 NOVEMBER 7 • 2019 | 45

ELLEN KAHN’
S STORY
Ellen Herz Kahn of Franklin and 
her sister Margaret were born 
in Krefeld, Germany; later their 
family moved to Berlin. Their 
father, Walter, imported fine 
fabrics. The girls went to syna-
gogue with their mother, Erna, 
on Saturdays. Both blonde, they 
were once stopped by a newspa-
per photographer who wanted to 
snap their picture as an example 
of “beautiful Aryan children.
”
After Kristallnacht, Kahn’
s par-
ents decided to send their daugh-
ters on the Kindertransport.
Days before she boarded the 
train, Kahn said her parents 
threw her a goodbye party, where 
friends and family signed a book 
similar to the autograph books 
grammar school children would 
sign in America. 
The book is on exhibit in a 
glass case. The pages have been 
enlarged, laminated and are 
accompanied by English trans-
lations of farewells from friends 
and family. Later, the family 
would be reunited in America, 
thanks to Detroit Jewish leader 
Fred Butzel, a family member.
“I was one of the fortunate 
ones,
” Kahn said. “I went and 
then my sister came a week later. 
My father knew a family outside 
of London that would take us in. 
We had a place to go and I knew 

not many children did. We lived 
for nine months with a wonder-
ful loving family. My mother said 
we would be together again. I 
was 11, and I believed her. Nine 
months later, we were together as 
my parents left Berlin one week 
before the war started. We wait-
ed in England until our visa to 
America was secured.
”

HANS WEINMANN’
S STORY
Retired engineer and 
Kindertransport child Hans 
Weinmann of West Bloomfield 
has long been a docent at 
the HMC. His story is doc-
umented there and by the 
Shoah Foundation and the 
Kinderstransport Association. 
Weinmann was born in 1926 
to a middle-class family that had 
been in Vienna since the 1880s. 
In 1938, Germany annexed 
Austria. He was kicked out of his 
school because he was Jewish. 
On Kristallnacht, Weinmann 
witnessed his father’
s arrest by 
two Gestapo agents. His father 
was imprisoned in the Dachau 
concentration camp but was 
released two months later with 
the specific requirement that he 
leave the country within 90 days. 
Weinman believes his father was 
released because of his army 
service; he was decorated and 
wounded during World War I.

Survivors Association In 
Michigan (C.H.A.I.M.) and 
the International Network 
of Children of Holocaust 
Survivors.
He chairs the Oakland 
University Judaic Studies 
Committee; the Kents have 
endowed an Israel Travel Fund 
for OU students to study in 
Israel.
Nina Kent’
 
s grandparents 
emigrated to the United States 
in the early 1900s. Both 
served in the U.S. military 
during World War II.
Dinner tickets range from 

$136 for those age 35 and 
younger to $360. Registration 
is required by calling 
(248) 536-9601 or 
visiting holocaustcenter.org. 

details

“Kindertransport — Rescuing Children on the Brink of War” is open 
Sunday through Friday and is free with museum admission ($5-$8) or 
membership. A docent-led tour is available at 7 p. m. Monday, Dec. 
16. Space is limited. RSVP by calling (248) 553-2400, ext. 145. For 
hours and more, go to holocaustcenter.org. 

In the exhibit is a document 
issued by the Austrian govern-
ment expelling Jewish students 
from non-Jewish schools. 
Next to it is a bus pass issued 
to Weinmann by the Austrian 
government so he could take 
a cross-town bus to attend a 
Jewish school. 
Weinmann remained in 
England for one year. By 1939, 
his parents had been able to 
immigrate to New York. At 14, 
he made the trip from London 
to New York alone. The voyage 
on a British ship through the 
U-boat-infested Atlantic took 
over a week due to the zig-zag 
course of the ship.
Since 1986, he has volun-
teered as an HMC docent. 
Unfortunately, he said many 
students are still ignorant 

of WWII history and the 
Holocaust. Some have never 
met a Jew. 
“I was recently asked by a 
student where my horns were,
” 
said Weinmann, who has also 
lectured about the organizations 
and individuals that made the 
Kindertransport possible. 
“I explained to this student 
that, though I had blue eyes, I 
was not considered a person 
who should live at that time. 
I tried not to get angry. As one 
can see, there is still much work 
to do in educating younger 
generations about the 
Holocaust.
” 

New York Jewish Week Associate 
Editor Jonathan Mark wrote the first 
part of this story in early December 
2018, shortly after the Kindertransport 
exhibit debuted in New York.

Hans Weinmann stops in front of two documents from 
his childhood in Austria. One expels Jewish students 
from non-Jewish schools; the other is a bus pass to 
allow him to get to a Jewish school across town. 

Honorees Bernie and Nina Kent

COURTESY HMC

