Transcript My Hero: Oskar Schindler - Wegman

My Hero: Oskar
Schindler
By: Alexa Wegman
Background
• b. April 28, 1908- Zwittau, Austria-Hungary
• Born into a rich family, but very troubled and rebellious
– Expelled from technical school (1924); raced motorcycles; arrested once in 1931
and once in 1932 for public intoxication, disorderly conduct, and assault; was a
well-known womanizer (had two kids with a woman who was NOT his wife1933 & 35), arrested in 1941 for dealing on the black market
• Married Emilie Pelzl on March 6, 1928
• 1935- joined the German Party as a way to boost his business sales
• 1939- joined the Nazi Party (for the same reason mentioned above)
A Hero In tHe MAkIng…
• Sept. 1939- Schindler went to
Krakow to open his own factory
where he would manufacture
mess kits & field kitchenware
• Deutsche Emailwarenfabrik
(D.E.F. or Emalia) opened in Dec.
1939
• 1941: 200 Jews worked in the
factory, later that year the
number increased to 550 Jews
• Schindler hired Jews b/c he didn’t
have to pay them as muchmaximizing his profit
• The more money Schindler made,
the less likely the Nazis were to
shut down the factory and ship
off the workers
• After seeing the cruelty of the
Nazis (shot and killed a mother &
her eight-year-old son), Schindler
began protecting his workers by
making the kids 4-5 years older
and the elders years younger on
their work/I.D. cards
• Schindler began participating w/
an Anti-Nazi organization (1942)
A Hero In tHe MAkIng cont…
• Amon Goeth came to the nearby Plaszow labor/concentration camp
– Decided to finally “remove” all the Jews from the Krakow Ghetto (March 13,
1943)
– Schindler kept “his” Jews at the factory all night in order to spare their lives,
and he succeeded. However, they still had to go to Plaszow
WHy He’s A Hero: FAct BAsed
• Schindler soon realized that in order to protect the Jews, he would have to have control of
them at all times; so he built his own camp for his Jewish workers, and it was attached to the
factory
– He spent a large amount of money in bribery to get the camp approved, and all the
while he risked exposing his real, unNazi-like intentions
• However, Emalia had to close b/c the war was getting too close. Schindler chose to move the
factory so the workers wouldn’t be sent to other camps and to an almost guaranteed death
• Moved the factory to Zwittau, and made a list of the workers he would be taking with him.
“Schindler’s List” consisted of 800 males and 300 females
• All of those on the list survived the war and the Holocaust, all thanks to Oskar Schindler
• Schindler is accredited with saving over 1,200 lives during the Holocaust
– This is the largest number of people saved by a single person during that time
“I could have done more…”
Exhibiting Schindler’s flaws and heroic traits
Explanation of the Clip
• The war ended on May 8, 1945 at midnight
• The Soviets were quickly approaching the factory, and if Oskar was caught
he would surely be killed on spot without a chance to explain what he had
done. Oskar and his wife had to head west
• Oskar freed the factory’s Jews, and divided up things he had, like cloth,
alcohol, and cigarettes, and gave them to the Jews for something to trade
on the black market, and as a sign of peace and thanks
• “His” Jews felt so incredibly indebted and thankful to Oskar, that they gave
him a letter explaining everything that he had done for them during the
war. They hoped if he was caught, the letter would spare his life; every
worker signed that letter. They also gave him a gold ring, inscribed with
the saying “whoever saves a single soul, it is as if he saved the world
entire.”
WHy He’s A Hero: My opInIon
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In my opinion, a hero is someone who is willing to sacrifice oneself for his/her cause,
but they can also seem relatable, and not like some God-like persona
Schindler is a hero because he risked his life for what he felt was right
He had many flaws, which made him a REAL person with his own demons and flaws
to overcome. However, the flaws didn’t hold him back from making an impact
Oskar gave up his entire fortune to help a group of people that had been turned
against and treated in the most inhumane ways imaginable
Instead of acting in the same ways as the rest of the Nazi Party, Oskar took the
suicidal chance of defying their ideals and incentives. He took a stand for what he felt
was right, and his stand saved over 1,200 peoples’ lives
He did many things for bragging rights, but this wasn’t one of those things. If he so
much as mentioned what he was doing, he would have been executed. He was a
man who loved danger, but he was also a man who loved people; and the latter gave
him more strength than anything, I believe
His story is so inspiring because it is unlike any other out there. He was the last
person you would think of to do something as courageous and heroic as this.
However, in the end he broke away from all the stereotypes that plagued him, and he
became his own person- a protector of Jews, a savior
scHIndler’s oWn coMMent on
what he did
"The persecution of Jews in occupied Poland
meant that we could see horror emerging
gradually in many ways. In 1939, they were
forced to wear Jewish stars, and people were
herded and shut up into ghettos. Then, in the
years '41 and '42 there was plenty of public
evidence of pure sadism. With people
behaving like pigs, I felt the Jews were being
destroyed. I had to help them. There was no
choice.“
-Oskar Schindler, 1964
AFter tHe WAr…
• Oskar Schindler was completely broke after WWII
• He and his wife, Emilie, moved around some, but Oskar ended up leaving
her in 1957 and went back to Germany
• He survived financially by depending on checks given to people who had
lost everything in the war, and those given to Oskar from the Schindlerjuden
(a.k.a. Schindler Jews)
• Today 7,000 descendants of Schindler Jews live in the US and Europe, many
of them are in Israel.
• Before WWII, Poland was home to 3.5 million Jews, today less than 4,000
Jews inhabit Poland
AWARDS
•Plaque in Israel’s
“Park of Heroes”
•Declared a
“Righteous Gentile” in
Israel
•Tree planted w/ his
name along the
“Avenue of the
Righteous,” which
leads to the Yad
Vashem museum in
Jerusalem, Israel
The End of
a Hero
•d. Oct. 9, 1974 in
Frankfurt, Germany at age
66
•Cause of death: heart
attack
•Last wish was to be buried
in Jerusalem. He said, “My
children are here…”
•He was buried in
Jerusalem, and on his
tombstone it says, “The
unforgettable savior of
1,200 Jews.”
Works Cited
• http://www.schindlerjews.com/
• http://www.oskarschindler.com/
• Williams, John. “Remembrances.” Schindler’s List
Original Soundtrack. MCA, 1993. CD.
• Schindler’s List. Dir. Steven Spielberg. Perf. Liam
Neeson. Universal Pictures, 1993. Film.
• Wukovits, John F. Oskar Schindler. San Diego: Lucent
Books, 2003.