Interview Summaries

Judith Coliver was a young Jewish woman in Germany during the beginning of Hitler’s rise to power. She was born on the twenty-sixth of July in 1922. At the interview in 1999, she was seventy-seven. She was brought up within the Karlsruhe Boarders. Her family was fairly average until the political change. Her father was a decorated infantry man of the first world war. He was injured, not fatally, by an explosion. She was just reaching her adolescent years when the Nazi party began to make an impact in Germany. She was a fan of making crafts, sports, and drawing. Coliver stated that the school she attended was a public school, so inevitably the school was filled with non-Jews and Jews. Of course, when the anti-Antisemitism really took off the schools then became segregated. At first Jews were allowed in class, but they were not treated like the non-Jews. She stated in the interview, “ The teacher pointed to a young woman in the class and said, “Now this is the typical Aryan woman”. She was not allowed to go to school during the year of 1937. Judith Coliver said that she never really considered herself a German. She said, “I never considered myself a German because I was an outcast by the age of ten”. Other than the anti-Antisemitism demonstrated in the schools, and the forced donning of the star of David she really didn't experience the worst of what came. She was fortunate enough to get out early enough to use a visa to enter the United States. She, of course, entered through Elise Island, but then she sailed down to the Panama Canal. She then continued to California. Life for Judith Coliver changed drastically due to the shenanigans of Hitler and his followers. For starters, she was now a resident of the United States. Further more, she no longer had much contact with any of her friends from home, save a few. She was able to forgive the German people through the German population in the U.S. Joseph Morton, a survivor of the Holocaust, gave his recounting of the events at age seventy-three. He last name at the time was actually Joseph Mokwitz. He was born on August 11, 1924 in the Polish town of Lodz. He, unlike the other interviewees I watched, did not have any contact with any non-Jewish kids. He attributed that to the fact that his neighborhood was very heavily populated with fellow Jews. Morton spoke about his dealings with the non-Jews as a kid, and what he had to say was, “…there wasn't a picnic living with them together, so uh, the association with them, I didn't do”. He spoke also about how the anti-Semites would not enter far into his neighborhood for the fact that they could not get away with things they wanted to do. This was due to the fact that a few of the bigger, buffer Jews would not allow for it. Mr. Morton was the oldest of seven siblings. He had five brothers and one sister. He did not get to have a normal coming of age party. Instead, he said some prayers and had a get together back at his house. His family was very familiar with anti-Semitic activities and acts, but they merely heard about the political movements within Germany. He said, “I was only a kid at the time….you don’t really pay attention to those things as a kid. It goes in one ear and out the other.” His father was actually in the Polish army at the time and was up towards the Russian front. He was captured and imprisoned around the time that the Nazi’s stormed into Lodz, Poland, so he had no idea what was going on. The Morton Family was soon put in a ghetto. As the Germans began to liquidate the ghetto, Joseph Morton and his family were shipped out to a handful of camps. He credited his being able to stay so fit through the majority of the ordeal to the stock from which he came and luck. However, he did say closer to the end there that he did catch the pandemic and became very sick. He remained this way until liberation, at which point he was given proper medical attention. His life changed significantly after this event in the fact that he no longer lives in Europe, where he more than likely would have stayed; had it not been for Hitler’s reign.