Rancho Mirage High School welcomed a special guest speaker on Thursday, February 12, as Michele Gold, a second-generation Holocaust survivor, shared her family’s powerful story with students.
During her presentation, Gold recounted her mother’s journey beginning with her childhood in Leipzig, Germany, her escape to safety through the Kindertransport program, and her life after World War II.
Marit Meisler was inspired to create artwork honoring the resilience and spirit of the Jewish people who faced the Holocaust by her father, Frank Meisler, who survived the Holocaust by escaping through the Kindertransport.
Frank went on to create public sculptures installed in cities around the world, many of which depicted the Kindertransport. Marit, who now lives in Tel Aviv, said her father’s experience inspired her to pursue a career as a sculptor.
Marit created Coconut Creek’s first Holocaust Memorial titled “Generations,” located at the Government Center. It is a metal sculpture showing cut-out silhouettes of children who were murdered or orphaned during the Holocaust. One of the silhouettes is her father, Frank.
“I was honored to be chosen to create this memorial. The holes are figures of the children who were killed, but future generations are filling in those holes. We are filling those holes,” said Marit.
The memorial was unveiled during an evening ceremony on January 29, attended by city leaders.
Lambeth Council hosted a Holocaust Memorial Day event on Sunday, January 25 with the theme of ‘Bridging Generations’ to serve as a reminder that the responsibility of remembrance doesn’t end with the survivors – but lives on through us all.
The event at Lambeth Town Hall in Brixton featured the lighting of a memorial candle by Lambeth Mayor Cllr Adrian Garden and performances by students from three local schools.
The main presentation was a powerful key note speech from the daughter of Henry Wuga MBE who came to the UK on the Kindertransport, escaping the Nazi persecution of Jewish people.
My grandfather, passed away on 27th January which is now the date of International Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD). I was born on 30th January, the day when the Nazis came to power in 1933 and the day when Hitler gave his Reichstag speech in 1939. Every year, these two days have been filled with sorrow as we remember all those who were murdered during the Holocaust, and I also remember my grandfather. But since I’ve been researching the Kindertransport, I’ve come to see 30th January and even 27th January in a new light.
The BBC has issued an apology after facing criticism for a December 26 episode of its popular program The Repair Shop, which discussed the Kindertransport without mentioning Jews, despite the operation’s central role in rescuing Jewish children from Nazi persecution during the Holocaust, i24NEWS reported.
The episode centered on the restoration of a 19th‑century cello belonging to theater producer Martin Landau, who fled Nazi Germany for Britain at age 14 aboard a Kindertransport convoy. The cello had been smashed by Nazi guards shortly before his departure and remained unrepaired for decades.
The Repair Shop, known for featuring expert craftspeople restoring items of deep personal significance, devoted nearly a quarter of the hour‑long episode to the cello’s history and the broader context of the Kindertransport. British actress Helen Mirren presented the instrument to the team, and luthier Becky Houghton restored it before it was played on screen by Jewish cellist Raphael Wallfisch.
However, the program never stated that Landau was Jewish or that the Kindertransport was primarily a rescue operation for Jewish children fleeing Nazi persecution. Historically, the Kindertransport enabled the evacuation of approximately 10,000 Jewish children from Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia between 1938 and 1939, with support from Jewish and humanitarian organizations.
The Jewish Chronicle reported that the word “Jew” was allegedly removed during editing from a sentence spoken by Mirren, which aired simply as, “…children were sent by the Kindertransport,” without further explanation.
The BBC has been forced to apologize for the December 26 airing of an episode in its series The Repair Shop, which, while discussing the Kindertransport for 15 minutes, fails to mention the Jews.
BBC fails to mention Jews in one hour The Repair Shop episode about a cello broken by Nazis
The Repair Shop is a BBC show about craftspeople bringing family heirlooms back to life. In the episode, renowned British actress Dame Helen Mirren takes her cello – damaged during the Kindertransport – for restoration.
The cello had belonged to her late friend, the theatre producer Martin Landau, and was broken by Nazi guards when he fled to Britain on the Kindertransport aged 14.
While the episode extensively details the story of the cello and the Kindertransport (for approximately a quarter of its 60-minute running time) it entirely fails to mention the Jews. The fact that Landau was forced to flee due to being Jewish is ignored.