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Adolf Hitler openly spoke about his antisemitism as early as 1919 in his book "Mein Kampf", years before Nazis came to power in 1933, saying “Rational antisemitism, however, must lead to systematic legal opposition.…Its final objective must unswervingly be the removal of the Jews altogether.”

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Hitler came into legal power on January 30th, 1933. His objective was to increase power, and overcome political oppositions. On April 1st, he started a boycott of Jewish businesses, and by the end of the month, they were dismissed from civil service, and Jewish participation in German schools was restricted.

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Nazis removed books and burnt them if they opposed Nazi ideology. A Jewish German poet, Heinrich Heine, wrote "Where one burns books, one will, in the end, burn people."

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By 1935, a law was passed to "protect German blood", by categorizing all Jewish people and prohibiting romantic and sexual relationships between Jewish people and "German blood".

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The Giver, written by Lois Lowry, tells a story of a young boy navigating life in a dystopian society where all memories of the past were eliminated, life is heavily controlled, and everyone is conformed to "sameness".

A connection that I believe was partially intentional is the number system in The Giver. Throughout the book, people are not given names for the first year of their lives, and even after they aren't given a surname, instead they are assigned a number. The numbers are the order the children were born, and they are used as identifiers. In the Holocaust, Jewish people, and other minorities placed in concentration camps, were stripped of their identities, and given numbers in place of their names. These numbers were tattooed on their forearms, treating them more like animals than human. While the numbers were used in very different ways, there are notable similarities, like how it dehumanizes them, and conforms everyone to "sameness".

Another less obvious similarity is the way twins are treated in The Giver and the Holocaust. In The Giver, when twins are born, they are raised for the first year of their lives, then the "stronger" twin (the heavier twin, the one who sleeps more soundly, etc), and the other is released to elsewhere (killed). During WWII, Josef Mengele was a "doctor" who practiced brutal human experiments. He searched for twins so that he could study and experiment on them at Auschwitz concentration camp because he was interested in the genetics of twins. Records state that he experimented on at least 732 pairs of twins.

It is implied and theorized that this is based on what a future could have looked like if Hitler had won WWII, and all people were part of his so called "master race". The book talks about the horrors and memories of war and the history that was hidden from the public, which connects heavily to the Holocaust.

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Jewish children in Auschwitz concentration camp

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Jewish children in Auschwitz concentration camp

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By 1939 Jewish people had been stripped of their basic rights, and placed in "Ghettos", where they were forced to live in a very small portion of Warsaw, a city that's Jewish population was 30%. This land was so small that there was approximately 9 people per room, leading to intense malnutrition, disease, poverty, etc.

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In June of 1941, the Nazis began the systematic murdering of Jewish people.

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"hostility to or prejudice against Jewish people."

(From the dictionary)

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Nazi ideology had Jewish people listed as a race, as opposed to a religious group.

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Jakob lived in a small town near Warsaw when WWII broke out. In 1941, at just 16 years old, The Nazi soldiers broke into his town, destroying Jewish businesses and homes, and demanding that every Jewish person wears the Star of David to be identified. His family was transported to Ghettos, then concentration camps, where his mother and sister were killed at Auschwitz. Out of the 6000 people who arrived in Auschwitz, Jakob and his father were of the 200 people who entered. They endured terrible labor, starvation, abuse, and illness. Jakob was able to be transferred due to saying he was a carpenter, but his father was killed for being a bricklayer. On May 4th, 1945, after years of torment, Jakob was rescued by American soldiers.

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Jewish people.

Although, you didn't have to be Jewish yourself to be affected. Anyone with two Jewish grandparents or more, or was married to a Jewish person, was classified as Jewish.

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Roma people.

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Homosexual people (specifically homosexual men. Didn't have to be proven, just accused.)

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People with disabilities.

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Black people in Germany.

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Soviet prisoners.

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Anyone who went against Nazi ideology.

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Nazis believed Jewish people were to blame for many social, economic, political, and ethical problems that occurred in Germany.

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Starting in 1933, the boycott and destruction of Jewish businesses began, ultimately leading to genocide as the focus for Nazis to completely "wipe out" the Jewish population.

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April 20th, 1889 - April 30th, 1945 (age 56 years old)

Born in Braunau am Inn, Austria.

Cause of death: Self inflicted gunshot to the head.

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Adolf Hitler, byname Der Führer (German: "The Leader"), (born April 20, 1889, Braunau am Inn, Austria-died April 30, 1945, Berlin, Germany), leader of the Nazi Party (from 1920/21) and chancellor ( Kanzler) and Führer of Germany (1933-45). He was chancellor from January 30, 1933, and, after President Paul von Hindenburg's death, assumed the twin titles of Führer and chancellor (August 2, 1934).

Hitler's father, Alois (born 1837), was illegitimate. For a time he bore his mother's name, Schicklgruber, but by 1876 he had established his family claim to the surname Hitler. Adolf never used any other surname.

Early life

After his father's retirement from the state customs service, Adolf Hitler spent most of his childhood in Linz, the capital of Upper Austria. It remained his favourite city throughout his life, and he expressed his wish to be buried there. Alois Hitler died in 1903 but left an adequate pension and savings to support his wife and children. Although Hitler feared and disliked his father, he was a devoted son to his mother, who died after much suffering in 1907. With a mixed record as a student, Hitler never advanced beyond a secondary education. After leaving school, he visited Vienna, then returned to Linz, where he dreamed of becoming an artist. Later, he used the small allowance he continued to draw to maintain himself in Vienna. He wished to study art, for which he had some faculties, but he twice failed to secure entry to the Academy of Fine Arts. For some years he lived a lonely and isolated life, earning a precarious livelihood by painting postcards and advertisements and drifting from one municipal hostel to another. Hitler already showed traits that characterized his later life: loneliness and secretiveness, a bohemian mode of everyday existence, and hatred of cosmopolitanism and of the multinational character of Vienna.

In 1913 Hitler moved to Munich. Screened for Austrian military service in February 1914, he was classified as unfit because of inadequate physical vigour; but when World War I broke out, he petitioned Bavarian King Louis III to be allowed to serve, and one day after submitting that request, he was notified that he would be permitted to join the 16th Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment. After some eight weeks of training, Hitler was deployed in October 1914 to Belgium, where he participated in the First Battle of Ypres. He served throughout the war, was wounded in October 1916, and was gassed two years later near Ypres. He was hospitalized when the conflict ended. During the war, he was continuously in the front line as a headquarters runner; his bravery in action was rewarded with the Iron Cross, Second Class, in December 1914, and the Iron Cross, First Class (a rare decoration for a corporal), in August 1918. He greeted the war with enthusiasm, as a great relief from the frustration and aimlessness of civilian life. He found discipline and comradeship satisfying and was confirmed in his belief in the heroic virtues of war.

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Adolf Hitler | Biography, Rise to Power, & Facts

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Adolf Hitler, the infamous dictator of Nazi Germany, rose to power with his radical ideology and orchestrated one of history's darkest periods through World War II and the Holocaust.

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Nazi Germany and its allies established over 44,000 concentration camps and incarceration sites during the Holocaust. Read about the Nazi camp system.

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Premysl was born in the Czech town of Turnov, in June 1913. Just six months after Germany annexed territory along Czechoslovakia, they divided it into two territories, Slovakia and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. In 1941, Premsyl was arrested for helping Jewish people, and transferred to the Terezin transit and labor camp, then layer Mauthausen concentration camp. He was forced into slave labor, and was medically experimented on. The camp was liberated in 1945 by American troops, and Premsyl worked for the Americans as an interpreter. Two years later, in 1947, he was able to move to London.

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Behind Every Name a Story consists of essays describing survivors' experiences during the Holocaust, written by survivors or their families. We encourage all survivors to share their unique experiences to ensure their preservation for future generations.

The essays, accompanying photographs, and other materials, including submissions that we are unable to feature on our website, will become a permanent part of the Museum's records.

I had little confidence when I started. My hands were so shaky I could barely read my own writing. As I started writing, I was given confidence, support, and encouragement. If I can do this, then you can too.

Manya's Memory Project
Manya's biography

Sima could easily pass as a non-Jewish Pole because she had a light complexion and was blonde, but to be able to live as a Pole, she needed a Kennkarte (identification card), and to get a Kennkarte she needed a Polish birth certificate.

The Gestapo visited us in the morning. They knew my father from his visits as Seelsorger (minister) to the Jews in the local prison.

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Behind Every Name a Story consists of essays describing survivors' experiences during the Holocaust, written by survivors or their families. We encourage all survivors to share their unique experiences to ensure their preservation for future generations. The essays, accompanying photographs, and other materials, including submissions that we are unable to feature on our website, will become a permanent part of the Museum's records.