Advanced Search

Learn About The Holocaust

Special Collections

My Saved Research

Login

Register

Help

Skip to main content

Print

Oral history interview with Janny Blom

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 1984.1.1.3 | RG Number: RG-50.157.0003

Search this record's additional resources, such as finding aids, documents, or transcripts.

No results match this search term.
Check spelling and try again.

results are loading

0 results found for “keyward”

    Oral history interview with Janny Blom
    Transcript
    --With Mrs. Blom, a rescuer from Holland who helped
    Jews by risking her life.
    I would like you to tell us in your own words
    about your rescue activity.
    Because your story is so important,
    I will be making notes as you talk.
    And we will also record your story
    so we can be sure not to miss anything.
    OK, we know the Freidenburgs--
    V-R-E-E-D-E-N-B-U-R-G. I worked for Dr.
    Freidenburg in Amsterdam before I was married as a dentist
    assistant.
    We got married in '37 and stayed friends
    all those years until 1942.
    By the time of '42, we heard that on Monday the 12th of July,
    they were going to start picking up
    Jewish boys from the age of 16.
    But we were not sure that maybe the parents were also picked up.
    Now, Mrs. Freidenburg's sister had a boy of 16.
    So I was very worried about him.
    And on Sunday, the 11th of July, we went to the Freidenburgs
    to visit and ask them what Johnny Veth--
    V-E-T-H-- was going to do.
    She said, my brother-in-law says maybe it
    will be just work camps.
    Maybe it will be good for the boy.
    And I said, how stupid can he get
    because we have several people that
    said they are destroying them.
    So they said, but what can we do?
    I said, well, we have a home, a downstairs living room, dining
    room, kitchen, and an upstairs four bedrooms and a bathroom.
    Why don't you come over to our place?
    Now, don't forget, at that time, Churchill
    said, over our hidden radio, because we were not
    allowed to have radio, that in the fall
    they would come and liberate us.
    Fill your bathtubs with water because your water
    might be closed off.
    So we all thought it was maybe a question of six weeks.
    And this became, instead of six weeks,
    it became merely three years, from the 12th of July 1942
    till the 5th of May 1945.
    In January 1945, there was a razzia.
    And he lived in a suburb of Amsterdam called Tuinsdorp
    Oostzaan-- spelt T-U-I-N-D-S-D-O-R-P Capital
    O-O-S-D-Z-A-A-N. And they singled the dykes, the Gestapo,
    and came into our village.
    And in the meantime, my husband had to hide also.
    Now, in our homes there were no attics.
    I'll show you a picture later on.
    But he took the ceiling out of one of the closets.
    And the Freidenburgs as well as he went upstairs.
    He had made a 6 by 6 piece of wood.
    And they sat there from 8 o'clock in the morning
    till 5:00 at night.
    The Nazis came-- the Gestapo.
    One went to the garage.
    One went upstairs with a big German shepherd dog.
    And one stood by me guarding me with a rifle.
    You mean the Germans?
    The German, the Gestapo.
    How many people you had in your house?
    Well, we did have a three-year-old boy.
    And we could not make it known to him
    because he called him Tante and Oom, which means aunt and uncle.
    And he knew their names.
    So we told him that he had been sleepwalking.
    And we put a hook and eye on his door
    at night when he went to bed.
    Now, in Holland, kids go to bed at 7 o'clock.
    And at 8 o'clock at night, it would be [NON-ENGLISH],, curfew.
    Yes.
    And after 8 o'clock, they could come downstairs.
    Now, they were always walking in slippers, crocheted slippers.
    They never made any noise.
    They never had any heat upstairs because in Holland the houses
    are just warmed in the winter time in the living room.
    But they had little wooden contraptions
    that you could put some coal in to warm your feet.
    That's all they had.
    Now, Mr. Freidenburg spent his time painting pictures.
    He even painted on a pillowcase for me.
    This was from van Gogh.
    And he himself painted a Bruegel and a Rembrandt
    and a Vermeer for himself for later on
    because his house had been broken into after he had left,
    and he had nothing left.
    Everything was taken out of the apartment that they had.
    They had a 12-room apartment.
    Who took it out?
    The Germans.
    There was nothing left.
    After the war, Mr. Freidenburg had lost 82 relatives.
    And Mrs. Freidenburg had lost about 45.
    She only had one sister left who had
    been hiding in a Christian nursery school on the attic
    also.
    So you had Mr. Freidenburg--
    And his wife, Marianne--
    --and his wife.
    And who was his three-year-old boy?
    My three-year-old boy was Bert--
    B-E-R-T.
    That was from your other family?
    No, that was mine.
    This is your own child.
    They had a boy, Max.
    And they had a servant girl until January.
    But then the Germans said a Christian girl cannot work
    for Jews.
    So she worked for a Christian doctor.
    But she said the minute they are going into hiding,
    I am going to take Max, the Freidenburg's boy.
    And she went at first to her brother's house
    in northern Holland.
    But later on, it was too well known
    that he couldn't go to school.
    And she took him to a farm of my mother's cousin.
    And he stayed there for eight months.
    Then there was a razzia over at that farm.
    And so they had to disappear.
    And she asked me in a letter, what can I do?
    And I said, well, go to my mother's old bookkeeper.
    And here's a letter.
    I said, help this girl.
    And that's what he did.
    He sent him to the most northern province, Drenthe,
    by a Christian head of a school, an elementary school.
    The man himself had six children.
    He adopted a Jewish boy whose parents
    had perished at the bombardment of Rotterdam.
    Yes--
    The Sunday afternoon that we were visiting them,
    they didn't know where to go.
    And I said, well, why don't you come to our house.
    And I already said, we all thought
    it would be over in six weeks because that's
    what Churchill had said.
    And they said, well, do you think you could do that?
    And I said, well, I have a guest room with a twin bed.
    So I have to order another bed.
    They said, no, don't do that because your neighbors will
    see it.
    And then they will say, what do you need another bed for?
    So they slept in a twin bed for three years, the two of them.
    Now, in the beginning, it was not too roomy.
    But after the war was ended, I weighed 80 pounds.
    She weighed less than 80 pounds.
    He weighed 90.
    And the dentist weighed 93 pounds.
    You did not have enough food for them?
    No, because-- well, that is-- let
    me tell later because that is from the last part of the war,
    you know.
    When they came on the bicycle, they came with their raincoats
    on with the Star of David on there.
    And on the ferry to our house, you
    had to go over the IJ in Amsterdam.
    That's the big canal all the big ships go through.
    On the ferry, they took off their raincoats
    and put it on the baggage carrier
    with the star folded inside.
    So then they wore a suit without a star.
    And they came close to dark and quickly put their bicycles
    in our hallway--
    we had a long hallway--
    and disappeared upstairs.
    My boy was already asleep because this was not curfew time
    yet.
    And he was asleep.
    And later on, the servant girl came
    to pick up one of the bicycles because that would be too much,
    you know.
    They would see that we had another bicycle.
    They disappeared upstairs at first.
    And, well, they said to me, well, I--
    he said to me, I gave Marianne 55 guilders,
    which is dollars in our place, household money a week.
    I said, listen, I don't want that.
    My husband doesn't even make that much a week.
    I said, I want $15 a week.
    I don't want any more.
    I did not do it for money.
    Just to cover--
    I did it because I had worked for them.
    They were human beings.
    They were friends.
    They were good to me.
    When we had practice on Monday night, I could sleep there.
    I did not have to bicycle home the 9 kilometers, 12 kilometers,
    9 miles, back home at night.
    So I did not want anything to happen to them
    and neither did he because--
    well, he became friends with them too.
    And so-- well, I used to call them Mrs. Freidenburg and Dr.
    Freidenburg.
    But the minute they came in our house,
    they said, well, just call us by our first name,
    Sam and Marianne, which is not done very much in Europe.
    You know that.
    But that's what we did.
    They went upstairs.
    And in the daytime, she studied graphology,
    you know the handwriting.
    And she used to work for the Department of Justice
    about handwriting.
    And he did study with her.
    We played a lot of chess when my boy was in nursery school.
    And we read a lot of books.
    I would go to the library and pick up
    French books and German books, Ludwig Klages,
    as you know, Max Pulver, all kinds of books about graphology.
    And at night, we would play chess.
    At night, when my husband was not home,
    because he was a commander of a fire
    department in Amsterdam, at night when he was not at home--
    and our homes were like condominiums, built together--
    we had to whisper.
    And it so happened that I was in a store one time
    and ordered something by the butcher.
    And I started whispering because I was so used to whisper.
    And in the long run, I got Jewish way
    of talking by answering questions with a question.
    And Marianne warned me.
    She said, you're getting to be more Jewish than we are.
    But over all the years, we had a very good companionship.
    After the war was over we visited each other all the time.
    On the 5th of May, they came every year
    and brought us a present of a chicken or something else,
    you know.
    Then we left the Netherlands in 1950 for America.
    They gave us a big dinner before we left.
    And after we came back in '58, they took us to Paris for an,
    you know, trip.
    But I wanted to tell you that in '44, we expected a baby.
    This was the second baby.
    No--
    That was our second--
    Yes.
    Yes.
    You had a three-year-old boy already.
    Yes.
    And he was in the meantime 5 and 1/2.
    And one time, Mrs. Freidenburg needed a doctor so bad,
    but she didn't dare, you know.
    But I said our doctor is good.
    I know you know what we meant by good.
    So she saw his handwriting when I had some letters from him
    for my little boy to go to a specialist for his asthma.
    And she saw his handwriting.
    She said, he is good.
    So he came over cured her cystitis because she
    had very bad cystitis.
    What kind of doctor was this Mr. Freidenburg?
    Dentist.
    He was a dentist, yeah.
    They were the two people whom you rescued.
    Yes.
    Some other people came later on?
    No.
    Or no?
    This one family.
    He was in the underground army.
    And he has rescued some other people
    that he brought to different parts
    because he was in the underground army.
    But we did not have him in our home.
    Uh, huh.
    Referred to some other places.
    Yes.
    Your husband?
    Yes.
    Quickly interview with him also maybe?
    No.
    It's not necessary.
    She knows all the particulars.
    And--
    Now, my mother was the only one that knew about it
    because she came often.
    She was a widow all by herself.
    And she came often to our place and would stay overnight.
    So she had to know.
    But we knew my mother was good.
    His parents, we didn't even want to bother.
    They would come and visit.
    But while they were downstairs, and they would stay upstairs
    and would be very quiet.
    And they never knew.
    Did they go out?
    No.
    Never in three years, they have not been out.
    You did not try to get for them false papers?
    They-- we all had [NON-ENGLISH],, identity cards.
    Yes.
    And they had Js on there because of Jew--
    Yes.
    Jood in Dutch.
    And they had the Js taken off.
    But it was such a botched up job that they did not even trust it.
    She once in awhile was so desperate,
    and he had taken along--
    a dentist has arsenicum because of root canal treatment--
    Yes.
    And he had taken along arsenicum.
    But one time, she was so desperate she
    wanted to take the arsenicum and go into the fields
    and make an end to her own life.
    And I locked all the doors because we had the dining room
    door to the garden, a kitchen door, and a front room door.
    And I ran to that doctor that I talked to you about.
    And he gave her a shot.
    He came over and gave her the shot.
    And he knew that they are Jewish?
    Yes.
    They were friends?
    And he was very surprised that we had them already
    for eight months.
    When he finally came to our house,
    she said I know of so many families that
    are hiding Jewish people, but nobody told me that you were.
    I said nobody knows because it was too dangerous.
    Yes.
    I will show you a picture.
    Maybe you can--
    Now you haven't been afraid that your little boy is going out
    on the street and he is going to tell?
    He has never seen them.
    He never saw them?
    No.
    Except for the night we ordered--
    about 4 o'clock the school goes out.
    And one time, the school was let out early because of air alarm.
    And he came.
    And she just came downstairs with a chamber pot,
    because that's what they used upstairs,
    to empty it in the toilet.
    And he came in and he said, hi, Tante Marianne.
    I haven't seen you in a long time.
    That was nearly three years, you know.
    And he ran right away outside.
    And she said, yeah, I'm helping your mother do
    the spring cleaning-- because this was May,
    you know, beginning of May.
    It didn't bother him at all.
    He thought it was just normal.
    But that's the only time he saw her.
    Yes.
    Some people came into your house during these three years?
    Oh, yes.
    It's a long period of time.
    I was sick one time.
    I had flu.
    And we didn't have the antibiotics that we have now.
    And I was sick for a whole week.
    And my neighbor is starting to get worried, you know.
    Now, since the time we had the Freidenburgs,
    it happened that in that same neighborhood
    ration cards had been stolen.
    So everybody kept their doors locked.
    But also, this whole neighborhood
    had keys that fit on every door practically.
    And one time, Marianne was getting downstairs
    to the kitchen to get some water for me, to get my medication.
    And she heard somebody on the lock of the kitchen door.
    And in Holland under the sink, we never
    have a door because of the pipes.
    We always have a little curtain.
    And there's a little basket with dust cloth
    and then, of course, the pipe is there.
    And she crawled under there.
    And so two neighbors came in and went straight upstairs
    and came to my bedroom and said, we haven't seen you.
    What's the matter?
    And I said, oh, I've been so sick.
    You better go away right away because I have a terrible fever
    and I'm afraid you will get it.
    And she was sitting in this small cubicle under the sink.
    But they did not see her.
    What did you feed them?
    Well, the first couple of months,
    they bought ration cards--
    390 guilders a card.
    Then he had a cousin who had married a Jewish boy.
    And they lost a little boy by drowning.
    And when we were at the funeral, somebody in the underground
    that he worked with said to him, if you happen
    to know some Jewish people that are hiding someplace,
    he said, come to me because I can get ration cards
    without the identity cards.
    And he said, well, I happen to know that a friend of mine
    has friends that are hiding Jews.
    And he said, OK, I'll take care of the cards.
    Just give me the numbers.
    So he didn't know their name.
    And from then on, we got ration cards every month
    for the two of them.
    But I had to shop in two different stores
    because otherwise they would say,
    how come you have five rations of bread, in the beginning,
    or five rations of cheese.
    Now, the last part of the war, you
    remember Montgomery and the Battle of Arnhem?
    And then the queen of the Netherlands was in England.
    And she declared a railroad strike.
    And from then on, all the railroad men were hiding also.
    But the west--
    Amsterdam was in the west--
    did not get any food except sugar beets.
    We did not have electricity.
    We did not have gas.
    We had a potbelly stove that our neighbor
    had cut down because he worked for the shipbuilding company.
    He was able to do that.
    And then later on, he made a small kind of a tin can
    with a grating in it.
    And a handful of wood, you know, would cook the sugar beets.
    And the pulp of the sugar beets, I
    would make pancakes from, you know, a dry pan.
    So Mrs. Blom, you hid these people for three years.
    And you told us before that because they were so nice people
    and they deserved to be safe.
    But what was actually what motivated
    you to do-- from what kind of reason
    except that they were so nice?
    What dictated for you to help these people?
    I would have thought it terrible if they had to perish, you know.
    And so would he.
    So what was the reason?
    For what kind of reason you believe?
    From humanitarian?
    Yes.
    For humanitarian reasons.
    Yes.
    And did you recognize the danger what
    you were going to take them?
    Oh, yes, the first couple of days, you
    know, my hair stood on end when the bell rang.
    But little by little, you get used to everything.
    And there were several nights--
    but because he was in the underground,
    he knew always when there was a razzia coming.
    And so one night we had what we call spiderweb night.
    And everybody was alert.
    And they were hiding in the attic you know.
    Otherwise, in the daytime, they were in the bedroom.
    But if there was any danger, they were in the attic.
    And like I told you, the 23rd of January '45, he was also
    in the attic and sat there from 8:00 till 5:00 at night--
    Because--
    --and was hiding with them on the 6 by 6 foot platform.
    --looking for him.
    Mm, hmm.
    So can you tell me that how was the apartment divided?
    How you--
    This is the house.
    This is the house.
    This is the front room.
    This is the long hallway.
    This is one bedroom.
    That was the master bedroom.
    This was our boy's bedroom.
    So you were saving these people.
    Do you think that you took a big risk saving them?
    Yes.
    There was a lot of danger because I know personally
    of a family, Lefevre, and they had
    a friend of Samuel Freidenburg, Joe Zwahlen
    was his name, and his 80-year-old mother.
    And the mother was kind of childish, you know.
    And she would run in the garden.
    And people saw that.
    And the Gestapo picked them up.
    And they both perished in gas chambers.
    Really.
    You think no one of your neighbor knew that you were--
    No.
    --hiding these people?
    The night before the liberation, we heard over the radio
    that we would be liberated by the Canadians
    and Americans the next day.
    And then they came out with me.
    And it was his day of work at the fire department 24 hours.
    And we went outside in the streets.
    And everybody was outside.
    And we went to our neighbors.
    And then they said who they were.
    And some of my next door neighbors
    knew them because they had been visiting before the war,
    you know.
    So they knew about them.
    And in fact, during the war, they
    would ask, have you heard about the Freidenburgs?
    And I said, no, I'm so afraid something happened to them.
    So what would happen to you when they would find out?
    Shot.
    Shot.
    And your husband too.
    Yes.
    How many times did the Germans came sometimes to search or to--
    Just the one time.
    --in your house.
    The 23rd of January 1945.
    And he had to hide also because they came then
    not for Jewish people, but they came for men to dig trenches.
    And they came for boys over 16 until 45.
    But he was hiding.
    But the German soldier, the SS, that
    stood with me downstairs and guarded me with the rifle,
    he said, where is your husband?
    I said, well, he's at the fire department, which wasn't true.
    It was his day off.
    But I showed him his ausweis.
    He had to hide because he was working with the underground?
    Yes.
    And also he took part in the strike when the--
    the middle of the strike in Holland?
    Well, the strike--
    No, not the strike.
    No, the strike was only the railroad strike.
    Only the railroad strike.
    Yeah.
    Not the fire department.
    Fire department was not on strike.
    They were not allowed to strike, too
    dangerous with all the bombing that went on, you know.
    Yes.
    We were bombed many times.
    Yes.
    So what else would you like to tell?
    Not much.
    So you say that someone knew about your rescue activities.
    No.
    Except my mother knew it because she so often stayed with us,
    you know, overnight.
    But at that time, my mother's village
    on the beach, North Sea beach, was evacuated.
    And she was with her family in the eastern part
    of the Netherlands.
    And she heard how bad it was in Amsterdam.
    And she went by the farm, you know.
    And she got, well, some lard, some eggs, some meat,
    some apples, some rye.
    And she brought it over to us.
    And she was 90 kilometers on the bicycle to bring it to us.
    And my mother was a nurse.
    So she came in nurse's uniform.
    And when the Germans took her in the little boat
    over the IJssel--
    you know, the River IJssel--
    they said, what have you all in that suitcase?
    And she said, those are my uniforms.
    I have a job to do.
    There's a baby girl to be born.
    And I have to work there.
    Did you have some other people also, let's say,
    for a very short period of time?
    No.
    The underground did not refer--
    No.
    --anyone to you?
    No.
    Could you-- I mean did you think about it that maybe you
    could save some more people?
    We did not have room for more people because one--
    those were small bedrooms except for the master bedroom.
    The bedroom was 9 by 10 feet.
    And our boy's room was maybe 6 by 9 feet.
    And my mother's, when she stayed over, was maybe 6 by 9 feet.
    And that was all the room we had.
    Is it running?
    Yeah, it is running.
    Yes.
    And when the war ended, the people went back to their home?
    They did not go back to their home
    because they had emptied the whole apartment.
    And they went in a motel, a hotel, for about a month.
    And then next door, one of the collaborators of the Germans
    had been picked up by the underground.
    And that house came empty.
    And they could buy that house.
    And that's what they did.
    They bought a house.
    And that's where he made his practice again because by that
    time, he was-- let me see--
    41 years old.
    Have you been in contact with them immediately?
    Yes.
    We stayed from '45 till '50 that we left for America,
    we were there, oh, let's say, every two weeks.
    Or they would come to our house.
    And every birthday, we would be there.
    We would go out for dinner.
    They would take us out to dinner, which we never could
    afford from his salary to go.
    Yes.
    But after the war--
    I mean when we went to America and came back
    after 8 and 1/2 years, they took us five days
    to Paris, the two of us and our son, Ed,
    who was born in the war.
    He was 13.5 and came with us to the Netherlands.
    When you came to America, how life treated you?
    How did you--
    I had relatives here.
    I had a cousin who was married.
    And it was-- what do you say, sponsored us.
    And, well, I stayed with another cousin on the farm
    with my two boys.
    And he worked in Royal Oak, Michigan.
    And, well, it took us nine weeks to find a home
    to buy for $500 down.
    We couldn't take any money out of the country, you know.
    Each of us got 90--
    So you had quite a hard time to settle down.
    So it took us nine weeks to save up for a $500 down payment
    and buy an old house.
    So you have two children.
    No.
    In '56, when we were 19.5 years married, we got a little girl.
    Oh, beautiful.
    So now our boys are 46 and 40, and the girl is 28.
    This is beautiful.
    They all studied--
    Yes.
    Yes.
    The two boys are engineers.
    And the girl works as a secretary
    for the board of education.
    And I went around in all that time
    in maybe 40 different schools and circles and churches
    and talked about Holland in war time.
    And that's how I met the two teachers
    that I was sitting with.
    And they asked Sister Carol to come
    to that meeting in the class because I told one of the boys
    that we were bowling with, you know.
    I was treasurer of Hollandia Society, a Dutch club.
    But we also had a bowling--
    League.
    --league.
    And I was secretary of the bowling league.
    And one little 17-year-old boy joined us, you know.
    He had nobody else to join.
    And he was reading the story of Anne Frank.
    And I said, how do you like it, Dave?
    And he said, oh, I didn't know all this happened.
    I said, well I knew Anne and her whole family
    because they were patients of my dentist.
    And he said, that's impossible, you know.
    He said, would you come to my class and tell us about it?
    And that's when the girl I was sitting next to,
    Barbara Demlow and Rose Siegel, they took their two classes
    together in one room.
    And I told them about our war experiences.
    And they had invited Sister Carol.
    And Sister Carol was the one that
    made sure that we got the medal last October.
    You get a medal from the Yad Vashem?
    Yes.
    And Sister Carol also planted our tree last year.
    Beautiful.
    Yes.
    Aren't you proud of yourself?
    No.
    Why?
    Not proud.
    I am only thankful.
    And you know when we were the most thankful, see,
    the one boy that they had, when he got married
    to a Jewish girl who also had been hidden somewhere,
    and they had a little boy, that's
    when I was the proudest because they
    were able to have a grandson.
    Beautiful.
    Don't you think that's nice?
    Yes.
    I mean that was for me the most thankful moment that they
    can perpetuate their family and not be annihilated, you know.
    Beautiful.
    And how you children feel about it?
    Oh, they like the story.
    They all know the story now, of course.
    You guys are doing some more speaking.
    The neighborhood where you live with, Mrs. Blom,
    they were living many Jews in this neighborhood?
    There were many Jews living in this neighborhood.
    And I was talking about this doctor
    that we needed during that time.
    And he even kept a mother and seven Jewish children
    in the village by sending in little slides of diphtheria
    and saying this family cannot go to a camp because the Germans
    were awfully afraid of scarlet fever and diphtheria and all
    these other sicknesses.
    So he kept him in their own home all that time,
    a mother and seven--
    This doctor who came to--
    --to, yeah, see our--
    Now, the people who were living in your house,
    they never get sick?
    Yes, that's when she got--
    How did you manage it?
    --cystitis.
    Well, that's what I said I will go to our doctor.
    And she said, well, I'm afraid that he would tell.
    And I said, no, he is good, what we called in the war good,
    you know, that--
    and when she finally saw his handwriting, because she
    was a graphologist--
    Yeah, you have been telling--
    --and I needed to go with my little boy to the allergist.
    And he had given me a letter to the allergist.
    And she said, oh, now, I see what you mean.
    He is good.
    He is very good.
    And then she finally decided that he
    could come over and treat her.
    And that's how he became friends.
    And this doctor died this spring.
    But until this spring, Dr. Samuel Friedenberg.
    And Dr. Fasseas Heffer, Leo Fasseas Heffer,
    has been playing chess every week one evening.
    Can you tell a little bit about your husband,
    how much he helped you, because we are not able to interview him
    at the prison, how much you have to you in this rescue
    activities, what kind of man he is.
    Well, he helped in the first place,
    when the first couple of years, you
    know, he went for miles and miles on the bicycle
    without tires, on the bare rims, to go to farmers
    and try to get some food, some fruit, something
    that we did not get on our rations.
    He went one time by train for a whole day,
    from early in the morning till late at night.
    And he came home to visit their little boy,
    to see that he was all right.
    So they had connection with this little boy?
    Yes.
    Through your husband.
    Yes.
    This servant girl that had taken him wrote letters to me
    and would say that her little boy was all right
    and told little stories about her little boy.
    But it was not her little boy.
    See, while he was there was this Christian school teacher.
    He called her mother because he--
    They were good to me when I worked for them.
    And I could not see them perish.
    I just wanted them to come to us.
    So we really did it only for humanitarian reasons.
    Yes.
    OK.
    You said they had one child.
    But you were not able--
    I mean they did--
    they were sending him to--
    I mean he was staying--
    To a farm.
    Yeah.
    And then later on to a Christian school teacher.
    Did you rescue her-- did you do your rescue work alone or did
    you work with others?
    No.
    He worked with other people in the underground.
    He has taken a Jewish couple to the eastern part
    of the Netherlands to an underground.
    Your husband.
    My husband.
    Say that your husband because you don't know who is he.
    Oh, my husband is Maynard Blom.
    So you did not work here.
    You worked alone but you did not work alone
    because you worked with your husband.
    Yes.
    And the husband worked also with the resistance,
    with the underground.
    Yes, mm, hmm.
    But this particular rescuing you did it with--
    The two of us.
    Husband.
    Members of your family, yes, family has husband.
    And three-year-old boy.
    Three-year-old boy did the [INAUDIBLE]..
    No.
    [LAUGHING]
    Did you rescue any people who were not Jewish?
    No.
    You say that you knew the person before the war
    because you worked for them.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And they were close friends before the war also?
    Yes.
    Or just acquaintances?
    No, close friends.
    When you decided to rescue, was this a quick decision?
    Yes.
    Did you think about it for a long time or did--
    No.
    --or--
    On the spot.
    On the spot.
    That Sunday afternoon.
    When you made the decision to rescue, how much did you--
    how much risk did you feel you were taking?
    A great deal of risk, some risk?
    We didn't think about it.
    You didn't think about it.
    But you have to give me some kind of--
    We knew there was a big risk.
    It was a--
    But they said they would keep quiet.
    And I said, well, in that case, I
    don't think we would get into too much danger.
    So you took about two things, what kind of risk do you take?
    Now, the risk was the same for everybody.
    I mean, if they had--
    Yes.
    --with that razzia, if they had found them--
    Yeah, because some people--
    My husband as well as me would have been shot.
    Yes.
    We were somewhat concerned that there
    was a chance of being detected.
    OK.
    But we were all grown-up people.
    They were 39 and 40.
    And we were 26 and 28.
    And we could keep our mouths shut.
    How did your rescue activity begin?
    Were you asked for help by person rescued [INAUDIBLE]??
    No, they did not ask.
    So you offered your help?
    Yes.
    In what month and year did you rescue activity first begun?
    The 12th of July 1942.
    For how long did it continue?
    Till the 5th of May 1945.
    It was the end of the war?
    Yes.
    That was our liberation day.
    At any time, did anyone put pressure on you
    to stop your rescue activities?
    No.
    Did any anyone praise your rescue activities
    during the war?
    No.
    No.
    Did you receive any compensation for your rescue activities?
    No.
    No.
    What kind of-- oh, sorry--
    were you or the person that you rescued ever arrested?
    No.
    Did you have contact with the person
    you rescued after the war?
    Yes.
    And are you-- with all of them, yes?
    Yes.
    You gave the names.
    I mean-- I have the names.
    Yes.
    And he told us also that you are still in contact.
    Yes.
    With the people.
    OK.
    Almost 40 years we kept in contact.
    Was there ever a time when you gave aid to someone
    and later regretted it?
    No.
    No.
    Did you discuss your rescue activities
    with any members of your family?
    Except my mother.
    Yeah.
    My mother.
    And what was her feeling?
    Well, she knew the family also.
    And she was glad that we were trying to save them.
    [AUDIO OUT]
    So were you involved in bringing Nazis to justice after the war?
    No.
    No.
    How much influence does your religion
    have on the way you live your life at the present time?
    Does it have a great deal of influence influence,
    some influence?
    Religion.
    Religion?
    Yes, some influence.
    Are you involved in helping activities in the community,
    such as volunteer work with charities, schools, churches,
    or anything of that sort?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And what kind of things are you doing?
    Well, our church circle makes blankets and sends towels and--
    Money.
    --money and different things for kids, glasses,
    empty pill bottles.
    Yes.
    And what is your part in it?
    I mean what you are selling it or you organizing it?
    No, no, organize it to get it together
    and make it into packages and make blankets and then
    to the needy countries.
    And what-- and what--
    send goods to needy countries?
    Yes.
    Yeah, sure, kind of care package.
    Care packages.
    And what else?
    Well--
    In church or in school somewhere, you don't--
    We talk about--
    Yes--
    Helping-- helping activities in communities
    or in your community.
    No.
    No more.
    Some kind of voluntary work?
    No.
    No except lectures in churches and schools.
    That comes up after.
    Have you spoken about your own experiences
    in any public places?
    Yes.
    For a couple of women's clubs.
    When was that?
    Oh, from the time I came here in 1950,
    in the northern part of Michigan where I stayed with my cousin,
    in Ellsworth--
    in Ellsworth, Michigan, and later on in Boyne City.
    And then when we moved to Royal Oak and bought a house,
    I have been to the Royal Oak Women's Club.
    I have been to the Pleasant Ridge Women's Club.
    I have spoken to the Methodist Church Circles.
    They had 15 or 17 at the time.
    They all had me.
    I spoke to the junior high class of my oldest son.
    I spoke later on to the junior high class of my youngest son.
    Then different teachers started to call me and ask
    if I would talk to their class.
    I told you that we had this boy that was in our bowling league.
    He read the story of Anne Frank.
    And I said, I had known the whole family.
    And so I talked to those two teachers, you know.
    They took the two classes together
    and also invited Sister Carol.
    Yeah, you told me before.
    Do you have any children?
    You said you have two boys?
    Yes, two boys and one girl.
    Yes.
    How much do you children know about your rescue activity?
    Quite a bit.
    Do you believe that your children
    have been influenced in any way by what they know
    about your rescue activities?
    I think so.
    In what ways?
    They know-- they help also their friends
    when they are in need of them.
    I think that's the example we gave them.
    Now, overall, do you think that your children strongly
    approve or somehow approve what you did, your rescue activities?
    Strongly approve.
    Do your present neighbors know about your rescue activities?
    No.
    No?
    Not now?
    No.
    Do they-- what would you tell to the young people
    if a party with goals similar to those of the Nazis
    came to power today?
    What would you say?
    Well, I would tell them about the example of the last world
    war and what happened.
    So what did you do?
    That's why I tell the schools about it because neo-Nazism
    is springing up.
    And I would not like this to happen again ever.
    So what would be your message?
    To the children.
    To be aware of the fact that we should not
    have Nazism ever again.
    Yes.
    They do be aware of the fact that will not be having fascism
    ever again.
    They should be aware that totalitarianism
    is a bad state of--
    Affairs.
    --affairs.
    Is there anything else that you would like to tell me
    about your rescue activity?
    I think we covered it quite well.
    Don't you think so?
    If you think so.
    Mm, hmm.
    We would like to begin by asking some questions about you
    and your family during the time when you were growing up.
    First of all, in which country were you born?
    The Netherlands.
    In the Netherlands, both of us.
    Can I put it Holland?
    Yes.
    In which city or town were you born.
    And please tell it after.
    My city was Almelo, spelled A-L-M-E-L-O.
    A-L--
    M-E--
    M-E--
    L-O--
    L-O.
    And my husband is born in Amsterdam.
    No, we are talking about you.
    Oh.
    And that was a town?
    A small town.
    A small town,
    20,000 people.
    Yes.
    Where did you live for--
    where did you live for the longest period of time
    when you were growing up?
    The longest.
    You mean Almelo?
    No.
    What place was where you lived the longest period?
    Oh.
    Amsterdam.
    When you were growing up.
    Oh, first Haarlem.
    Haarlem.
    So we chose the place.
    Amsterdam.
    Amsterdam, the American say but, we say Amsterdam.
    Amsterdam.
    And it's a city.
    Now, you have a little booklet in your hand.
    And I would like you to look on page 1.
    And please answer me, did you live in a large city,
    a small city, what was it?
    It was--
    Amsterdam.
    --a large city.
    Yes.
    In the page 2, please look at the page 2.
    And how would you describe the neighbors
    when you were growing up?
    We're talking about the time when you were growing up.
    Were they very friendly and helpful, somehow, somehow--
    Yes.
    --friendly.
    Where would you say?
    Very friendly.
    Number 1.
    Yes, very friendly.
    What was the month and year of your birth?
    My birth was on October 16, 1915.
    Excuse.
    Now, I would like to make a list of the people who
    lived in your household during the time you were growing up.
    I don't need their names, just their relationship
    to you and their ages when you were 10 years old.
    And that was in 1925.
    Yes.
    When I was 10 years old I lived with a foster father
    and a foster mother.
    The foster father was 39 years old.
    And the foster mother 38 years old.
    After that, I lived in 17 different foster homes.
    OK.
    So this includes everyone in the household in 1925.
    Who was the head in this household when you were 10?
    The foster father.
    He was-- he was the main wage earner?
    Yes, a builder.
    Would you describe the relationship
    between members of your family when you were growing up?
    Would you say your family was very close, somehow close, not
    very close, not at all close?
    With the foster parents I was very close to the ones
    that I have stayed four years with.
    Yes.
    In fact--
    And your real parents, your biological parents?
    My biological parents divorced when I was two.
    And I have seen my father only back when I was 23 for one day
    and when I was 33 for another day.
    And that is all.
    My mother died here in Michigan and is buried when she was 74.
    And that's 26 years ago.
    Very unfortunate.
    Now, would you see in page 4, before the war,
    was your family very well off financially, quite
    off financially, neither rich, nor poor?
    Not very rich, not very poor.
    Before the war, on page 5--
    turn to page 5, before the war was
    your family thought of as being upper class, middle class, or--
    Working class.
    Working class.
    Who was the person in your household
    who had the most influence on you when
    you were being brought up?
    My foster mother.
    Your foster mother.
    So the next question refers to a person in your household
    who had the most influence on you when you were brought up.
    What kind of work this person did
    when you have been growing up?
    She was a housewife.
    Did she learn any kind of profession?
    No.
    No.
    She had been a store clerk before her marriage.
    Did your foster mother attend elementary school?
    Yes.
    And did she attend high school--
    did she attend high school?
    Household school in Holland.
    Household school.
    What was the religious affiliation
    of your foster mother?
    She was Protestant?
    Protestant.
    Protestant.
    He was Catholic.
    The foster father was--
    Catholic.
    No, but we are talking now strictly about you
    foster father--
    foster mother, sorry.
    Now, please, look the page 5, how much influence
    do you feel that her religion had in the way you--
    I mean your foster mother lived her life?
    She had a great influence on me.
    Oh, no.
    Not on you.
    On the religion, had a great influence on her--
    Religion itself.
    Yes.
    Religion itself.
    Yes?
    She sent me to Sunday school and Sunday church for children.
    Yes.
    And overheard my Bible lessons.
    On the page 7, did she felt that people from other religions
    were very different from herself?
    Or--
    No, because we lived--
    Somehow different--
    They-- we lived right between--
    no, there were very different neighbors.
    Yes.
    But the religion?
    Their religion was Jewish.
    No, no, no.
    Probably you did not ask the question.
    Did you foster mother felt that people from other religions
    were very different from her religion or from herself?
    No.
    Or somehow different?
    Or just about the same?
    About the same.
    Did you ever-- did she ever talk to you about the Gypsies?
    No.
    Where is that?
    Did she ever talk to you about the Jews?
    Yes, because we had Jewish neighbors.
    What did she tell you?
    They were good people.
    She was very close to them.
    What do you think were the most important things you learned
    from your foster mother?
    To be thrifty.
    Thrifty?
    Thrifty.
    Yes.
    To be clean.
    To be industrious.
    Yes.
    And in the first place to be an honest person at all times.
    And what else?
    And to be good to other people.
    Now, please, move to page 8.
    And the list of qualities on this page, and for each one,
    please tell me whether you feel you
    learned this quality from your foster mother.
    Did you learn to be self-confident?
    Yes.
    I learned to be self-confident.
    To be independent?
    Yes.
    To take responsibility?
    Yes.
    Take chances?
    Not too many.
    To make your own decisions?
    Yes.
    To be adventurous?
    Not too much.
    To help others?
    Yes.
    Very Yes.
    Now looking at these qualities on the page 9,
    please tell me whether you feel that when you grow up,
    you were this person.
    Self-confident?
    Yes.
    Independent?
    Yes.
    Able to take responsibility?
    Yes.
    Willing to take chances?
    Yes.
    Able to make your own decision?
    Yes.
    Adventurous?
    So-so.
    Helpful to others?
    Yes.
    OK.
    Now during the Second World War, did you
    foster mother ever helped Jews in any way?
    No.
    No.
    Before the Second World War, was your foster mother
    a member of a political party?
    No.
    Had she some kind of sympathy with some party?
    No.
    No.
    After the war started, yes, when the war started, did you
    foster mother belong to a group that opposed the German Nazis.
    She did not belong to a group.
    But she was very anti-Nazi.
    Now we are talking about you.
    Now, I would like to ask some questions about you
    during the time you were growing up.
    Did you attend elementary school?
    Yes.
    What kind of elementary school did you attend?
    Was it a Protestant, Catholic, nonsectarian?
    Nonsectarian.
    Did any Jew attend your elementary school?
    Yes.
    Were there many Jewish students?
    Yes.
    Some Jewish student, what would you say?
    I would say a third of the class was Jewish.
    So some.
    Did you attend gymnasium or high school?
    High school.
    Or Lyceum?
    High school.
    High school.
    What was it a Catholic, Protestant, nonsectarian?
    Nonsectarian.
    In which year did you graduate from high school?
    In 1931, before I was 16.
    Yes.
    Did any Jews attend your high school?
    Yes.
    On the page 10, please, were there many Jewish students,
    some Jewish student, or a few Jewish student
    attending your high school?
    About a fourth of the class in high school.
    So what we would say, some, many, what you would say?
    Some.
    Yes.
    Did you attend university?
    I went to teacher college.
    In Holland, that's not a university.
    Yes.
    So that it is comparable.
    Yes.
    It's equal probably.
    What subject did you study teaching?
    Elementary school teacher.
    Teaching in an elementary school.
    What years did you attend university?
    In what city?
    What years?
    What years?
    1931 till '34.
    Did any Jews attend your university?
    Yes.
    And on page 10, were the many Jewish students, some--
    Some.
    Did you ever apprentice in a trade?
    No.
    What was your religious affiliation
    during the time when you were growing up?
    Were you a Protestant, Catholic?
    Protestant.
    On page 11, please, during the time you were growing up,
    how much influence did your religion
    have on the way you lived your life?
    Did it have a great deal of influence?
    Yes, a great deal.
    You look in that book, the answers, yes?
    On the page 12, during the time you were growing up,
    did you have many close friends--
    Yes.
    --some close friends?
    What would you say?
    Many close friends.
    When
    You were with your friends, were you usually
    a leader or a follower?
    A follower.
    Total leader.
    No.
    Were any of your close friends very
    different from you in terms of religion or social class?
    Yes.
    I had Jewish friends, Catholic friends.
    During the time you were growing up,
    were any of your close friends Jewish?
    Yes.
    Or did you know Jews?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    During that time you were growing up,
    was there a particular person that you admired very much
    and wanted to be like him or her when you grow up?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And who was it?
    What-- oh, no, sorry, what were the qualities
    that you admired in this person?
    This was our psychology teacher.
    What were the qualities?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    I admired him because he was knowledgeable.
    He taught a very good lesson to each of us.
    And he tried to be making human beings out of us.
    So what were the qualities?
    His humanity.
    Humanity.
    Knowledge and humanity.
    Now, we are interested in your feeling about various groups
    of people before the war.
    Did you have any feelings about people
    with educational background different from yours?
    Please turn to page 13.
    Yes or no?
    No, I thought, well of people that--
    Yes or no.
    Yes.
    How did you-- now, using the 7-point scale on this page,
    we have numbers from 1 to 7.
    And you have to put it on which point
    you want to put, you thought well of this first number
    and did not think well of it, the 7th.
    Where you would like to put it on the scale?
    You mean the teacher?
    No.
    We are talking about the about the knowledge--
    In other groups.
    Yes.
    Who were different from you in education.
    And you say-- now, the previous question was, before the war,
    did you have any feeling about people
    with educational background different from yours?
    And you said, Yes.
    Yes.
    Now, using this scale, what means--
    Let me say 6.
    You did not think well of these people?
    Do not think well is that 7?
    No, I thought, well of them.
    Yes.
    And so where you would put it?
    Yes.
    Put it on 1.
    Number 1, yes.
    You have also here the scale.
    During the war, did you feeling about people
    from different educational background change?
    No.
    OK.
    Now page 13, using the same scale,
    please tell me the number that comes closest
    to the way you felt during the war about people
    from different educational background,
    where you would put it.
    I thought well of all people, except of people
    that are collaborators.
    We're talking about education now.
    Yes.
    Education.
    Before the war, did you have any feeling
    about people of nationalities different from yours?
    No.
    No.
    Now on the page 13, when you look, what number on the scale
    comes closest to the way you felt
    about people of different nationalities before the war?
    I saw thought well of all countries.
    OK.
    During the war, did you feel about people
    of different nationalities change?
    Yes, about the Germans.
    On the scale again on page-- please
    tell me the number on the scale that comes closest to the way
    you felt during the war about people
    of different nationalities.
    Different nationalities can be the Jews, can be the Germans.
    So you thought of probably--
    From the Germans did not think well at all.
    And the Jews?
    Very good because they always have been friends of ours.
    So this is the 7 for the Germans--
    And 1 for the Jews.
    OK.
    Before the war, did you have any feelings
    about people of religions different from yours?
    No, I have friends in different religions.
    What number on the scale come closest
    to the way you felt about people of different religions
    before the war?
    I thought well of people of different religions.
    During the war, did you feel about people
    of different religions change?
    No.
    What number of the scale comes closest
    to the way you felt about people of different religions
    during the war?
    I thought well of all different religions.
    Before the war, did you have any feeling
    about people from social class different from yours?
    No.
    No.
    What number on the scale come closest
    to the way you felt about people of different social class
    before the war?
    I thought well of all kinds of people.
    During the war, did you-- where you would put it?
    So please tell me the number on the scale that
    comes closest to the way you felt during the war
    about people of different social classes.
    Yes.
    Put it on number 3.
    OK.
    Before the war, did you have any feelings about Jews?
    Yes, they were my friends.
    What number on the scale come closest
    to the way you felt about Jews before the war?
    Well thought of.
    During the war, did your feeling about Jews change?
    No, I felt well about the Jews.
    What number on the scale come closest
    to the way you felt about Jews during the war?
    1.
    Before the war, did you have any feeling about Gypsies?
    I haven't known any Gypsies.
    There were no Gypsies in the Netherlands.
    So are you going to leave it out.
    Before the war, did you have any feelings about Nazis?
    Yes, very against.
    What number on the scale come closest
    to the way you felt about Nazis before the war?
    7.
    7, I didn't think well of them.
    During the war, did your feeling about Nazis change?
    No, it got worse.
    What number on the scale comes closest
    to the way you felt about Nazis during the war?
    7.
    OK.
    Where were you living for the longest
    period of time during the war, in which place--
    in what place and country?
    Amsterdam, Holland.
    What was the largest--
    was it a large city, small city?
    Large.
    Large.
    Page what?
    No.
    I tell you when you should refer to them.
    Did you live in a house or in an apartment?
    House.
    House.
    OK.
    How many stories--
    2.
    --did the house have?
    2.
    Was there a cellar in the house?
    No.
    Was there an attic?
    Yes.
    Well, he made it.
    Did you own your own home or pay rent for it?
    Pay rent.
    Was there a cellar in the house?
    You already asked me.
    Yeah.
    No.
    Sorry.
    I told you I'm sorry.
    How many rooms were there in your home,
    not counting the bathroom?
    Six, seven, plus kitchen.
    There were other families who were living in this house?
    No, except for the Jewish people.
    Before the war, were there any Jews living in the community?
    Yes.
    Were there many Jews living or some Jews or a few Jews?
    Many.
    Many?
    Mm, hmm.
    Did you have a sense of belonging into this community?
    Yes.
    Now, again, you have to-- now I would
    like to make a list of the people who
    were living in your household before the war broke out
    in 1939.
    And I don't need their names, just their relationship to you
    and their ages in 1939.
    Yours-- who else?
    Husband.
    Husband.
    Yes.
    Child.
    And child, boy.
    Boy.
    Son?
    Yes, son.
    And he was the head of the family, your husband?
    Husband.
    And then how old was he in 1939?
    25.
    25.
    And you?
    I was 24.
    And your son?
    One year old.
    The country where they were born?
    Where he was born?
    Holland, Amsterdam.
    All of you, yeah,
    All was Holland, yeah.
    And what your husband did?
    Fire department.
    Fire department, commander of a fire department.
    Commander?
    Yeah.
    Post commander.
    So this includes everyone in your family.
    Now, on page 16--
    you have the page 16?
    Before the war, were you very well off financially or quite
    well off?
    It's mean around 59.
    Number 3.
    Number 3.
    On page 17, before the war, did you think of yourself as being
    upper class, middle class--
    Working class.
    Did you get married during the war?
    No.
    No.
    We got married in '37.
    In what month and year did you get married?
    February 25, 1937.
    February 20?
    26.
    26.
    1, 19--
    Oh, no, it's 25.
    I got mixed up.
    OK.
    It's 25.
    25.
    And?
    1937.
    1937.
    In what place and country was your husband born?
    Holland.
    Amsterdam.
    And what was--
    Amsterdam was the place?
    Yeah.
    And did you have any children during the war?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    One boy in '44.
    How many children?
    One boy?
    One boy in October '44.
    And how old was he?
    When he was born, he was born.
    In what year was each child born?
    19-- October 1944.
    October 1944.
    Yes.
    OK.
    Did he live with you?
    Yes.
    What kind of work did you do just before the war?
    The same.
    No, you.
    I was a housewife.
    Housewife.
    And before I got married I was a dentist assistant.
    Yeah.
    What kind of work did you do just before the war.
    What was your title or position.
    Housewife.
    Should have had a day book.
    Uh, huh.
    During the war, was your major different
    than the one you have been just discussed or was it the same?
    I did not hear the first part of your question.
    I was asking what was your profession before.
    And then during the war, was your main job different?
    No.
    No.
    The same.
    On page 18, please, during the war,
    did you have some close friends?
    Yes.
    A few.
    Close friends.
    What you would say?
    Number 1.
    Did your husband attend elementary school?
    Yes.
    Did your husband attend gymnasium?
    No, trade school and after that, architectural school.
    That wasn't in university?
    No.
    That's called architectural school.
    So trade school, right?
    I'll put trade school.
    First trade school and then architectural school.
    In which year he graduated?
    He would have graduated in May '45.
    But during the Battle of Arnhem, the college was demolished.
    Yeah, but when--
    Trade school I was--
    I graduated.
    In what year?
    In what year?
    And you were 15--
    it's 1929.
    29.
    1929.
    OK.
    He didn't-- he did not attend the university, yes?
    No, I didn't.
    What was the religion affiliation of your husband?
    Was he Protestant--
    Protestant.
    On the page 19, how much influence did his religion
    have on the life he lived?
    Not--
    Not very much?
    Not very much.
    His parents were not very religious.
    Which number would you say?
    Did they have a great influence on you, your parents--
    or the religion?
    No.
    No, not very much.
    Which?
    Which?
    Which?
    4.
    What was your husband's main job during the war?
    Fire.
    Fire manager--
    Firemen.
    Post commander of the fire house.
    That was during the war, yes?
    Yes.
    What sort of work did he do?
    What was the title?
    Fireman.
    Fireman.
    Had some title as a fireman?
    Yes, post commander.
    Fire post commander.
    Were any of your husband's friends Jewish?
    Yes.
    Scarborough.
    Yeah.
    Before the Second World War, were you
    a member of a political party?
    No.
    What were the things you like-- oh, after the war started, yes--
    Yes.
    Did you belong to a group that opposed the Nazis?
    Yes.
    He--
    No--
    You.
    Oh, I did not belong.
    What was the name of the group?
    So you know-- no, sorry, it doesn't apply.
    On page 20, if someone needed your help,
    would you be more likely to help someone you know
    or someone you don't know, or would it
    not make any difference?
    I would maybe first help someone I know.
    OK.
    During the war, did you ever help any Jews?
    Yes.
    What kind of things did you do?
    Hide them.
    What else?
    Well, took care of them, gave them--
    Shelter.
    Shelter, nourishment.
    Food.
    OK.
    Encouragement.
    Wow, that is--
    Was there ever a time when you wanted to help a Jew
    but felt that you could not.
    No.
    No.
    During the war, were there any leaders that you admired?
    Yeah, Roosevelt.
    Roosevelt.
    Yes.
    What were the things you admired about him?
    Yeah?
    You mean, Roosevelt?
    What you admired about them?
    Their leadership.
    OK.
    Before 1939 and 1945, were you ever unjustly treated
    by any government official?
    No.
    Was anyone you cared about ever unjustly treated by the Nazis?
    No.
    Did you ever witness mistreatment of Jews
    by the Nazis?
    Yes.
    What was that and when was that?
    Well, in '42, we saw people rounded up.
    1942, people were rounded up and sent in cattle cars
    to concentration camps.
    Jewish.
    Jewish people.
    And so you say--
    And people being shot.
    Did you ever witness mistreatment of anyone
    by the Nazis, anyone else, not a Jew?
    Yes, that's what I said.
    When was that?
    That was in 1943 when somebody had burned down a house
    where Nazis were boarding.
    And they shot 29 people on the Weteringschans in Amsterdam
    and let them rot there for weeks.
    On what occasion you became aware of the Nazis
    intent to do with the Jews?
    In '42.
    What was the occasion?
    When they were supposed to be rounded up on the 12th of July
    by alphabet.
    And they were rounded up.
    Mm, hmm.
    How did you feel the first time when
    you saw a Jew wearing the yellow Star of David?
    Terrible.
    What was the most stressful situation
    you were in during the war?
    The razzia.
    And what was your reaction to this stress?
    Crying.
    Well, afterwards, I was crying.
    But I kept very straight face.
    And I talked German to the German soldier that was--
    in the house.
    --in my house.
    Can you tell me what the razzia, a little bit more
    about the razzia?
    We have still some time.
    They started to surround the village,
    because this was a suburb of Amsterdam.
    And--

    Overview

    Interview Summary
    Janny Blom, born October 16, 1915 in Almelo, Netherlands, describes living in 17 different foster homes starting when she was 10 years old; becoming aware of changes starting with the July 12, 1942 round-up of Jews; feeling closest to the foster parents with whom she lived for four years and learning from them about how to be thrifty, clean, honest, industrious, and good to all people; working as a dental assistant for Dr. Freidenburg (also spelled Vreedenburg) with whom she and her husband became good friends; hiding the Freidenburgs in their home; her husband carrying out assignments for the underground; moving to Michigan after the war; giving lectures about the war in schools, women’s clubs, and Methodist church circles; her children knowing about the rescue activities during the war; and how her message to children is never to have Nazism ever again and that totalitarianism is a bad state of affairs.
    Interviewee
    Janny G. Blom
    Date
    interview:  1984 September 19
    Credit Line
    United States Holocaust Memorial Council

    Physical Details

    Language
    English
    Extent
    1 sound cassette (90 min.).

    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
    Blom, Janny, 1915-

    Administrative Notes

    Legal Status
    Permanent Collection
    Provenance
    The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council interviewed Janny Blom on September 19, 1984 as part of the international conference "Faith in Humankind: Rescuers of Jews During the Holocaust" held at the U. S. Department of State, Washington, DC.
    Funding Note
    The cataloging of this oral history interview has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
    Record last modified:
    2023-11-16 08:18:38
    This page:
    https:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/irn510778

    Additional Resources

    Transcript (English)

    Download & Licensing

    In-Person Research

    Contact Us

    Also in United States Holocaust Memorial Council, Faith in Humankind oral history collection

    Oral history interviews from the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, Faith in Humankind collection

    Oral history interview with Eve Bergstein

    Oral History

    Eve Bergstein (née Nisencwajg), born September 12, 1936 near Krakow, Poland, describes her to a large, close-knit family, only two of whom survived Auschwitz; her mother living in the forest with a partisan group and father being caught and killed in trying to escape a labor camp; living with a Catholic family, the Szumielewicz’s, and being disguised as their orphaned niece; being taken to a convent to be hidden; the bombing of the convent; living under a downtown building with her uncle and many other people for nine months; turning to Catholicism, eventually being put in an orphanage in Schirmeck, France until arrangements were made for her to go to Canada to live with her mother’s sister and her family; moving many times and wanting to live a normal life; suppressing memories to the extent that she forgot how to speak Polish; believing that people can survive almost anything; her Canadian husband and having three children; returning to Judaism; organizing a Holocaust teaching group; and feeling that she has an obligation to continue her Jewish legacy.

    Oral history interview with Annette Berman

    Oral History

    Annette Berman (née Kupfer), born on May 3, 1924 in France, describes extensive support given by Christian friends (the Bernaille family) after restrictions on Jews were put in place; the Bernailles managing to get her and her mother to a farmhouse, where they stayed for two and a half years; being supported by another farm family, while her father was caught while trying to leave and was jailed; becoming part of the underground, carrying out assignments (changing road signs, burying parachutes) even while German soldiers were staying at the same farmhouse; liberation in 1945 and returning to Paris to the Bernailles by hitchhiking; finding her father at the synagogue talking to soldiers, one of whom is now her husband; her feelings of guilt because she was not in a camp and survived; her family surviving as a unit; and the Bernailles' motivation for having done all that they did simply as a matter of principle.

    Oral history interview with Sjouke Bouwme de Vries

    Oral History

    Sjouke Bouwme de Vries, born August 31, 1923 in a small friendly village in Holland to a very close working class family; how along with her family and fiancé, she helped in rescue activities during World War II; receiving support from members of the underground movement; having rescued 33 strangers altogether; the everyday pressures, risks, and the sense of it being unrecognized for their efforts; how after the war she and her family continued their commitment to helping others by feeding and providing clothes for survivors; not speaking publicly very much about her experiences but that she would do the same things again if needed; and how the most stressful time during the war was when they were hiding Jews in their house.

    Oral history interview with Knud Dyring Dyby

    Oral History

    Knud Dyring Dyby (alternative name Knud Dyring-Olsen), born in Denmark on March 28, 1915, describes being raised in a non-political Lutheran family; being aware of what was happening to the Jews after 1940 but not seeing any persecution until 1943; getting involved in the underground movement; his activities collecting weapons and making photographic engravings for the underground papers; being a boatman in the Copenhagen police department and asked to take Jews in his boat to Sweden; taking them to Swedish fishermen who were his friends; the logistics of transporting Jews to Sweden, which involved meeting Swedish boats outside of Swedish ports rather than going right into Sweden; not remembering names but ferrying 30 to 40 people; having many close calls during those runs; not being paid money for the rescues; how the refugees were given money by a Danish-Swedish rescue group and by other Jewish refugees and, later, the Swedish government; receiving thank you notes from many of the people he helped; and liberation on May 5, 1945.

    Oral history interview with Herman Graebe

    Oral History

    Herman Graebe, born June 19, 1900 in Solingen, Germany, discusses working for Organisation Todt as an engineer and being assigned to a project in Zdolbuniv, Ukraine in 1941; convincing officials that his secretary and interpreter, Rosalia Warchiwker, whose husband had been killed by the SS, was not a Jew and that she should not wear the yellow star; hearing reports of Jews being killed but being denied information by Organisation Todt; making ID cards for 500 of his Jewish employees that said they were contracted to work for him and could not be taken elsewhere; providing food for Jews who were, for their protection, listed as employees on a railroad project but were not actually employed; fearing he might be killed for helping Jews, but feeling it would be dishonorable to himself and his country to do nothing; hearing that there was to be a mass execution of Jews in Rivne, Ukraine and taking 130 of his workers to Zdolbuniv under the guise of having them treated for lice; being told by an official that there was to be no mass execution, but hearing of a conflicting report from another official; witnessing a mass killing in October 1942; and not being believed by other German citizens when he told them that Jews were being killed.

    Oral history interview with Annelies Herzl

    Oral History

    Annelies Herzl describes living in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 1943 after getting out of a concentration camp and being hidden by a retired couple who were part of the underground resistors; being taken to Utrecht, Netherlands via train by Eric Braun [sic] to a home with five children and working as their maid; escaping just hours before the home was searched and staying with an elderly Catholic woman for several months until Eric Braun took her to a new house where she stayed until being liberated in May 1945 by the Canadians; and feeling that she would not be able to do what all of the rescuers did and be as courageous and generous.

    Oral history interview with Harry Jaarsma

    Oral History

    Harry Jaarsma, born June 3, 1914 in Balk, Netherlands, describes growing up in the Christian Reform Church and how his religion influenced his decisions during the Nazi occupation; losing his laundry business in Amsterdam when he was called to serve in the Dutch Army; being aware that patients and staff of the Jewish psychiatric hospital in Apeldoorn, Netherlands were taken away by the Nazis, but feeling he could not do anything to intervene; becoming an inspector of the Evacuation Service in 1943 and inspecting homes in the countryside to find places for people who had been evacuated by the Germans; encountering Jews hiding in homes and not registering them; obtaining a quarantine sign from a doctor to hang on the door of a home where Jews were hiding to deter the Germans from entering the house; working with the underground in various ways, including identifying hiding places for Jews and transporting Jews to safety, aiding those wanted for slave labor by the Nazis (including non-Jews), and hiding a Jewish woman in his home; hitting a car of SS officers while transporting two Jewish boys to a hiding place; stealing supplies from a German office, being investigated, and avoiding punishment because the detective was his friend; hiding his underground work from his family; not knowing the names of those he helped; being arrested by the German police but being let go on the recommendation of an officer whose bicycle he had helped fix earlier in the day; leaving the Netherlands in 1949 after failing to get financial help to restart his business; resettling in the United States; not keeping in touch with others with whom he worked in the underground; feeling that his experiences strengthened his religious beliefs; and sharing his story with his children.

    Oral history interview with Mary Schroder Moen Jacobs

    Oral History

    Mary Schroder Moen Jacobs, born in 1930 in a suburb of Utrecht, Netherlands, describes spending most of her life in Amersfoort, Netherlands beginning in 1940; hiding four Jews (a young man, a young woman, and a couple) in their house from 1942 until liberation; remembering that time as dangerous, tense, and very difficult; the two times that the Germans came to their house, once to search and the other to house two German soldiers, all while the Jews where hiding in one room next to the Germans; the network of 40 to 50 people who were involved in the rescue activities; how her mother was her role model because she always wanted to help the underdog or less fortunate and do all she could to sustain life; immigrating to Canada in 1955 after having first lived in the United States for a short while; and writing a book (as Maria Jacobs) about her experiences, “Precautions Against Death” (published in 1984 by Mosaic Press) along with a few other publications.

    Oral history interview with Cornelia Knottnerus

    Oral History

    Cornelia Knottnerus, born April 14, 1927 in Ermelo, Netherlands, discusses her experiences as a teenager during World War II in a family that worked with the Dutch underground; her family’s motivations for working with the underground, including their Christian beliefs and their community’s emphasis on helpfulness; the progression of their involvement from the beginning of the occupation through the end of the war; her older brother’s assignment to the police force, his refusal to follow orders to arrest Jews, and his sentence to a concentration camp for two years; her father, who worked for the railroad and helped people obtain coupons and papers; her family’s false closet in their home which was used to hide people; housing a Jewish girl, Netty van Maarsen; feeling like she was a sister and remaining in contact with her; housing a Dutch boy whose family had worked with the underground and had been betrayed; being aware of the risks of working with the underground; being taught by her parents to hide their activities; the search of her home by German soldiers, one of whom lingered at the false closet door and may have been aware of it, but moved on; the bombing of the house; her family going into hiding in a chicken coop along with a 16-year-old Jewish boy and others; using a bicycle light as an overhead lamp and taking turns using it to read; being liberated; feeling that her family did what they did “with God’s help” and that if everyone in her community had actively worked to protect the Jews many more people could have been saved; and talking with her children about her experiences and speaking at churches and schools.

    Oral history interview with Carl Heinz Kneuman

    Oral History

    Carl Heinz Kneuman, born in Bydgoszcs, Poland in 1922 (note that Mr. Kneuman dedicates his interview to Dr. and Mrs. Wolfgang Heubner), describes moving to Berlin, Germany in 1932; his sister getting married and moving to the United States; Dr. Wolfgang Heubner discovering that his institute was being used as a clearinghouse where humans were being used as guinea pigs for new medications; the country’s general strife at the time; hearing about the activities of Kristallnacht in 1938 from his sister, who arrived home completely upset by what she’d seen; how both his father and mother were active in helping Jews escape, as they could not tolerate injustice; the political terror at that time; his father being involved in the black market and how the highest-priced commodity at the time was saccharine since sugar was not available; becoming a journalist because of his experiences during the war; and helping French co-workers who were working with the Danish resistance groups.

    Oral history interview with Rose Koenigsberg

    Oral History

    Rose Koenigsberg, born in 1914 in Velichovky, Czechoslovakia (Czech Republic), describes her life teaching in Ralova until March 1939 when the Hungarians occupied the entire town; being arrested but then later being released to return to Velichovky where she lived fairly comfortably until 1944; going into hiding towards the middle of 1944 after they began to feel the pressures of being Jewish; being discovered and arrested by Hungarian guards and then going to Berehove, Ukraine before their transport to Auschwitz; staying with her sisters throughout her time at the camp; the terrible food and the poor clothing in Auschwitz; eventually moving with her sisters to Zittau (a sub-camp of Gross-Rosen), where she worked in an airplane factory; holding various positions at the factory until the camp was liberated by the Russians; returning home to Czechoslovakia and soon being reunited with the rest of her family; and moving to the United States in 1948.

    Oral history interview with Jane Laufer

    Oral History

    Jane Laufer (née Rosenblum), born in Poland on July 25, 1922, describes growing up with a younger brother; being aware of the war because so many people were coming from Austria; her memory of September 1, 1939 as a big propaganda day and being told to leave; walking with their luggage; hiding in the woods; Germans making them move to the ghetto starting in in May 1941; remaining in the ghetto until September 1942; the deportations of people to work camps; being helped by some nuns; a priest preparing a passport for her so that she could work in a restaurant, where she worked until 1944 when the restaurant closed; being liberated by the Russians on January 21, 1945; going home and finding that the Russians had taken all the food so there was literally nothing to eat; living in the Black Forest to hide from the Russians and eventually moving to Munich, Germany for a few years; going to the United States in September 1956; the effects of the Holocaust on her; experiencing nightmares, sleeplessness, and stress; and her reasons for never returning to her home town.

    Oral history interview with Margot Lawson

    Oral History

    Margot Edith Lawson, born April 3, 1909 in Mannheim, Germany, discusses her life in Germany leading up to World War II; growing up in a Catholic family with many Jewish friends; studying in England, Italy, and Spain; her family being aware of and concerned about the persecution of Jews; seeing Hitler Youth on her street; her family’s housekeeper’s husband being accused of speaking against Hitler by members of Hitler Youth; moving with her family to Amsterdam, Netherlands near the beginning of the war; witnessing the mistreatment of Jews in Amsterdam; being given American money by her father, a representative of General Motors, to use to buy her way out of conflicts with Nazis; working with an organization to forge papers for Jews and smuggle Jewish children out of Holland; delivering clandestine newspapers; being taken in for questioning by German authorities for criticizing the Nazi Party or for breaking curfew; being jailed after breaking curfew; witnessing poor conditions in the jail and the sexual abuse of prisoners; the ransacking of her house by Germans who were looking for papers she had hidden there; meeting with the head of the Dutch Nazis, criticizing Nazi policy, and telling him that the Germans would never win and that he would be a prisoner one day; encountering the same man after the war and testifying against him at his trial before he was hanged; her feeling that her faith made her willing to take risks because she was not afraid to die; and how she remembers her wartime experiences now that she lives in the United States.

    Oral history interview with Eva Lewin

    Oral History

    Eva Lewin (née Lipschutz), born in 1925 in Swinemünde, Germany (now Swinoujscie, Poland), describes having one brother, Hans, who was four years older; having a nice childhood until 1933 when they had to move to Berlin, Germany; how her family tried unsuccessfully to emigrate; trying to get papers so that she and her brother could go to a kibbutz in Palestine in 1939, but her papers did not go through; being contacted by a Quaker woman, Mrs. Landmann, in England who arranged for her to go to a farm in August 1939; going on the children’s transport to London and being taken in by a woman who ran a youth hostel; staying with a couple who ran a school; going to the United States after the war to become a nurse; continuing her connection with Mrs. Landmann, who is now 95 years old and has a tree planted at the Avenue of the Righteous in Israel; how Mrs. Landmann worked every day to get affidavits for children without being paid; and Mrs. Landmann’s sacrifice to save about 70 children.

    Oral history interview with Barbara Makuch

    Oral History

    Barbara Makuch, born in Russia in 1917, describes growing up mostly in eastern Poland, in a Catholic family; being approached beginning in 1942 by several Jews seeking help; sheltering Malka Glass, a six year-old girl, for approximately six months, telling neighbors that Malka was her cousin; how, as it became more dangerous, she found a convent that agreed to accept Malka; helping another Jew, Sophia Price, by buying her a train ticket to a large city; aiding a pediatrician, Dr. Olga Lilion, by telling the director of the school at which she worked that she had a friend who needed a job; helping to save another young Jewish boy, Stefan Jacobchek, by getting him enrolled at the school; joining an underground organization that provided false documents, money, and food to Jews in hiding; acting as a courier and being caught by the Germans; being held in prison for a month, but being released after the Germans were bribed; being sent to Ravensbrück, where she remained until the end of the war; making her way back to Poland and later traveling to Canada, where she met her husband; settling in Montreal; staying in touch with several of the people she saved during the war; and being recognized for her heroism by Yad Vashem.

    Oral history interview with Alice Meilof

    Oral History

    Alice Meilof (née Prviksma), born in the Netherlands 20 miles from the German border, describes being 14 to 19 years of age during the war; her brothers and sisters; her father, who took in three Jewish boys brought to him by the underground; having to move the boys from time to time; how the boys helped her father in his work as a butcher; the hiding place in their house, which was simply a hole in the floor with a carpet rolled over it; the Germans never coming to search the house; her father’s motivation to take in the Jewish boys because of his belief in the Christian Reformed concept of “to do something good is normal”; her mother providing farm food to people who had escaped the bigger cities of Rotterdam and Amsterdam; how her father was in command of a region of the underground; her work as a messenger; how nothing could be spoken out loud since neighbors or others might overhear and report their activities; the lack of food in the big cities such that people were eating tulip bulbs and their pets; housing five policemen for two nights; her emotions when they were liberated by the Canadians; and still feeling sorry for the German soldiers in their defeat.

    Oral history interview with Halina Melnyczuk

    Oral History

    Halina Sophia Melnyczuk (née Zahaikiewicz), born February 21, 1921 in Przemysl, Poland, describes her two brothers and one sister; growing up in a vaguely religious Ukrainian Catholic family that was not political; living in an apartment building where they were the only non-Jews; how when the war started in 1939 they had as many as 30 Jews living with them and their housekeeper threatened to turn them in to the Nazis; moving to another apartment in 1942 because the old one had heavy damage from shelling; how the new apartment was across from the police station; the liquidation of the ghetto in 1943 and taking in a young couple, Edek and Eda Scheffler, whom they hid by camouflaging the pantry to look like bookshelves; sharing their rations and sometimes selling items from their apartment to buy meat; instances when it seemed they’d been found out; being on the list to be transported to a concentration camp in Siberia but deciding to emigrate instead; leaving everything behind, including the Schefflers, who now live in Israel; living in Kraków, Poland; fleeing to Vienna, Austria in 1944; how the war did not change her religious beliefs but left her more tolerant of other people; and her belief that the most important thing is to do good deeds.

    Oral history interview with Tjitske Mulder

    Oral History

    Tjitske Mulder (née Hoogeveen), born June 23, 1909 in Westermeer, Netherlands, describes growing up in a very close family with five brothers and two sisters; her father, who was a dairy farmer and a member of an anti-revolutionary party and the underground; her father teaching her that the most important attribute was to be independent and to ignore social class structures; getting married in Bergum, Netherlands in 1930 to a barber; having two sons in the small city of Sneek, Netherlands during the war years; how in Sneek Jews were always well thought of; her and her husband’s first rescue activity moving a Jewish girl from one hiding place to another; hiding the parents of the Jewish girl, whom the Gestapo were chasing; an interesting subterfuge they used when the Gestapo came to their house; remaining friends with the girl, Lydia; speaking frequently publicly about their activities; their children and grandchildren, who are as strongly supportive of what they did during the war; their willingness to help anyone, whether they knew them or not, and doing so without regret; the friendship that grew between the two families when they lived together, praying, singing, and arguing together; her husband’s belief that Hitler was doing wrong by the Jews and how his own inner voice told him to help, as the Bible was his guide; and how they were given no money to keep the Jews in hiding.

    Oral history interview with Wanda Ollbryska

    Oral History

    Oral history interview with Irene Opdyke

    Oral History

    Irene Opdyke, born in Kozienice, Poland, describes growing up in a close, Catholic family with four younger sisters, all of whom were taught always to keep an open heart, to be helpful; joining the Polish army then hiding in the forest after Poland was defeated; being very brutally treated by Russian troops and eventually being sent to an ammunitions factory in Poland, where she acted as a server; being sent to the front in Poland, close to the Russian border where she witnessed horrendous brutalities carried out on Jewish families; being moved again to work in the laundry room of about 300 Germans and the local head of the Gestapo in Ternopil', Ukraine; befriending 12 Jews working there and creating an information network; becoming the housekeeper to a German major and managing to hide Jews in the cellar in an underground area under the gazebo; the liquidation of the ghetto in early 1943 and taking the 12 Jews to the forest to join others in hiding; building a bunker where the Jews stayed until the Russian Army liberated them; joining the Polish partisans to help in the fight against the Russians and eventually being arrested and put in detention; escaping by jumping out a window; going to Krakow, Poland; going to the United States in 1949 and becoming a US citizen; working in the garment center in NYC; getting married to a man who worked for the United Nations; and the tree planted in her honor on the Avenue of the Righteous in Jerusalem.

    Oral history interview with Jacob Oversloot

    Oral History

    Jacob Simon Oversloot, born in Rotterdam, Netherlands, describe growing up in a family that was not religious and not political; his six siblings; living in The Hague, Netherlands when the war broke out and working at a department store in the furs section; people arriving from Poland and Germany starting in 1938; the German occupation and Germans shipping staple goods to Germany, leaving nothing for residents; taking in his close Jewish business acquaintance (Leo Krell) along with his wife and son when they were going to be transported to Auschwitz and hiding them from 1940 to 1944; making fur coats with this man; the persecution and deportation of the Jews; never witnessing acts of violence against Jews; his hatred for the occupying Germans and refusing to follow their laws or do what they told him to; no one in their family knowing that he and his wife were hiding Jews; how they kept the Jews safe; getting foods from the black market and from the underground movement; restarting his fur business after the war, until 1950 when he moved to Canada; how his rescue activities strengthened his inner faith and that he would do the same now; and his lifetime friendship with the family he hid.

    Oral history interview with Alice Paulus

    Oral History

    Alice Paulus (née Rijskamp), born in 1915, describes being newly married with a five month old baby when she and her husband began their rescue activities; helping to rescue five people; one couple staying with them for two and a half years in hiding; how many of their friends would not help the Jews, thinking it much too dangerous; believing it was their Christian duty; the most stressful time during the war when her second child was born and there was no hospital, few medicines, and bombs dropping on the city; conducting rescue activities from October 1942 to the end of the war in May 1945, but continuing to host the couple because there was no place for them to live; how three of her husband’s brothers also hid Jews; speaking to church groups often when they first came to Ohio in 1957-1962; speaking in the pubic schools; the major influence religion now has on how she lives her life; and her admiration for Winston Churchill and the Holland leadership for being very honest.

    Oral history interview with Marion Pritchard

    Oral History

    Marion Pritchard, born November 7, 1920 in Amsterdam, Netherlands, describes her apolitical family; her brother; her family’s Jewish friends; how her father was upset with the Dutch government because they didn’t just open their borders to refugees; her work finding foster homes for Jewish children and also hiding Jews; how her family did not know all of what she was doing, which was for their safety; the widespread antisemitism in Holland; being imprisoned for six months in a jail in Amsterdam after being caught with friends who put out an anti-Nazi newssheet; being threatened and intimidated, but not physically abused; leaving Holland in 1945 to work with the United Nations in displaced persons camps in Germany; becoming active with Zionists trying get to Israel; going to the United States in 1947; her thoughts on Elie Wiesel; her husband, who was a liberator at Buchenwald; and her belief that you must do the right thing if you can find out what the right thing is.

    Oral history interview with Mary Barys Szul

    Oral History

    Mary Szul (née Barys), born in 1928, describes being 15 years old and living in a little village in Poland with her mother, brother, and sister at the start of the war; rescuing a total of four people, the first being a widow with two small children, whom they hid in the attic in the summer and in a bunker built under straw in the barn in the winter; being caught by the Germans and being badly beaten then jailed for two weeks; being freed and finding her way home, a 70 mile trek; going to Austria to a displaced persons camp; going in 1948 to Canada, where she found the Jews she had rescued and ended up living with them as family; the reason she got involved in rescue activities; how her rescue activities started in May 1943 and continued for 18 months; her neighbors’ disapproving of her family’s rescue activities when they found out about them after the war; and her life now in London, Ontario.

    Oral history interview with Magda Trocme

    Oral History

    Magda Trocme, born in 1901, describes her rescue activities during WWII in the French village of Le Chambon sur Lignon; Philip Hallie’s book, “Lest innocent blood be shed,” which describes the French village Le Chambon as a safe haven for Jewish escapees; working with the Quakers; one of their first rescued Jews, Hanna Hirsch, and the quasi-underground arrangement for refugees, so that she eventually ended up in Switzerland and then Queens, New York after the war; how the French people got involved with rescue activities and inspired others to help; the daily routine during the war and the large numbers of refugees who were sharing their house; the difficulty in explaining the rescue activities to their children so that the refugees wouldn’t be discovered and how it was a matter of constant problem-solving and resisting in small ways; being very aware of the danger they were in but never considering not helping; her husband’s arrest because he was the organizer of the rescue activities and most responsible; her husband’s release after the war was over; leaving Le Chambon in 1960 and moving first to Versailles and later to Geneva, where her husband was a minister; and visiting Yad Vashem in Israel, where a tree was planted in her husband’s honor.

    Oral history interview with Andrew van Schilfgaarde

    Oral History

    Andrew van Schilfgaarde, born in 1933 in The Hague, Netherlands, describes growing up one of seven children; being members of the Christian Community Church but not being particularly religious or political, though they did vote; having many Jewish friends; being aware of the persecution against Jews as his friends dropped out of school and were deported; the vacated homes being looted or taken over by the Germans; his attempts to listen to the BBC and being caught with a radio, which was a forbidden item; stealing food to survive and selling the food back on the black market; hiding Jews for a few days in the attic before they went on to another house, then to France, and then to England; how his neighbors were a problem because they might report them; the role of resistance groups as the contact point for the rescue activities; how human values change due to starvation; leaving Holland in 1956 and going to the United States; having a landscape business then working in the food and drink business; not discussing his wartime experiences with his wife or friends; his life-philosophy to live day by day; and knowing that the past cannot be changed but something like the Holocaust should never happen again.

    Oral history interview with Ann van Veldhuizen

    Oral History

    Oral history interview with Johanna Vos

    Oral History

    Johanna Vos, born December 29, 1909 in Amersfoort, Netherlands, discusses her upbringing and the influence her parents had on her life; her family’s religious background in the Christian Reformed Church; moving frequently as a result of her father’s job as a military officer but living in Leiden for most of her school years; dating a Jewish boy at age seventeen despite her parents’ disapproval; leaving home at age 20 to go to Paris, France; studying at the Sorbonne and working in Paris as a freelance journalist and as a delivery person for a Dutch grocer; marrying a German artist against her parents’ wishes and later divorcing; living in Laren, Holland during World War II; marrying her second husband and having children; becoming involved in activities to help Jews, first by helping her Jewish friends and then joining the Dutch underground; wearing the Star of David in solidarity with the Jewish population; falsifying papers and smuggling the belongings of German Jewish refugees into the Netherlands; serving as a messenger; hiding more than 36 people in her home, most of whom were Jews but some of whom were intellectuals or others targeted by the Nazis; her husband picking up weapons airdropped by Allied forces for the resistance; the killing of an author by the Gestapo and the capture of a fellow member of the underground; being confronted by the Gestapo at her home; facing the challenge of hiding small children who did not fully understand their situation; coping with the mental breakdown of a woman hiding in her home; her husband’s pension through the Stichting 1940-1945 and his suffering from “Twenty Year Syndrome;” and her thoughts about her actions during the war.

    Oral history interview with Theresa Weerstra

    Oral History

    Theresa Weerstra, born August 6, 1907 in Wijckel, Netherlands, describes her father Hans Peopjes, who was a fisherman, and her mother Arendje Roskan; her eight younger siblings, who were all girls; growing up in a family that was not religious but taught her to be generous to everything that is living, from flowers to human beings and never to be prejudiced; living in IJlst in Freisland province when the war broke out; getting married to Martin in 1930 and moving to Chicago, IL that same year during the recession but returning home soon thereafter; living two miles from the Nazi headquarters for the Netherlands; living near a large antisemitic population; taking in an orphaned young Jewish girl, which opened the door to helping many, many more Jews, some of whom she remains in contact with; hiding places they created in their home; housing 18 Jews at one point; receiving help from friends, who got them extra ration cards; delivering a baby born to one of the Jewish couples; the large network of people working in the rescue effort and using codes to relay messages since as there was only one phone in town; and how she is still upset by the Holocaust and does not consider herself a hero.

    View All 30 Items in the Collection