8th grade English classes attended a very special presentation about the Holocaust on February 23. Local resident and researcher Linda Ziskind was gracious enough to share her family’s personal collection of rare documents and artifacts with the students. Linda’s collection of letters from her German relatives (including those sent from Nazi internment camps), foreign visa applications, travel documents, and photographs is one of the most comprehensive in existence, and was left to her by her grandparents after they escaped Nazi Germany in the late 1930s and settled on a farm in New Jersey. While both heartbreaking and hopeful, Ms. Ziskind’s presentation did a wonderful job of personalizing the Holocaust for the students. The original copies of her 500-piece “Mayer/Bierig/Ehrmann” family collection are currently housed at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC., which you can view online here...
“We are extremely lucky to have Ms. Ziskind as a resource and sincerely thank her for volunteering her time and knowledge for the enrichment of Chatham’s students,” remarked eighth grade English teacher Jeffery Artist.
Moving forward, the students will finish reading the novel Refugee in Mr. Artist’s English class, embark on a Holocaust timeline experience in Mr. Connelly’s Social Studies class, and complete research projects under the guidance of Mrs. Eager, our school librarian.
