The Holocaust was a watershed event in human history—an act of murder and violence that the Nazis and their accomplices unleashed against the Jewish people. Danger faced every person who professed the Jewish faith—but women, men and children followed different paths to death.
Spots of Light: To be a Woman in the Holocaust—which will run September 4 to December 19 at the Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center—will share the unique voice of the women among the victims. More than two million women were murdered during this horrific campaign.
Spots of Light—produced by Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem—features large panels that depict nine aspects of the daily lives of typical Jewish women during the Holocaust: “Arts,” “Caring for Others,” “Faith,” “Food,” “Friendship,” “Love,” “Motherhood,” “Resistance and Rescue” and “Womanhood.” Each aspect is accompanied by a personal story and is told in the first person.
Nazi ideology viewed women as agents of fertility. Therefore, the extermination of Jewish women would thwart the rise of future generations. Many women who survived annihilation were sent to women-only labor camps. where most died within months. Many others were left alone with children and the elderly and became responsible for the survival of their remaining family members.
Emanuel Ringelblum, a historian who documented the Warsaw ghetto, notes: “The future historian will have to dedicate an appropriate page to the Jewish woman in the war. She will take up an important page in Jewish history for her courage and steadfastness. By her merit, thousands of families have managed to surmount the terror of the times.”
The Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center is located at 851 North Maitland Avenue, Maitland. For more information, call or visit the website.
