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Oral history interview with Leon Bass

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 1993.A.0088.75 | RG Number: RG-50.002.0075

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    Oral history interview with Leon Bass

    Overview

    Interview Summary
    Leon Bass, born in 1925 in Philadelphia, PA, discusses his childhood in Philadelphia; his experiences with racism in the 1930s; his experience as a soldier in an African-American unit during World War II; his time in England in 1943 with General Patton's Third Army, 183rd Engineer Combat Battalion; his participation in the Battle of Bulge; his interaction with white soldiers during World War II; his unit's work putting up bridges and removing land mines in Belgium; his unit's move into Germany; his inability to assess the nature or character of the Germans; his memories of entering Buchenwald concentration camp and seeing "walking dead people"; his memories of entering the crematorium where the bodies were piled up and recollections that the ashes were used for fertilizer; his learning that there were many concentration camps like Buchenwald; his time in the Pacific War Theatre; his enrollment in West Chester State College and his desire to become a history teacher; his experiences with racism after World War II; his involvement in the civil rights movement of the 1960s; his experiences as a principal of two different African-American schools and one all white school; a visit to his school by a Holocaust survivor that led him to talk about the Holocaust publicly; and his reflections on the Holocaust as being a human problem. Also contains a photograph of Leon and another soldier in their army uniforms.
    Interviewee
    Leon Bass
    Interviewer
    Bernard Weinstein
    Date
    interview:  1988 March 16
    Credit Line
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Holocaust Resource Center at Kean University

    Physical Details

    Language
    English
    Extent
    2 videocassettes (VHS) : sound, color ; 1/2 in..

    Rights & Restrictions

    Conditions on Access
    There are no known restrictions on access to this material.
    Conditions on Use
    No restrictions on use

    Keywords & Subjects

    Personal Name
    Bass, Leon, 1925-

    Administrative Notes

    Provenance
    The interview was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum along with other interviews between 1993 - 1997 by the Holocaust Resource Center at Kean College (now Kean University).
    Record last modified:
    2023-11-16 07:56:42
    This page:
    https:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/irn503075

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