An ad ran in the Daily Cougar asking students to find one person who died at Auschwitz, Germany’s largest concentration and death camp. The ad implied that the Holocaust never happened, but it was a Jewish conspiracy that paved the way for the creation of Israel.
Chaja Verveer knows first hand that Germans were eradicating Jews in several countries. She was born in Holland in 1941 and went into hiding in 1942. She lectured about her life in hiding and being a Holocaust child survivor.
“Holland was neutral during the first war, and had every intention of being neutral if another war broke out, but when Germany attacked and threatened to destroy Amsterdamthe Dutch backed off and the Jewish population fell into German hands,” Verveer said.
Verveer was captured and taken to Westerbrook transit camp when she was 2-years-old. A 14-year-old boy had given her and several other Jews up when he was captured by the Germans.
“Germans would go house to house to search for Jews, and if that didn’t work, they offered money for information on hidden Jews,” Verveer said.
Because of the ordeal, Verveer didn’t know her family when they reunited after 2 years in the concentration camps. Her brothers were sent to one place, her mom another and her father had died because Germans linked him with the resistance.
“It was impossible to have a happy childhood. We think that we are done with war when it is all over, but we haven’t even begun to solve the psychological problems.”
Verveer said that racism is a substitute for thinking.
“I started speaking when I heard people say that the Holocaust didn’t happen. That it was just a Jewish conspiracy. I don’t know any religion that would sacrifice 6 million people to start a state.”
“People don’t want to talk about what happened. People who collaborated with Germany didn’t want to talk about what they had done because they didn’t want to get punished. People who were with the resistance did a lot of things that were not nice nor pretty so they didn’t want to talk. Jewish victims couldn’t talk about what they went through because everyone told them to be quite.”
Because she was small during her trial, it took Verveer about 15 years of research to find out what had happened to her.
“I don’t have any memories of being in the camp, and I am glad because none of them were good,” Verveer said.
My first memory is at a beach house on Bolivar Peninsula.The house was yellow with white trim and set right on the beach.
Beach and Bolivar were a major part of my life. Any time we had anything to celebrate, we would spend the week end at the beach in Galveston. We have gone to Galveston for so many years that we forget that Hurricane Ike devastated Galveston Island and Bolivar Peninsula.
Recently, my parents and I were talking about were to have my graduation party, and Dad had brought up the idea of a beach house. We are used to going to the coast, we forget that Bolivar isn’t there anymore. At least, not what we knew as Bolivar.
My parents and I had traveled to Bolivar Peninsula last December. We drove through Winnie and went over Rollover Pass. When we reached Crystal Beach we didn’t know where we were. A place that holds so many memories, more than 20 years for me and more than 40 years for my parents, was radically transformed. The sand dunes were gone, we could see the coast in places that we shouldn’t have. Bolivar had lost a good three feet of elevation.
Almost a year after Hurricane Ike, there are debates on what should happen to Bolivar Peninsula.
Residents want to rebuild the peninsula and reconstruct Rollover Pass to allow tourist in, others want to open the area up for casinos. One resident, Richard Black from Pearland, wants to revamp the peninsula for fishing.
In an article he wrote to the Galveston County Daily he argued that if Bolivar spent $6 million it could open an economical base as an angler destination. He suggested to build piers out to the bay, dredge Rollover Pass and open areas of beaches between Galveston and Sabine Pass.
Opening the area to fishing will bring economical development to Bolivar Peninsula as well as preserve the beaches and ecology.
Black introduced the most effective use of an area that was wiped clean by Hurricane Ike.
The peninsula will never be what it was before the hurricane, but sometimes sentiments must be put aside so a new generation will enjoy Bolivar.
