Survivor Stories

Portraits of Survival is many things: an award-winning exhibition and series of videos; a much-touted educational program that has touched the hearts and minds of many, and a resource center that includes books, journals, videos and teaching materials.

But, at the heart of it, Portraits of Survival is about the Holocaust survivors and refugees themselves, their stories, their journeys, their heartaches, and their triumphs.

“Honoring our survivors symbolizes our victory over forgetfulness.”
~Elie Wiesel (z”l), author, Holocaust survivor

George Rusznak
Erika Kahn
Dora Tanner
Ichak Adizes
Julie Rusznak
Margaret Singer
Stan Ostern
Mike Wolff
Clara Reitman
Leslie Reitman
Josie Levy Martin
Edith Ostern
Fred Jamner
Nina Morecki
Norman Jaffe
Bernhard Penner
Eva Hartenstein
Fred Perutz
Maria Segal
Martha Prince
Andrew Nichols
Judith Meisel
Juliane Heyman
Karl & Bertyl Boehm
Lisa Rozsa
Ruth Nebel
Sally Gertz
Rudolf Herlinger
Cesia Kingston
Eric Boehm
Gela Percal
Lili Schiff
Helga Carden
Renee Clement
Alex Stein
Stella Better
Kurt Singer
Laura Rusk
Nathan Zepell
Klara Zimmer
Paul Gertler
Charles Bergere
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George Rusznak

As a young Jewish boy in Budapest, I survived the Holocaust thanks to my mother’s extraordinary courage and resourcefulness. My father was killed in a Jewish work battalion, and we were forced into the ghetto, made to wear yellow stars, and faced severe restrictions. When deportations began, my mother saved us from concentration camps by convincing a guard to let us escape, and we survived in hiding with a kind Christian family. After the 1956 uprising, I escaped Hungary, arriving in America with just $10 and ten English words, eventually becoming a pioneer in computing, grateful to contribute to humanity after such darkness. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Erika Kahn

I was born in Berlin in 1925, living under constant threat. On Kristallnacht, I fled past our burning synagogue to find our school in total devastation, where we 25 remaining children said farewell with songs and hora dances by candlelight. I sent my little brother Erwin on a Kindertransport to England and I fled to America thanks to my stepmother’s affidavit and visa, though my dear grandparents perished in Auschwitz. In America, I discovered an aptitude for design, eventually becoming a full-time artist whose work can be seen across the world. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Dora Tanner

I was born in Bobrka, Poland in 1913. After Russians burned our village during a pogrom, we fled to Vienna. I married Emil Tennenbaum in 1934. After Kristallnacht, Emil was taken to Dachau. At 25, with two babies, I arranged his release, obtained forged papers, and escaped with my family to New York. Emil joined us in 1940, changing our name to “Tanner.” We built a textile business in America and retired to Santa Barbara in 1968. My children have blessed me with grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Ichak Adizes

I was born in 1937 in Skopje, Macedonia. While 7,153 Macedonian Jews were sent to Treblinka, my family escaped the concentration camp because of Spanish passports. We hid in Albania as Muslims fleeing a blood revenge, where my father pretended to be a medical doctor. After the war, I moved to Israel, then America where I earned a doctorate from Columbia, taught at UCLA, and founded the Adizes Institute, publishing books on managing change without conflict in 22 languages. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Julie Rusznak

I was born in July 1940 in Budapest, Hungary. My father died in Buchenwald in 1944, and a total of 30 family members perished in the Holocaust. After being deported, my mother bribed a guard with her wedding band to come back for me. We survived by hiding as Catholic Hungarians until a German soldier almost exposed us. After the war, following the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, we fled to Austria. There I met my husband George, and in 1957 we married in Vienna and moved to the U.S., settling in Los Angeles where I worked in real estate before retiring to Santa Barbara. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Margaret Singer

I had a fairly pleasant childhood, growing up in a happy Jewish home in Frankfurt where my mother prepared wonderful Shabbat dinners, and we attended synagogue regularly. When the Nazis came, the other children threw stones at us and called us names. My father sent my sister Paula, brother Sidney, and I to America, while my mother and youngest brother Henry went to Paris. My mother was sent to Auschwitz where she died, though Henry escaped on the last children’s transport. My father was caught trying to cross the Alps but survived, later reuniting with us in America when my brother Sidney, then with the U.S. Army, found him. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Stan Ostern

I was born in 1935 in Stryj, Poland, surviving nearly a year in the ghetto before my family and I hid in a bunker beneath a house for three years until liberation by the Russian army in 1944. After coming to America in 1946, I went from being illiterate with no English to graduating from NYU and New York Medical College, eventually practicing medicine in Santa Barbara from 1966 until 1999. I lost something precious—my youth—but I was fortunate to survive when over one million Jewish children perished in the Holocaust. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Mike Wolff

I was born in Breslau, Germany in 1936, sent away on a Kindertransport as conditions for Jewish families worsened under Nazi rule. I was the youngest of approximately 200 children slated to go at barely three years old. After being cared for by the Ness family in Scotland, I reunited with my parents in Bolivia in 1940, where my father had fled after his arrest on Kristallnacht and my mother had secured a rare visa. My family eventually rebuilt our lives, moving to Memphis in 1952 and later to Santa Barbara where I worked as an engineer, married my wife Lani, and raised our children and grandchildren. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Clara Reitman

I was born in 1919 in Komarno, Czechoslovakia, where my Hungarian family ran a textile business, until our lives were shattered when the Germans occupied Hungary in 1944. My parents, sisters and I were betrayed while working in fields to avoid deportation and sent to Auschwitz, where my sister Lily and I survived brutal labor camps, a death march through winter snow, and moments where my life hung by a thread. After liberation, I returned to find my brothers and fiancé Leslie had survived, and we married after eight years of separation, finally reuniting after unimaginable horrors. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Leslie Reitman

I was born in 1914 near Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, falling in love with Clara Raab while serving in the Czech Army before being separated by the war. In 1942, I volunteered to report to authorities when one child from each Jewish family was ordered to go, narrowly escaping transport to Auschwitz thanks to my childhood friend who recognized me among 1,500 others. I survived through hiding, working for the underground, and even hiding in bales of straw for months before being liberated by the Russian Army in 1945, reuniting with Clara, and eventually escaping Communist Czechoslovakia with our son by hiding in a coal barge traveling to Vienna. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Josie Levy Martin

I was born in 1938 into an observant Jewish family in France, where my German parents had fled after Hitler came to power. When Nazi searches intensified in 1944, my parents changed my Jewish-sounding name from Levy to L’Or and sent me to live with Soeur St. Cybard, a nun and Resistance member. After eight months hiding in Catholic school near the village of Oradour where 600 civilians were massacred, I was reunited with my parents after liberation, though I initially felt abandoned. I later became a teacher and school psychologist in America, writing “Never Tell Your Name” to honor Soeur St. Cybard’s bravery and share my experience as a hidden child. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Edith Tanner Ostern

I was two years old in 1938 when my father was taken to Dachau after Kristallnacht in Vienna, forcing my mother to flee with me and my infant brother when Nazis bolted our apartment. Our family navigated a harrowing escape through Europe before narrowly reaching America in November 1939, where my brother and I were temporarily placed in a children’s shelter until our family reunited. After escaping Europe just in time to avoid the Holocaust, I later attended the High School of Music and Art, became a civil rights activist at the University of Alabama, and taught art in New Jersey schools. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Fred Jamner

I was born near Saarbrucken, Germany in 1930, and after Kristallnacht shattered our lives, my brother and I were smuggled into France, eventually reaching America in 1941 having lost our father and been separated from our mother. I stayed with my aunt and uncle in Brooklyn until reunited with my mother who survived by passing as a gentile in Italy. I worked days and attended City College at night before building a successful accounting firm in Los Angeles. I built a loving family and retired to Santa Barbara, but my experience as a refugee greatly affected me – I always have one bag packed mentally. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Nina Morecki

My life began in 1920 in L’vov, Poland, until the Nazi invasion in 1939 shattered my dreams. I lost my mother and sisters and was sent to the Janowska concentration camp. When the Germans liquidated the camp by shooting us in the forest, I fainted and awoke among dead bodies, escaping through the forest and later risking my life by secretly stamping travel papers for the resistance. After escaping to Romania where I met my future husband Josef, we eventually immigrated to New York in 1947, making good lives for ourselves and our two daughters. We should “never forget” the tragedy and always fight bigotry, hatred and prejudice. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Norman Jaffe

I am a survivor of Auschwitz/Buna, prisoner number 104954. I was the only Jew in my class and faced Nazi theory and antisemitic schoolmates. In 1938, I witnessed Kristallnacht; later my entire family was deported, and I never saw them again. I was sent to Auschwitz to do construction labor, escaped the gas chambers three times, and survived a death march until liberation in 1945. I weighed only 80 pounds. After arriving in America, I married my sweetheart Rose, became a citizen, and enjoyed a career as a graphic artist before retiring to Santa Barbara. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Bernhard Penner

I was born in 1926 in Unna, Germany, where as one of only four Jewish children in my school, I faced increasing abuse from my Nazi teacher and former friends who joined Hitler Youth, forcing me to become a street fighter to protect myself. In 1938, I arrived in America through a Jewish-sponsored children’s transport, while my parents and younger brother perished in camps in 1942. After serving in the U.S. Army and becoming a General Surgeon, I retired to Santa Barbara in 1995, forever grateful to HIAS for saving my life, though America could have saved many more from the Holocaust. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Eva Hartenstein

I was born in Berlin in 1906 and had a normal childhood until age 10, when my only memories became hunger and death during WWI. In 1918, my sister Hanna and my father died during the flu epidemic. After Hitler came to power in 1933, I faced extensive persecution. On a Nazi arrest list for receiving mail from my American fiancé Fred, I moved between students’ homes to avoid capture. After my mother passed away in 1934, I applied for a visa to the US, finally arriving in June 1935 with only $2.50 and 12 coats in my suitcases. Fred and I married in Chicago that year; after he passed in 1959, I remarried and settled in Santa Barbara in 1961. Having lived through two world wars, I firmly believe war is never the solution to any disagreement. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Fred Perutz

I was born in Vienna in 1919, witnessing Nazi persecution when brown-shirted Austrians destroyed Jewish stores across the city. I fled with a forged Greek passport in 1938, evading Gestapo detection by pretending to speak only French, and married my wife Margaret during a two-day army pass before serving in Military Intelligence and Psychological Warfare. After reclaiming our ransacked Vienna home after the war, I became a director of the New York Cotton Exchange and President of the Importers Association, forever grateful to have escaped Nazi-occupied Austria for a new life in America. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Maria Segal

I was born as Miriam Polanowicz in 1935 in Poland, deported with my family to the Warsaw ghetto in 1940 where a Polish woman named Stasia smuggled me out. After hearing my mother’s final words—”You are the only one who will survive”—I hid in fields and attics before joining my friend Wanda, narrowly escaping execution thanks to Polish doctors who put yellow powder on us to pretend we had jaundice. After liberation in 1945, I moved to Canada, earned a master’s degree in social work, and worked for 23 years in Child and Adult Protective Services, sharing my story to encourage tolerance and prevent another Holocaust. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Martha Prince

I was born in Vienna in 1913, studying orthopedics until Hitler’s 1938 invasion forced my family to flee after my brothers were briefly imprisoned in Dachau. I met my future husband Robert on the boat to America, remarkably reuniting when we bumped into each other on Broadway months later, marrying and starting a family after his military service. After moving to Los Angeles where we opened an electrolysis studio, I continued working as an electrologist following Robert’s death, later teaching aerobics to seniors at the Jewish Community Center well into my retirement years. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Andrew Nichols

I was born in Hungary in 1914, losing my mother before I was three and my father during World War I. I escaped Nazi persecution in 1939 when the chief of the passport office recognized me and secured my passport the same day, allowing me to reach London. I worked as a farmer near Oxford and served as an X-ray technician in the British Army in India. All of my immediate family in Czechoslovakia perished except for my sister and cousin. After the war, I immigrated to America, eventually becoming a real estate broker in Santa Barbara. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Judith Meisel

I was born in Lithuania in 1929 and survived the horrors of the Kovno ghetto where at age 12, I smuggled food through barbed wire at night while working as a slave laborer by day. At Stutthof concentration camp, I experienced unspeakable cruelty—watching guards murder babies, having my mother’s gold teeth pulled out, and being torn from my mother at the gas chamber entrance when she told me to “Run, run…” in Yiddish. My sister and I endured a death march, crawled across the frozen Vistula River, and survived a torpedo attack at sea. When liberated in Denmark in 1945, I was 16 years old, weighed only 47 pounds and had tuberculosis, but thank God I survived. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Juliane Heyman

I was born in Danzig in 1925, and when the Nazis came to power, I suddenly found myself isolated as no children could play with a Jewish child, forcing my family to flee multiple times—first to Belgium, then through occupied France after German invasion. During our desperate journey, I once had to pretend not to understand German when soldiers threatened to kill us, before being smuggled over the Pyrenees Mountains at night and eventually making our way through Spain to Portugal. After this harrowing escape across Europe, we finally reached New York by freighter in late 1941, where I could begin a new life away from persecution. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Karl & Bertyl Boehm

Karl, born in 1881, and Bertyl, born in 1888, both were from Germany. After Karl served four years as a soldier in WWI, they lived a typical middle-class Jewish life until Nazi persecution intensified. Though Karl was spared from arrest during Kristallnacht, they recognized this ominous warning and applied for US visas unsuccessfully. After being forced into “Jewish buildings” in Berlin and Karl’s near deportation to Dachau, they finally secured passage to America in 1941, narrowly meeting the strict weight requirements for their flight. In the United States, they rebuilt their lives as Karl transitioned from shipping clerk to entrepreneur and legal consultant helping with Holocaust restitution claims, eventually finding peace in Santa Barbara with their children and grandchildren. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Lisa Rozsa

I was born in 1917 in Czechoslovakia and never encountered anti-semitism until the German occupation in 1939 when I could no longer attend university. I escaped via Baghdad thanks to my future husband Imre’s visa, while my family was deported to concentration camps where only my mother miraculously survived. My journey spanned four continents—from Iraq to East Africa where I worked with the Red Cross and became chairperson of Kenya’s WIZO, to California where I built a new life with my family. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Ruth Nebel

I was born in 1919 in Marburg, Germany, and after Hitler took power, my entire family was sent to Auschwitz while I endured four years in concentration camps where every day was full of worry with often no food or water. During my darkest moment in Thorn, sick with typhus and wanting my life to end, another prisoner stopped me from touching the electric wire. After liberation in 1945, I met my husband Hans, and we came to America where the Statue of Liberty’s torch gave light where our lives had been in complete darkness. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Sally Gertz

I was born into a traditional Jewish family in Tluste, Poland, and at nine years old, watched through a crack in the door as the Nazis invaded our city, miraculously stopping before reaching our house. My mother and I escaped to a labor camp, where I saved both my cousin’s and my life while others, including my grandmother Rose, were shot outside. Through the kindness of a Ukrainian farmer who took me in, I survived when so many perished, eventually immigrating to America where I built a new life with my family. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Rudolf Herlinger

I was born in Egypt in 1913, but my family became stranded in Europe when World War I erupted, eventually settling in Czechoslovakia where my father established a clothing factory. I narrowly escaped just days before Hitler’s invasion in 1939, enduring a four-month wait before reaching Palestine. After serving in the Czech army under British command during World War II and losing family in the Holocaust, I eventually made my way to America where I built a new life with my wife Ingeborg after escaping Communist Czechoslovakia. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Cesia Kingston

I was born into a happy Jewish family in Lodz, Poland, until Germany invaded in 1939 forcing us into the ghetto where I endured starvation and forced labor before being sent to Auschwitz, where I lost my parents, brother, and sisters. My older sister Nadzia and I miraculously survived multiple camps and a death march, eventually hiding and posing as Catholic girls until the war ended. After the war, I married my husband Morrie, immigrated to Los Angeles, built a successful business, and raised children who I taught to stand against injustice and discrimination. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Eric Boehm

I was born in Germany in 1918 and lived a normal middle-class German-Jewish life until Hitler rose to power in 1933, when my family sent me to America at age 16. After completing my education in the United States, I served as an interrogation officer in the U.S. Army during World War II, where I was present at the arrest of German Field Marshall Keitel. My journey from Nazi Germany to America was the defining experience of my life – I arrived where I truly belonged, and through my work in historical bibliography, I’ve dedicated myself to preserving knowledge for future generations. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Gela Percal

I was born in Rakow, Poland, into a loving family until the Nazis invaded in 1939. After hiding in forests and losing my family when they were discovered and killed, I escaped to Germany with false papers as a Catholic Polish laborer, working in Nazi households in constant fear of being recognized, witnessing firsthand how Germans knew what was happening to Jews. After liberation by Americans in 1945, I made my way to Belgium, met my husband Fred, and chose vigilance over hatred despite my experiences. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Lili Schiff

I was born as Liliane Mendrowski in Brussels in 1932, and my life changed forever when the Germans invaded Belgium in 1940, forcing me to wear a yellow star as a Jewish child. My sister and I were hidden by the righteous Donnay family for two years, then rescued by Father Bruno Reynders when the Gestapo raided their home, while my brother was deported to Auschwitz and killed. After the war, I built a new life in America as a translator at the United Nations, married Edward Schiff, and dedicated myself to helping others, finally finding the courage to share my story. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Helga Carden

I was born in Berlin in 1925, a Jewish child who witnessed the growing wave of anti-Semitism, from being banned from public schools to seeing Hitler’s parades and experiencing the terror of Kristallnacht when synagogues burned and Jewish shops were vandalized. In March 1939, my parents managed to send me to safety on a Kindertransport to England, while they remained behind—my father later died in a detention center and my mother survived slave labor in Theresienstadt. Despite these hardships, I built a successful nursing career, eventually becoming part of the original open-heart surgery team in Los Angeles, always aware of how fortunate I was to have survived when many did not. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Renee Clement

I was born in Vienna, Austria, where my life changed dramatically when Hitler invaded in 1938 – I witnessed a Nazi parade from our balcony, and my father was attacked in our home simply for being Jewish before he fled to America through Switzerland. When we joined him in America, we arrived speaking only German and with nothing left of our former comfortable life, eventually settling in California where my mother decided we would no longer identify as Jewish to avoid discrimination. Despite these hardships, I built a new life in America, marrying and raising two wonderful children, later finding fulfillment through volunteer work with cultural organizations in Santa Barbara. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Alex Stein

I was born in Brno, Czechoslovakia, to a well-to-do German-speaking Jewish family, but fled to London in 1938 after facing antisemitism, insisting my brother Paul join me while my mother returned home. When my parents tried to escape, it was too late—they were sent to Theresienstadt and then murdered at Chelmno, along with 20 other family members. My brother and I escaped to Panama and eventually reached New York in 1941, where I worked as a mechanic, served in the U.S. Navy, met my future wife Doris, and built a successful career as an electronics engineer managing space programs for the U.S. Air Force. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Stella Better

I was born in Vienna, Austria, and witnessed the Nazis take over in 1938, forcing my family to separate as we fled for our lives. While my brother escaped to Palestine and my sister to Holland and eventually New York, I was fortunate to leave on a Kindertransport to London, though my parents were tragically deported to Auschwitz. After living through the Blitz in London, I came to the United States in 1944, where I built a new life with four children and nine grandchildren. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Kurt Singer

Born in Vienna as Kurt Deutsch, I risked everything publishing an underground newspaper with my wife Hilde that exposed Nazi concentration camps, and when discovered, I fled through Europe while she served prison time before reuniting in Sweden. From Sweden, I published critical works on Nazi atrocities until Göring demanded my extradition, forcing our escape to America where I lost contact with 66 family members who perished in the Holocaust. In America, I wrote over 100 books, including works on World War II espionage and notable biographies, while conducting intelligence work for the Allies and interviewing figures like Einstein and Trotsky. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Laura Rusk

I was born in Poland in 1922 and lived a comfortable life until Hitler invaded, forcing Jews to wear yellow stars and live in constant fear of deportation. In labor camps, I endured inhuman conditions, working to make thread and assemble bomb fuses until I risked everything to escape with a Czech prisoner, running through barbed wire only to be captured, interrogated, and sent to Auschwitz where I became prisoner 79564. After months of starvation, brutal work in the fields, and endless roll-calls, I was finally liberated by the Russian Army in 1945, somehow feeling protected through it all, as though God was telling me, “It’s not your time to die.” Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Nathan Zepell

I survived extreme poverty in Latvia, the horrors of Nazi occupation where I lost my family and fiancée during the Holocaust, and managed to escape a death march to become one of only 1,000 Latvian Jews to survive World War II. After struggling for years in New York with no money and unable to speak English, I eventually sold my pen inventions, found love with June Ruth Goldberg at age 50, and went on to hold patents for 40 pen designs that sold over 100 million pens. My journey from the lowest depths of despair to the highest jubilation demonstrates the resilience of the human spirit. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Klara Zimmer

I was born in Romania in 1912 and faced the terrors of the Holocaust when my family was deported to Terezin ghetto, where I worked in housing administration while caring for my nearly blind mother. In Auschwitz, I lost my mother to Josef Mengele’s selection and was beaten back when trying to follow her. I also lost my husband Alfred, who had voluntarily accompanied a transport of children to Auschwitz. After surviving slave labor in a German airplane factory, transport to Mauthausen, and liberation by American troops in May 1945, I rebuilt my life by marrying fellow survivor Josef Zimmer and finding new meaning through family in Canada and California. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Paul Gertler

I was born in Budapest in 1937, and my life changed forever when my father died in a Jewish Labor battalion and my mother was deported to Auschwitz. Living with my grandparents, I couldn’t go outside for fear of Fascist police or Arrow Cross terrorists who sent Jews to concentration camps or shot us into the Danube River. When the situation became desperate, I was placed in a safe house where I endured starvation and artillery bombardments in a dark basement. We were liberated by a Russian soldier who descended the stairs with a handgun, asking if there were Germans present, and in that moment, we knew we were finally free. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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Charles Bergere

I was born in Paris in 1929 and lived through the dark years of Nazi occupation, during which my family was deported to Auschwitz while I found refuge in a Catholic seminary. As a teenager, I joined the French Resistance group Groupe Soleil, fighting against German forces with a Sten machine gun under the nickname “Ouistiti.” After the war, my path led me from dental school to helping smuggle weapons for the Irgun, before eventually deserting the French Army and making my way to Canada and later California. Come to Portraits of Survival to learn more.

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