Holocaust

Hyman D. Silberstrom, a Holocaust survivor who later was interned in Siberian labor camps, died Nov. 11 at his Columbia home of complications from Parkinson's disease. He was 90. "I was determined to survive!" Mr. Silberstrom told a newspaper reporter in a 1987 interview about his wartime ordeal first at the hands of the Nazis and later the Russians. Mr. Silberstrom was born and raised in Ciechanow, a small town near Warsaw, Poland. He was a descendant of generations of rabbis and Talmudical scholars, family members said.

Frank Warner Kussy, a Holocaust survivor who won reparations for damages done to him and his business by both the Nazis and the communist government of East Germany, died of heart failure Oct. 1, less than two weeks short of his 100th birthday. "He was probably unique, in that he fought the German government double-time," said Kenneth Waltzer, director of Jewish Studies at James Madison College at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Mich., who invited Mr. Kussy to speak to his class several times.

The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation announced this week that it will award $10 million over five years for emergency services for impoverished Holocaust survivors living in North America. The Weinberg Holocaust Survivors Emergency Assistance Fund provides medical equipment and medications, dental care, transportation, food and short-term home care for Holocaust survivors. The money from the Baltimore-based foundation will be managed by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, based in New York.

Shanlei Cardwell could not fathom why so many people had wanted to kill the engaging old man standing before her. Meredith O'Connell laughed at his jokes and wondered how he had the spirit to tell them after all he'd endured. Both teenagers sensed that they'd be talking about Leo Bretholz for decades to come, that they would take on a small part of the quest that has driven him for almost 50 years. For all that time, Bretholz has crisscrossed the Baltimore area telling his harrowing tale of eluding capture and death as an Austrian Jew living in Europe through the Holocaust.

Watching "Eichmann" on Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Baltimore Jewish Film Festival will remind viewers of the power movies can get from timing and circumstance. It's not a crackerjack film, but it's a strong conversation-starter. (Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin will be the guest speaker.) It centers on an Israeli police interrogator, Capt. Avner Less, who relentlessly questioned Adolph Eichmann, a prime engineer of Hitler's Final Solution, from May 29, 1960 (shortly after Eichmann's capture in a Buenos Aires suburb)

The Jewish Federation of Howard County has received a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany. County residents who are Holocaust survivors and have a limited income might qualify for a grant to obtain medical care, shelter, food and clothing. Call 410-730-4976, ext. 120, for more information.