A Timeline of Tragedy Holocaust Retrospective Presentation by Mark J. Kuntz

Hitler becomes Führer of Germany August 19, 1934

July 23, 1938 Nazis order Jews to apply for identity cards October 5, 1938 Jewish passports required by law to be stamped with a red “J” November 23, 1939 Polish Jews over the age of 10 are required to wear yellow stars on their clothing

Kristallnacht On November 9, 1938, Herschel Grynszpan, a 17 year old Jew living in Paris, shot and killed a member of the German Embassy. Nazi storm troopers beat and murdered Jews, broke into and wrecked Jewish homes, and brutalized Jewish women and children. All over Germany, Austria and other Nazi controlled areas, Jewish shops. department stores, and synagogues were vandalized and desecrated. In total, 7500 businesses and 267 synagogues were destroyed. 91 Jews were killed.

"The Jewish people ought to be exterminated root and branch. Then the plague of pests would have disappeared in Poland at one stroke.“ Der Stürmer, a Nazi newspaper, published by Julius Streicher September 1939

January 25, 1940 Nazis choose the town of Oswiecim (Auschwitz) near Krakow as site of a new concentration camp. September 16, 1940 Congress passes the United States military conscription act.

March 1, 1941 Himmler makes his first visit to Auschwitz, during which he orders Kommandant Höss to begin massive expansion, including a new compound to be built at nearby Birkenau that can hold 100,000 prisoners.

December 7, 1941 The United States is attacked by Japanese aircraft at Pearl Harbor. The next day, the United States and Britain declare war on Japan.

"I ask nothing of the Jews except that they should disappear.“ Hans Frank, Gauleiter of Poland 1941

December 10, 1942 The first transport of Jews from Germany arrives at Auschwitz.

“… Most of you know what it means to see a hundred corpses lying together, five hundred, or a thousand. To have gone through this and yet - apart from a few exceptions, examples of human weakness - to have remained decent fellows, this is what has made us hard. This is a glorious page in our history that has never been written and shall never be written … “ Heinrich Himmler, to SS Group Leaders in Posen October 4, 1943

April 14, 1944 Elie Wiesel and his family are deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

June 6, 1944 D-Day: Allied forces land in Normandy.

October through December 1944 On October 30, the gas chambers at Auschwitz are used for the last time. Oskar Schindler saves 1200 Jews by moving them from Plaszow labor camp to his hometown of Brunnlitz.

April 29, 1945 United States 7th Army liberates Dachau. April 30, 1945 Hitler commits suicide in his Berlin bunker. November 20, 1945 The tribunal at Nuremberg convenes to try Nazi war criminals.

Aftermath Military Casualties 24,456,700 Civilian Casualties 32,326,100 Jewish Casualties 5,754,000 Total Casualties 62,536,800 Holocaust Survivors Living Today 834,000

“I decided to devote my life to telling the story because I felt that having survived I owe something to the dead, and anyone who does not remember betrays them again.” Elie Wiesel Mark Kuntz CIS 101: Introduction to Computers April, 2007