Loyola Honors 86th Kristallnacht Anniversary

The History Department and Loyola Libraries co-sponsored an annual commemoration of the anniversary of Kristallnacht and 80th anniversary of the destruction of Hungarian Jewry Nov. 11. Agnes Schwartz, a Holocaust survivor, and Rochelle Rainey, daughter of survivor Magda Brown, spoke.

At the event, six candles were lit in honor of the six million European Jews who died during the Holocaust. Sheets with historical statistics and an explanation of Kristallnacht were handed out.

Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass, took place Nov. 9-10, 1938 throughout Germany, Austria and the Sudetenland. The name is a reference to the broken glass littered on the streets from the destroyed Jewish homes, synagogues and businesses, according to the United States Holocaust Museum. 

Hungary, a German ally during WWII, had discriminatory laws against Hungarian Jews but didn’t deport Jews with Hungarian citizenship until 1944. Beginning in March 1944, Jewish Hungarians were targeted. 

Schwartz is a Hungarian Jewish Holocaust survivor who was rescued by a Christian Hungarian woman. Her autobiography, “A Roll of the Dice: A Memoir of a Hungarian Survivor,” was sold at the event.

At age 11, Schwartz disguised herself as the niece of her former Christian housekeeper, remaining in hiding until the Soviet Union liberated Budapest in 1945.

Third-year political science major Thomas Erskine said he’d never heard a Holocaust survivor speak before.

“It’s a lot to take in,” Erskine said. “But hearing these important stories from so many different people is what keeps the history alive.”

Schwartz’s parents were deported, and her mother was killed while her father survived under harsh conditions. Her other family, who remained in Budapest, were killed on the Danube River by the far-right political party Arrow Cross. The Arrow Cross shot an estimated 20,000 Jews from Budapest between December 1944 and January 1945, according to USHMM.

Schwartz said she’s worried about antisemitism being on the rise today.

“I find it very, very scary,” Schartwz said. “I have always found it very scary for Jews to gather in one spot.”

Schwartz said she and her parents were in the process of moving to the U.S. in 1942, but their visa was canceled, so they remained in Hungary. In 1947, Schwartz and her dad immigrated to Chicago to join her aunts. Her dad later went back to Hungary while she stayed in the U.S.

Schwartz has never returned to Hungary.

“To me, it’s a big cemetery,” Schwartz said. “I know that Budapest was rebuilt and everybody tells me it’s beautiful, but I am almost 92 years old and I will never go back. I don’t have anybody left there to go back to.”

Schwartz, in her talk, urges the Loyola community to be kind. 

“All people are created equal and we must respect each other in our different ways,” Schwartz said. “Just because somebody may look different than you do, reach out and shake their hands and see if they want to be friends.”

Paul Voelker is the director of the Information Commons and began working for Loyola in 2013— the first year the event was held. Voelker said it’s important to host this event. 

“You might not be able to take an advanced history class or something like that,” Voelker said. “So it’s a great way to learn about really important human issues.”

Rainey, daughter of Hungarian Jewish Holocaust survivor Magda Brown, spoke about her mother and reflected on the impact she had on her life. Brown died in 2020 at the age of 93, according to her website.

Brown was pushed onto a crowded boxcar in 1944, on her 17th birthday. From there, she was taken to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp where she was permanently separated from her mother.

Brown was later transferred by boxcar to Allendorf, Germany to work in a factory. She then went on a death march to Buchenwald where she and other prisoners escaped to a barn. They were liberated there by American soldiers.

After the war, Brown went to Chicago to be with her uncle, assisted by a chaplain and other volunteers.

Rainey, a Rogers Park native, spoke of her mother’s positive attitude, emphasizing her experience growing up surrounded by Holocaust survivors and kids of survivors.

When the Illinois Holocaust Museum opened in 2009, it was across the street from her mother’s house and Brown eventually started speaking there.

Rainey said her mother raised her and her brother to never hate and shared three messages from her mother. 

Brown’s messages were: “One. Think before you hate. Two. Stand up to the deniers. Three. Protect your freedoms.”

Third-year psychology major Izzy Hasal said she’s heard from survivors before having grown up in Skokie, IL where the Illinois Holocaust Museum is located.

“I really liked from the second speaker, the daughter of the Holocaust survivor, talking about being kind to others and not letting hate take over your life,” Hasal said.

Patti Ray, founding Hillel director emerita and Hebrew program mentor of the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, helped organize the event and introduced the speakers.

“Hearing a child of a survivor speak is powerful and important for this generation of students we have today because they’re the last generation to be able to hear directly from a Holocaust survivor,” Ray said.

Dr. Elliot Lefkovitz, professor emerititus, taught a history class at Loyola titled “The Holocaust and 20th Century Genocide,” which was started in the mid 1980s. He helped found the Illinois Holocaust Museum, later producing several Holocaust documentaries and interviewing hundreds of survivors sharing their stories.

“It’s important to hear messages of people who have been victimized by bigotry and prejudice and how they have not been defeated by it but rather have, in the case of Holocaust survivors, rebuilt their lives and how you have to go forward and rebuild rather than dwell on the past.” Lefkovitz said.

Lefkovitz and others at the event said they’re worried about the recent wave of antisemitism. 

“Don’t be a bystander,” Lefkovitz said. “Rather, be an upstander. Take positive action to make the world a better place. Make the world a better place for peace and freedom.”