Holocaust Remembrance Week Speaker: Dr. Hans Fisher

Dr. Hans Fisher was born on March 4, 1928, and he lived in Breslau, Germany as a child. By the time Dr. Fisher was ready to go to school, Hitler was already in power. Jewish children were not allowed to go to public schools any longer, so he attended a Jewish school. On the morning of November 10, following the first night of Kristallnacht (“night of broken glass”), Dr. Fisher’s father was arrested by the Gestapo and taken to Buchenwald Concentration Camp. Dr. Fisher shares his vivid memories of how his family escaped Germany in 1939. At 11 years old, he was one of 937 passengers aboard the MS St. Louis, a ship that left Germany for Cuba in 1939 to escape escalating antisemitism. Tragically, neither Cuba nor the US granted refuge to the ship’s passengers, who all were forced to return to Europe on the eve of WWII.