch andere Länder an dieser grauenhaften Geschichte beteiligt waren. Ein Buch, was die Oma-Mama an ihren Besuch an das KZ Buchenwald denken läßt, wie sich die Gedenkstätte im Laufe der Jahre veränderte, das Grauenhafte verlor – und wie die Homepage wieder mit eindringlichen Fotos an das Geschehen erinnert.  Ein Buch, was dem Satz von Guido Westerwelle “Wir haben nicht vor 20 Jahren für den Fall der Mauer gekämpft, damit jetzt wieder die Kommunisten und Sozialisten etwas zu sagen haben” (geäußert einen Tag vor der Bundestagswahl 2009) einen bitteren Nachgeschmack verleiht. Ein Buch, was man weglegt, aber was einen nicht sofort loslässt.

Es wird ein paar Tage dauern, bevor die Oma-Mama zur neuen Lektüre greift.

Ihr Thor Löwenherz

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Action Reinhard Staff Photos

You can learn about each of the individuals pictures on the

Action Reinhard Personnel page

click to advance to next page
 

Belzec smiling workers & guard 800 X 562 62 KB	Blaurock – Sobibor 568 X 800 51 KB	Bred, Ment, Moller, Hirtreiter 800 X 553 79 KB	Bredow in Italy 800 X 552 67 KB
Eberl – Treblinka 472 X 799 42 KB	Erich Fuchs 581 X 800 30 KB	Felfe – Treblinka 531 X 800 34 KB	Fichtner – Belzec admin 800 X 539 51 KB
Floss 546 X 799 34 KB	Forker – Treblinka 548 X 800 49 KB	Franz in Belzec 799 X 572 66 KB	Fritz_Hirche 302 X 385 17 KB

See the full image gallery here: http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ar/arstaffphotos/index.html

The Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

www.HolocaustResearchProject.org

Copyright Carmelo Lisciotto H.E.A.R.T 2009

The Boy in the Photo?

The Warsaw Ghetto & The Stroop Report

The above photo is one of the most iconic photographs of the Holocaust, the German Guard pointing the machine gun is known, the little boy is not known, but some of the other people captured in this photo, have been identified.

The photo was included in the infamous Stroop Report – “The Warsaw Ghetto no longer exists.”

————————————————————————————————————————————————————- 

Extracts from the book by Richard Raskin

The Boy in the Photograph

There are four possible identities for the little boy at gunpoint. 

• Artur Dab Siemiatek

It was advanced as early as 1950, but documentation was first found in 1977-78, one source was responsible for making the claim, a woman named Jadwiga Piesecka, who was a resident of Warsaw.

According to a statement she signed on 24 January 1977, the boy in the photograph was named Artur Siemiatek born in Lowicz in 1935.

He was the son of Leon Siemiatek, and Sara Dab and the grandson of the signatory’s brother Josef Dab.

A similar attestation was signed the following year in Paris by Jadwiga Piesecka’s husband, Henryk Piasecki, dated 28 December 1978. 

• Tsvi Nussbaum

In 1982 a 47 year old ear, nose and throat specialist in Rockland County New York, came forward that in 1943, at the age of seven, he had been arrested in Warsaw and ordered to raise his hands by an SS man standing in front of him and aiming a gun at him. And although he could not recall that a photograph was taken, Dr Nussbaum believes that he might be the child in the picture.

Tsvi Nussbaum expressed uncertainty that he was the boy in the photo, whilst others say that it is him. There are indeed two specific factors that heavily way up, against him being that boy.

The first is that although he was arrested in Warsaw, he had never set foot in the ghetto- the second is the date he was arrested. Tsvi Nussbaum clearly remembers that he was arrested on 13 July 1943. This was nearly two months after the Stroop report is thought to have been completed, and sent to Himmler and Kruger.

In the early 30’s Nussbaum’s parents emigrated from Poland to Palestine, where Tsvi was born in 1935. When conflicts broke out between the Jews and the Arabs in Palestine, the Nussbaum family returned to Poland, settling in Sandomierz in 1939.

By 1942 Tsvi Nussbaum parents had been murdered by the Nazis, and he was brought from Sandomiercz to live with an Aunt and Uncle, in hiding, on the Aryan section of the city.

Read more here: http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/nazioccupation/boy.html

The Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

ww.HolocaustResearchProject.org

Copyright Carmelo Lisciotto H.E.A.R.T 2009

“Dubai sein ist alles” ist erlaubt, “Jedem die Seine” als Werbespruch für die (kürzlich von der Lufthansa verschluckte bzw. in Verschluckung befindliche) Austrian (ehemals AUA, Austrian Airlines).

Dem Zentralrat der Juden in Deutschland zufolge sei der allgemeine Ausspruch “Jedem das seine” so sehr mit dem Schrecken der Nazi-Zeit verbunden, dass man so etwas nicht in der Werbung verwenden dürfe.

Der Zentralrat belästigt damit nach Tschibo  und Esso wieder einmal ein Wirtschaftsunternehmen, das mit kreativer Werbung versucht, Kunden in Zeiten der Wirtschaftskrise zu gewinnen.

Dass im Gittertor des Konzentrationslagers Buchenwald der Schriftzug “Jedem das Seine” eingearbeitet ist, dürfte den meisten potentiellen Kunden der Austrian so unbekannt sein, wie das spezifische Gewicht von Seeschlamm an der Küste von Madagaskar um 7:43 Uhr morgens. Zudem ist “Jedem das seine” ein so allgemeiner Ausspruch, dass eine zwanghafte Verknüpfung mit der Lingua Tertii Imperii wenn schon nicht an den Haaren herbeigezogen, dann doch wenigstens paranoid ist.

Weiterlesen:
http://derstandard.at/fs/1253596419957/Werbungs-Wortwahl-Direktflug-in-die-Nazi-Falle (derstandard.at)

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Odilo Globocnik

 “The Worst Man in the World”        

Odilo Globocnik was born in Trieste on 21 April 1904 he was the son of an Austrian Croat family of petty officials and a builder by profession.

He joined the Nazi Party in Carinthia Austria in 1930 and became a “radical” leader of its factory cells in the province. In 1933 Globocnik joined the SS and was appointed deputy district leader of the NSDAP in Austria.

He was imprisoned for over a year for a number of political offences, he may have even murdered the Jewish jeweller Futterweiss. Globocnik re-emerged as a key liaison man between Hitler and the Austrian National Socialists, he was appointed provincial Nazi chief of Carinthia in 1936, and subsequently he was promoted to Gauleiter of Vienna on 24 May 1938.

But  his decline was soon at; Globocnik was using an astonishing number of dirty tricks, particularly in financial matters.

Another was that he was an absolutely uncompromising person who was extremely successful in finding new opponents and enemies in the party ranks, mainly in the Catholic wing of the NSDAP. 

A major factor was the fact that Hermann Göring (ReichsMarshall) endeavoured to have Globocnik removed from his high party office. On January 30, 1939, Globocnik was suspended as a Gauleiter and replaced by Josef Burckel.

 Globocnik was pardoned by Himmler and appointed on 9 November 1939 as SS and Police Leader for the Lublin district in Poland. Globocnik was a brutal police commander who not only waged a terrible war on Polish Jewry, but who carried out drastic population expulsions in the Zamosc Lands, to germanise the Lublin area.

He was chosen by Himmler as the central figure in Operation Reinhard – named after Reinhard Heydrich, no doubt because of his scandalous past record and well-known virulent anti-semitism.

Put in charge of a special company of SS men not subordinate to any higher authority and responsible only to Himmler, Globocnik founded three death camps as part of Aktion Reinhard, and one combined death camp and concentration camp Majdanek (Lublin).

Globocnik drew rich rewards from the slaughter of 1.7 million Jews whose property ranging from their houses and valuables down to the gold in their teeth was seized by the SS.

As Globocnik’s Summary Reports show, he carried out Himmler’s orders with brutal efficiency and by November 1943 Operation Reinhard had been completed and the three death camps directly under his control were liquidated.

  Aktion Reinhard had consisted of four separate tasks: 

Read more here: http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ar/globocknik.html

The Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team

www.HolocaustResearchProject.org

Copyright Carmelo Lisciotto H.E.A.R.T 2009

Dunreith and I spoke with Dr. Leon Bass the other night. 

One of my heroes, he had sent us a video that interspersed him telling his life story with images of the topics he was discussing. 

Born in Depression-era Philadelphia, he served during World War II in the segregated United States Army.  During his training he had to endure numerous humiliating experiences in the segregated South. 

During the war, he fought in the Battle of the Bulge and witnessed unspeakable horrors as a witness to the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp.

Bass returned home and began a 34-year career as an educator, during which time he impacted the lives of thousands of individuals, including Community Renewal Society Executive Director and my boss Dr. Calvin Morris.

Dr. Bass participated in the March on Washington, became the first black principal at the Benjamin Franklin High School and eventually started speaking about his experiences before, during and after the war.

Shortly after returning home, Dr. Bass fell in love with, and married, his wife Mary.

A former schoolteacher, she bore, and together they raised, their son and daughter.  They traveled around the world.  They buried each other’s parents. 

In short, they shared their lives during the more than half century they were married. 

Unfortunately, toward the end of her life, Mary contracted Alzheimer’s disease.  

Eventually, like so many others who are snared by a declining memory, she struggled to recognize her loved ones and to remember who she was. 

Ultimately, Dr. Bass made the painful decision to move his wife to a facility near the community where they were living.  While there she received high-quality and compassionate care as well as daily visits from her husband. 

In doing so, he heeded the advice given in Nancy Mace and Peter Rabins’ The 36-Hour Day: A Family Guide to Caring for Person with Alzheimer’s Disease, Related Dementing Illnesses, and Memory Loss in Later Life.

As the name suggests, one of the main point the book makes is that caring for people with dementia or other issues is a never ending task that, if not shared, can end the caregiver’s life years early than would otherwise have happened.  

First published in 1981 and subsequently revised several times, this classic guide covers nearly every aspect imaginable for people dealing with loved ones who have memory issues.  Accessible and practical, the book covers everything from dealing with other family members to taking care of oneself to how to deal with issues of hygiene and how to provide environments that are not excessively disturbing for the person with memory loss. 

Mrs. Bass died in the earlier part of this decade, and Dr. Bass is still soldiering on.

He’s had a knee replaced, cataracts removed from his eyes and a pacemaker implanted, but his spirits are still strong, he still sees family members regularly and travels across the country to speak to audiences about his life’s journey.  

Writer Charlie Pierce tells a less happy, but at least as significant, tale in his book, Hard to Forget: A Family’s Alzheimer’s Story.

In 1985, Pierce’s father John went to place flowers on a family grave in Worcester, Massachusetts.

He was found three days later in Vermont. 

This was the first undeniable sign that his father had some neurological loss-evidence that Pierce and other members of his family promptly denied.

The book tells the tale of how his family moved from denial to confronting his father’s decline, its impact on his family and the heated competition between researchers to make breakthroughs on this disease that robs its victims of their identity even as their body often remains intact.

Readers may know Pierce for his lighter fare as a regular guest on the public radio quiz show Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me, his work for Esquire magazine or his sports writing, such as his biography, Moving the Chains: Tom Brady and the Pursuit of Everything.

While Pierce’s writing skill is familiar, the gravity of his subject matter is not.  

He skillfully moves between a searching examination and then description of the rampant nature of Alzheimer’s within his family-most, if not all of his father’s siblings have the disease-the emotional toll dealing with it takes, and the questions he asks himself at 44 years old about his own neurological future. 

Pierce’s wife Margaret Doris is the book’s heroine, supporting Pierce, working to care for his parents and urging all to look squarely at what they are facing. 

The number of families dealing these issues has already increased, and will only continue to grow, according to news reports.

Those who do would do well to draw on these two valuable books and to consult these resources.

Der 65. Jahrestag der heimtückischen Ermordung des Vorsitzenden der Kommunistischen Partei Deutschlands, Ernst Thälmann, am 18. August 1944 im Krematoriumshof des Konzentrationslagers Buchenwald durch die SS ist Anlass des Gedenkens an den großen Sohn des deutschen Volkes, der als unbeirrbarer Kämpfer gegen Faschismus und Krieg und mit den Vorstellungen über den Aufbau einer der Freiheit und dem Humanismus verpflichteten Gesellschaft 11 Jahre in Haft gehalten und schließlich heimlich und unter Vortäuschung eines alliierten Bombardements erschossen wurde.

Es war die Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, die eine Woche nach der Machtübernahme durch die Nazis am 7. Februar 1933 auf der illegalen Tagung in Ziegenhals als erste politische Kraft dem Faschismus und der Kriegspolitik den organisierten Kampf ansagte.

Der RFB-Vorstand wird in Folge von Veranstaltungen und politischen Aktivitäten aus gegebenem Anlass berichten, an denen RFB-Mitglieder im Selbstverständnis des RFB im Besonderen beteiligt waren.

Hamburg – 15. August 2009

40. Jahrestag der Gedenkstätte Ernst Thälmann in Hamburg, Tarpenbekstraße 66.

Sie wurde 1969 zum 25. Jahrestag der Ermordung Ernst Thälmanns durch das Kuratorium Ernst-Thälmann-Gedenkstätte eröffnet.

Der Vorsitzende des Kuratoriums, Genos-se Hein Pfohlmann erinnerte an die Arbeit und Solidarität zur Einrichtung und zum Erhalt der Gedenkstätte nötig war und ist.

Das Hauptreferat hielt der Vorsitzende der DKP, Genosse Heinz Stehr, selbst  Mitbe- gründer und Kuratoriumsmitglied von Anfang an.

Auf Beschluss des RFB-Vorstandes nahm eine Delegation des RFB an der Veranstaltung im Thälmann-Haus teil:
- Gerd Hommel, Vorsitzender (Dresden)
- Karl-Heinz Wendt, Mitglied des Vor-standes (Berlin),
- sowie die Mitglieder Hildegard Wendt (Berlin) und Albrecht Geißler (Chemnitz)

Ankunft der RFB – Delegation in Hamburg

Gerd Hommel überbrachte ein Grußwort der RFB – Mitglieder an die Versammelten und überreichte Hein Pfohlmann das Verbandsabzeichen des RFB.

In persönlichen Gesprächen wurden die Kontakte vertieft und erweitert, um das Zusammenwirken des Kuratoriums und des RFB-Vorstandes weiterzuentwickeln und die Öffentlichkeitsarbeit im Sinne der Satzungen der Verbände wirksamer zu gestalten.

Die RFB-Delegation ehrte Ernst Thälmann mit Blumen.

Fotos: Karl-Heinz Wendt

Grußwort des RFB-Vorsitzenden an die Teilnehmer der Veranstaltung
im Thälmann-Haus Hamburg:

Liebe Genossinnen, liebe Genossen,
liebe Freunde,

als Bundesvorsitzender des Revolutionären Freundschaftsbundes e. V. (RFB) über-bringe ich mit einer Delegation, der Heinz Wendt und sein liebe Hilde, beide aus Berlin, und Albrecht Geißler aus Karl Chemnitz angehören, den Versammelten die von Herzen kommenden Grüße der tschechischen und deutschen Mitglieder unserer Organisation.

Der RFB wurde 1995 mit Unterstützung der Tochter Irma unseres von den Faschisten ermordeten Teddy gegründet. Er stellte und stellt sich der Aufgabe, Anti-faschisten, Kommunisten und Sozialisten mit und ohne Parteibuch zu mobilisieren, das politische Erbe des Vorsitzenden der erfolgreichen Kommunistischen Partei Deutschlands, Ernst Thälmann, gegen die Angriffe der Reaktion und Konterrevolu-tion zu verteidigen und die Fälschungen der Geschichte und Herabwürdigung der besten Söhne unseres Volkes und der Kommunistischen Internationale zurück-zuweisen.

Unsere Mittel sind

• die politische Bildung auf der Grundlage unserer wissenschaftlichen Weltanschauung,
• das Wirken für die Aktionseinheit der antifaschistisch – demokratisch orientier-ten Menschen, um den Gefahren zu begeg-nen, die sich aus der Krise des Kapitalis-mus und dem Wiedererstarken der faschi-stischen Bewegung herleiten. Die uns von Genossen Thälmann übermittelten Erfah-rungen sind wir bemüht zu nutzen.
• das Wirken für die Wiederherstellung der Einheit der revolutionären Arbeiterbewe-gung und der Überwindung der parteipoli-tischen Spaltung der Kommunisten auf dem Wege der Aktionseinheit,
• die politische Aktion gegen das kapitalisti-sche, imperialistische System durch Auf-klärung und politischen Angriff für die Interessen der Ausgebeuteten und Unter-drückten und an ihrer Seite.

In der Tradition des Roten Fontkämpferbundes wollen wir heute Helfer der Kommunistischen Parteien sein und auch Parteilose an die Partei heranführen. Mit den Parteiführungen der KPD (Ost) und  der KP Böhmen und Mähren entwickelt sich das bei Bewahrung der Unabhängig-keit des RFB erfreulich.

Hier ist keine Werbeveranstaltung für den RFB. Mein Hauptanliegen mit diesem Grußwort ist zu betonen, dass alle Gedenk-stätten und Gedenkorte für Ernst Thälmann Orte der Mobilisierung des Widerstandes gegen Geschichtslügen, gegen die ideologische Diversion der reaktionären schwar-zen, braunen, gelben und auch grüner Kräfte sein müssen. Das ist unser aller Aufgabe im ganzen Lande und außerhalb deutscher Grenzen.

Die Thälmann-Gedenkstätten in Ziegenhals und Hamburg leisten in der Bewah-rung von authentischen Dokumenten eine nicht zu unterschätzende Arbeit. Danken wir den Genossen, die diese Arbeit unter schwierigen Bedingungen leisten.  Der RFB als Mitgliederorganisation ist ein Bindeglied geworden, der Thälmannfreunde im Lande und im Auslande vereint und den Informationsaustausch und die Tradi-tionspflege unterstützt.

In diesem Sinne wird das Zusammenwir-ken der Ernst-Thälmann-Gedenkstätten und des RFB immer besser und kontinuierlicher abgestimmt.

Ganz in diesem Sinne sollen die Gedenkveranstaltungen zum 65. Jahrestag der Ermordung Ernst Thälmanns Signalwirkung haben.

Ganz in diesem Sinne bereiteten wir auch das diesjährige Riesengebirgstreffen mit unseren tschechischen Genossen am letzten August-Wochenende als Tradition der Arbeiterbewegung vor. 1927 sprach Genosse Thälmann auf dem 6. Treffen in Královec vor 6000 deutschen und tschechoslowakischen Kommunisten. Nach der Beseitigung des Denkmals an die Tradition der Arbeiterbewegung in Malá Úpa durch konterrevolutionäre Bilderstürmer im Jahre 1994 belebten tschechische Kommunisten 1996 die Tradition. Auf der Wiese , wo einst das Denkmal stand, stand auch Irma Thälmann an der Seite der tschechischen Genossen. Für dieses Treffen am 29. August 2009 konnten zahlreiche neue Teilnehmer mobilisiert werden.  Meine Ausführung sollte anregen, die Teilnahme 2010 einzuplanen.

Liebe Genossinnen und Genossen, ver-einen wir unsere Kräfte noch gezielter für eine wirksame Erinnerungskultur, in der unser Ernst Thälmann mit seinen Kampf-erfahrungen und mit seiner Leidenschaft für die Arbeiter und alle Ausgebeuteten seinen ihm gebührenden Platz hat.

Beantworten wir den Kampf der Ausbeu-terklasse mit unserem Kampf, wie es uns Ernst Thälmann lehrt.

Erheben wir symbolisch unsere Faust zum Gruß

Rot Font!