Memories of a Holocaust Survivor - Irving Farber

From my earliest childhood memories, I recall my dad speaking about his experiences in the holocaust. When he started talking about it, which wasn't often, you just listened. You'd occasionally hear him screaming in his sleep, reliving the nightmare of the holocaust.

As I heard his stories, they were disconnected, with no organized chronology. Most of the time, you had very little idea as to when a particular story took place, and even my father was fuzzy on the timeframe.

When I was about thirteen, an event occurred that imprinted itself indelibly in my mind. While shopping with his family in downtown Brooklyn, my father encountered a man who had been a kapo (guard) at one of the slave labor camps where he had been interned. I can still see the confrontation, which is described in the book, as clearly as if it happened yesterday.

When my father neared eighty, I realized that all his stories would be lost to future generations when he died; and, when I died, no one in the family would have any knowledge of the suffering he endured. I persuaded him to collaborate with me to get his story on paper. It took two years, and here's the product of our efforts.

His story is too important for it not to endure and serve as a lesson to future generations. What happened to him and the Jewish people must never be allowed to happen again - to Jews or any ethnic group.

Don't ever let it happen again!