HAVE YOU READ YOUR KA TODAY?
May 5, 2017
Volume 41, number 18
Ramstein honors Holocaust victims Story and photos by Senior Airman Elizabeth Baker 86th Airlift Wing Public Affairs
Page 20
cuted a major program to destroy hundreds of synagogues throughout Germany and Austria, attack homes and businesses and send tens of thousands to concentration camps. Kindertransport was an organization established to transport children and find places away from danger for them to stay. “In April of 1939, my parents took me to the railway station,” Mrs. Kirk said. “As the train passed, they frantically waved to me. I was 10 years old and that was the last time I ever saw them.” The Kirk’s parents were eventu-
US, Greece strengthen partnership in Stolen Cerberus IV, Page 5
ally taken to concentration camps and, though they exchanged letters, neither of the children ever saw their parents again. Though times were difficult, the Kirks said they consider themselves fortunate for the lives they have lived. They spoke of coping with their pain and learning to live normal lives. “Basically we just had to get on with it,” Mrs. Kirk said. “I think the feeling at the time was, don’t look back. Just look to the future.” Mrs. Kirk described a smuggled letSee REMEMBRANCE, Page 2
LIFESTYLES
been married 67 years, took turns telling their stories from their perspectives. “On the night of November 9th, I was awoken by my parents but they wouldn’t tell me what was wrong,” Mrs. Kirk said. “We packed a bag and went out into the street where I saw glass everywhere and synagogues in flames. That evening, we went to stay in a flat which my mother’s best friend had left when she had immigrated to England.” The night Mrs. Kirk describes is known as Kristallnacht, or night of broken glass, when Nazis exe-
FEATURE
Special Mother’s Day offers,
Airmen lay stones in accordance with Jewish culture April 25 on Ramstein. The laying of the stones is a tradition to mark a visit to the gravesite of a loved one. Airmen laid stones during the 86th Airlift Wing’s Holocaust Remembrance to honor the victims of the estimated 11 million who were killed during the Holocaust.
NEWS
Ramstein personnel and families honored the memory of Holocaust victims during the 86th Airlift Wing’s Holocaust Remembrance April 24. As honored guests at the remembrance, Bob and Ann Kirk, Holocaust survivors, told their stories of persecution and their experience on the Kindertransport. According to the 86 AW Holocaust Remembrance Day Committee, the Holocaust was the systematic, statesponsored persecution led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazis during World War II. During the Holocaust, an estimated 11 million people were killed and many more were persecuted for their race, religion and ethnicities. As children, the Kirks escaped persecution through the Kindertransport, a series of rescue efforts which brought thousands of refugee Jewish children to Great Britain from Nazi Germany between 1938 and 1940. During their visit to Ramstein, the Kirks stepped on stage to capture Airmen, civilians and children with stories and pictures from their days of struggle. “As soon as the Nazis took power, everything changed,” Mr. Kirk said. Mr. Kirk spoke of the new regulations that began to make life for Jewish people more and more difficult and how his life at school began to change as well. “There was more bullying and my classmates were ordered not to associate with Jews,” Mr. Kirk said. “We were usually forced to sit in the back of the class and not allowed to participate in the lesson. You can imagine how much we learned this way.” The Kirks, who met at a club for young Jewish refugees and have
Celebrating 109 years of Army Reserve, Page 8
Landstuhl sponsors castle event days, Page 14