College hosted early morning Holocaust observance

The Magnolia Avenue Campus and Adult Education Program co-sponsored a program last week in observance of the 62nd anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The event was January 25 in the Community Room at the Magnolia Avenue Campus.

Auschwitz was the largest concentration camp of the Holocaust, a systematic extermination of millions of European Jews, Romanians, Slavs, intellectuals, homosexuals and political dissidents by the Nazis and their allies during World War II.

At the observance event, Henry Fribourg, a Knoxville resident, discussed how he and his family escaped from France when he was a teenager in January 1942 and took refuge in Cuba.

Fribourg’s grandparents remained in France and were arrested in April 1944. His grandmother perished at Auschwitz on May 15, 1944.

In 2004, he published his memoir, “I Gave You Life Twice: A Story of Survival, Dreams, Betrayals and Accomplishments.”
“Remembering is so important,” said Tamela Wheeler, assistant coordinator and teacher for Adult Education. “We need to recognize that the Holocaust did not happen that long ago, and there are parallels today to the current genocide occurring in the Darfur region of Sudan.”

“The Magnolia Avenue Campus is dedicated to bringing relevant topics for discussion to the community,” said Rosalyn Tillman, assistant dean for the campus.

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