■ WHY HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR IS LIVING THE AMERICAN DREAM
Ben continues to
fight intolerance
33
Jewish Telegraph
Friday February 20, 2015
|
NEWS
F
OR Holocaust survivor Ben Lesser, living the
American dream was his only goal after sur-
viving the horrors of the concentration
camps.
In his new book Living A Life That Matters: From Nazi
Nightmare to American Dream, Ben revealed the challenges
and successes before Nazi Germany, during the Second
World War and after his liberation to America.
Ben was born on October 18, 1928 to Shaindel (Shari) and
Lazar Leser in Krakow. He and sister Lola were the only two
of his family of seven to survive Auschwitz-Birkenau and
Dachau concentration camps.
He recalled: “My family lived a happy, Orthodox life. My
father had two successful
businesses.
“One was a kosher wine
and fruit-syrup manufac-
turing business named
Sklad and the other was a
chocolate factory, named
Pischinger’s.
“But when war broke out,
the Nazis marched right
into our house and life
turned upside down.”
Ben was 10 when the Nazis
came barging through the
doors to find Jews.
They broke into his fami-
ly home with burlap sacks
in their hands screaming
“throw all your valuables
in”, violently forced his
father to open the safe and
took his mother’s jewellery
off her wrist.
Ben added: “At the same
time, I heard crying from
the next door neighbour.
Lola and I saw a man swing-
ing a crying baby by his legs
screaming at the mother to
make him shut up.
“I could see the Nazi was
enjoying it. He killed the
baby instantly.”
As the war went on,
things became progressive-
ly worse for the Jews.
The Nazis confiscated his
father’s businesses and all
Jews were forced to leave
their homes and belongings.
They moved to a small
village on the outskirts of
Krakow.
Ben’s family had an unex-
pected twist of fate and
avoided entering the
Krakow Ghetto.
Though many of Ben’s rel-
atives died there, a young
suitor called Mechel Lieber
had eyes for Lola.
Ben explained: “He pro-
fessed his love for Lola and
told my father he wanted to
marry her.
“Mechel’s family were not
going into the ghetto and
were leaving Krakow. He
asked us to move with him
to Niepolomice, just outside
Krakow.
“Because they were madly
in love, my father said ‘yes’
and we were spared from the
certain death of the Krakow
Ghetto.”
In 1941, Lola and Mechel
married in a small family
wedding in their back gar-
den.
They moved into an
apartment, but one night
Mechel was warned of a raid
on the Jewish people.
In order to escape, they
hired a wagon and reached
Bochnia, southern Poland.
Ben said: “Terrible things
were happening in Bochnia.
“In the middle of the
night they picked up chil-
dren and threw them into a
truck. Parents were run-
ning after their children,
but were mowed down by
machine guns.
“Everyone tried to stay
away from Bochnia, but
coming from Krakow, we
had no choice but to stay.”
Once again, his sister’s
beauty saved them and they
managed to obtain forged
documents for the whole
family to escape.
Eventually though, the
family were transported to
Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Ben describes graphically
in his book, the inhumane
conditions in the cattle cars
as they were transported to
the death camp.
He said at Auschwitz “all
hell broke loose”.
He recalled: “Women and
children were directed to
the right and men to the
left.
“One minute I was hold-
ing on tightly to my little
brother and my sister
Goldie, and then the next
minute they were gone. I
never saw them again.”
Lola and Mechel were the
only other members of
Ben’s family to survive.
When the Second World
War ended, 18-year-old Ben
was taken to America.
Mechel and Lola had their
first child, Heshi, and, in
1947, they received their
visas and headed to New
York City aboard the steam
ship SS Ernie Pyle.
Ben received his visa a few
months later and his uncle
David made it possible for
him to receive enough mon-
ey to book passage on a
ship.
He was taken from Bre-
merhaven, Germany, on the
SS Ernie Pyle.
They were on the ship for
two weeks and, just as they
were about to lose hope,
they approached New York
City.
Ben spotted Lola and
Mechel waiting outside the
exit door and they fell into
each other’s arms, laughing
and crying.
He said: “I knew that
everything would be okay
because one day I’d be an
American.”
Ben met Jean Singer at a
Friday night dinner in Los
Angeles and instantly knew
she would make the perfect
wife.
They married on June 17,
1950, and he became an
American citizen three
years later. They have two
children, Sherry and Gail.
Ben’s determined attitude
led him to succeed in many
jobs throughout his Ameri-
can life, including uphol-
stery, plumbing, plastering,
painting and writing.
He was a UPS employee
for 25 years and, in 1980,
started his real estate busi-
ness Ben Lesser and Associ-
ates.
Jean and Ben left the real
estate business and retired
to Las Vegas.
In 1995, he was invited by
his 10-year-old grandson
Adam to talk to his class
about surviving the concen-
tration camps.
More than 50 years since
he had spoken about it, he
was determined not to let
its horror contaminate his
American life and family.
In 2009, Ben founded the
Zachor Foundation with the
goal to reach more than six
million individuals who
want their voices to be
heard and to stop intoler-
ance.
He also started to hand
out badges which consist of
the word Zachor (remember)
to represent the message he
tries to convey.
Through the Zachor
Foundation, Ben founded I
Shout Out, for people to act,
speak out against intoler-
ance, injustice, racism or
bullying.
He said: “When enough
people are willing to speak
up and speak out, change
will happen and the world
will be a better place.”
BY ZOE COHEN
❝
He killed
the baby
instantly
❝
The next
minute they
were gone
HORRORS: Ben Lesser
■ zachorfoundation.org
BY SIMON YAFFE
ARTIST Julian Hanford has
devised a unique way to mark the
Holocaust.
London-based Julian is aiming
to create an epic art installation
of six million domino tiles enti-
tled FALL.
But to deliver the project —
which he hopes will take place in
around six months time — he
needs to raise £1.58 million.
Consequently, it will be crowd-
funded on Phundee.
As part of the campaign, Julian
has recorded a new version of
Tears for Fears’ Mad World,
which features his 13-year-old
daughter Aurelia, which is being
released on iTunes, Amazon and
Spotify.
A video is also being released
of the track
Julian, 54, said: “I went to
Bergen-Belsen when I was 13 as
an army cadet. It left such an
impression in me.
“What struck me was the sense
of desolation — it was tangible.
“Nothing was growing there
and there were no birds singing.”
He explained that his art
explores the human condition and
the ways people traditionally
think about things.
Hereford-born Julian, who is
not Jewish but has maternal Jew-
ish antecedents, added: “What I
could never get my head around is
the scale of the Holocaust.
“Through the six million domi-
noes, I want to get that sense of
scale across.
“I struggle to visualise the vast
figure — it is an abstract number,
diluted by the passage of time.
“FALL is about trying to re-
frame the memory of the Holo-
caust 70 years on. Most people
have a basic understanding of
these events, but in some way the
emotion and scale of the Holo-
caust is now somewhat discon-
nected with our present day
lives.”
The work consists of a block of
tiles, which will take up the area
of a football pitch.
The tumbling of the dominoes
— which Julian is planning at
Berlin’s Templehof Airport —
will take around 12 hours.
The gigantic block will be set
up by world champion stunt domi-
no master Robin Weijers and his
team. The current world record is
4.5 million dominoes.
A Holocaust survivor will push
the first tile, setting off the chain
reaction of dominoes falling.
After the event, Julian plans to
send every school in the country a
domino with an education pack.
Prior to the toppling, Andre
Singer’s documentary Night will
Fall will be shown. It was recent-
ly featured on Channel 4.
The programme chronicles the
making of the 1945 British gov-
ernment documentary German
Concentration Camps Factual
Survey, which languished in
British archives for almost seven
decades.
Julian said: “The poppies at the
Tower of London successfully
reframed the symbol of the poppy.
“Everybody has worn them for
years, but they buy them without
thinking what it symbolises.
“The installation made people
think what it is about.”
Nearly a million ceramic pop-
pies were planted in the dry moat
at the Tower.
■ Details: www.fall15.com
MP Luciana’s
abuser banned
from London
A WHITE supremacist activist, who tried to
organise a rally against the “Jewification of
Stamford Hill”, has been arrested for inciting
racial hatred and banned from entering Lon-
don.
Joshua Bonehill-Paine, of Yeovil, is
accused of sending antisemitic messages on
Twitter to Jewish MP Luciana Berger, who
represents Liverpool Wavertree.
Bonehill-Paine wrote on his blog that police
seized two mobile phones, a laptop and a
“priceless” Nazi party badge.
The Board of Deputies welcomed his arrest.
Vice-president Jonathan Arkush said: “It
does not come as a surprise to discover that
the self-promoting far-right activist with a
criminal record has been arrested again.
“It is reassuring to see the police are tak-
ing strong measures to curb the actions of
haters like him.”
In January, Bonehill-Paine called for a
“mass protest” in March against what he
perceived as the “complete Jewification” of
Stamford Hill, in north London, with particu-
lar focus on the Shomrim, a Jewish neigh-
bourhood watch group.
Since his arrest, he has written on his blog
“I will not stand for Jewry of any kind” — and
vowed to expand his campaign nationwide.
Why Julian will topple six million
dominoes in £1.58m Shoah tribute
UNIQUE: Julian Hanford
