First Person: Conversations with Holocaust Survivors

“The timing of our escape was indeed a miracle,” remembers Holocaust survivor Frank Cohn about his arrival in New York City on October 30, 1938. Frank and his mother got out of Nazi Germany just weeks before Kristallnacht (the “Night of Broken Glass”), when authorities and ordinary citizens committed a wave of violent, orchestrated attacks across the country on Jewish people, their businesses, and their places of worship. Frank’s relative security was short-lived. Just five years after finding a safe haven, he went back to Europe—this time to fight the Nazis. Watch to learn more about Frank’s experiences in Nazi Germany as a young Jewish boy and later as part of an intelligence unit with the US Army. Submit a question for Frank during the live discussion on Wednesday, April 16, at 1 p.m. ET by signing into your YouTube or Gmail account.

Marking 25 years, First Person is a monthly, hour-long live interview between journalist Bill Benson and a Holocaust survivor on the Museum’s YouTube page, and it includes questions from the audience. This program is made possible through generous support from the Louis Franklin Smith Foundation.