ORLANDO, Fla. – Louis Goldman’s grandfather arrived as a teen in the U.S. before World War II. He and his family escaped Jewish persecution in Europe, but not all of his relatives escaped.
“One of the things that I remember as a young child is first learning about the horrors of what went on there and it was very emotional,” Goldman recalled.
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Goldman, who is cantor at Southwest Orlando Jewish Congregation, said his family has pictures of their Jewish relatives but they’re not sure what their fates were.
“It’s a sobering thought when I walk down that hall and I see those faces not knowing what happened to them,” Goldman said.
At Southwest Orlando Jewish Congregation, Goldman said they strive to teach their members lessons from the past in hopes history won’t repeat itself.
It’s a mission Talli Dippold also holds dear to her heart. Dippold’s grandparents were survivors of the Holocaust.
Friday marks the 78th year of the day Soviet Troops entered Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp in Poland to liberate prisoners.
Dippold said International Holocaust Remembrance Day is a day to take action.
“Quite frankly, it gives us the chance to address the rise in hate rhetoric that is going on in today’s society, so we see it as an opportunity to re-focus and re-commit on education,” said Dippold, the CEO of the Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida in Maitland.
There were some highly visible examples of that hate rhetoric in the last month in Orlando. A group projected antisemitic messages on the side of a building in downtown Orlando on New Year’s Eve. Antisemitic flyers were also found in a Winter Garden neighborhood.
State lawmakers filed a bill in the Florida Legislature this week to increase penalties for antisemitic acts.
“The lesson that I take from my grandparents is about rebuilding and resilience,” Dippold said. “I wouldn’t be where I am today had it not been for their strength to pick up their lives, to rebuild, to move, and so I try to take all of the positive elements from the past and use that to do this important work.”
It’s work that is expanding with a brand-new museum in downtown Orlando. According to the center’s website, the Holocaust Museum for Hope & Humanity will be the first museum designed from the ground up around the stories of survivors and will serve to honor the victims and reflect on their legacies.
“History does repeat itself, we know that it rhymes and it’s our role to educate so that we can be better informed and to try and take more of the lessons from the past and put them into the future,” Dippold said.
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