46 | OCTOBER 24 • 2019
Arts&Life
exhibit
After the
Holocaust
New exhibit from DJN Foundation explores
how Detroit Jews aided survivors.
SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
I
f you visit the Holocaust
Memorial Center (HMC)
in Farmington Hills Oct.
24-Jan. 5, you are likely to
view familiar family names as
they appear in a new exhibit,
“
Aftermath: Detroit Jews in the
Wake of the Holocaust.
”
Either the impact of the
people recalled still affects the
community or the descendants
of those people have continued
the commitments established
years ago.
The exhibit is the second
installment in a two-part series
that recalls Holocaust issues as
reported by the Detroit Jewish
Chronicle and the Detroit Jewish
News. Besides pointing out
what local residents did to help
members of their extended
families, the latest exhibit also
describes what they did for
survivors personally unknown
to them.
“We would like viewers to
understand that although the
Holocaust itself ended with
the Allied victory in World
War II, Jewish and non-Jewish
communities in Detroit, in
America and around the world
had to deal with the effects of
the Holocaust,
” says curator
Mike Smith, Alene and Graham
Landau Archivist Chair of
the Detroit Jewish News
Foundation. He worked close-
ly with Mark Mulder, HMC
exhibits manager, and Joanne
Loney, HMC exhibits assistant.
“There were millions of
displaced persons around the
world; hundreds of thousands,
maybe a million, were Jewish.
They desperately needed food,
shelter and the basic necessities
of life, and one of the main
exhibit themes is that Jewish
Detroiters did their part.
”
Through the articles posted,
viewers will learn how Jewish
Detroiters provided generous
funding and volunteered in
various capacities to support
displaced persons who arrived
here and for the hundreds of
thousands who settled in British
Mandate Palestine, a portion of
which would become Israel in
1948.
The names Emma Schaver,
Louis Berry and Joseph
Holtzman are seen throughout
the articles. Schaver, a well-
known singer, became the first
American to perform for those
interned in the displaced per-
sons camps.
Stories about not-so-well-
known Jewish Detroiters, such
as Mabel Giszezak, also are
spotlighted. Giszezak taught
classes to Jewish displaced per-
sons who arrived in Detroit not
knowing English or local gover-
nance and customs.
A MIGHTY RESPONSE
From fundraising campaigns to
political cartoons, the exhibit
recalls the people who coun-
tered the devastating effects of
the Holocaust.
“Unlike secular media at the
time, the pages of the Jewish
News and Jewish Chronicle pro-
vided ongoing and often stark
content and headlines that start-
ed with Hitler’
s rise to power
to the defeat of Nazi Germany,
”
says Arthur Horwitz, publish-
er and executive editor of the
Jewish News and president of
the DJN Foundation. “Central
to that ongoing reporting was
the horrible plight of European
Jewry and what we now refer to
as the Holocaust.
“Detroit Jewry responded
mightily to supporting the
American war effort and to
activating whatever moral and
details
“Aftermath: Detroit Jews in the Wake of the Holocaust”
will be on view Oct. 24-Jan. 5 at the Holocaust Memorial
Center in Farmington Hills. No additional cost beyond
general admission. (248) 553-2400. holocaustcenter.org.
continued on page 48