Holocaust survivor and Nobel laureate Prof. Emeritus Roald Hoffmann, chemistry, gave a lecture in commemoration of Holocaust Remembrance Day in Anabel Taylor Hall’s auditorium on April 24.
The event, hosted by Grinspoon Hillel, saw over 50 students and community member attendees, serving as a memorial and celebration of Jewish resilience throughout the Holocaust. Rabbi Talia Laster, Hillel’s campus rabbi, started the event by introducing the purpose of Yom HaShoah, a day of remembrance and celebration of the Jewish people’s strength throughout the Holocaust.
Hoffman spoke of his personal experience in the Holocaust in his lecture, beginning with, “I tell you a story. I fulfill my own desire to tell the good of the people who saved us,” Hoffmann said.
Hoffmann was born in 1937 in Złoczów, Poland, a town that shifted borders and saw bloodshed from Nazi occupation in his childhood. In a candid account of his childhood during the Holocaust, Hoffmann described going from a forced labor camp to the attic of a Ukrainian schoolhouse and finally to refugee camps before his family came to the U.S. in 1949.
In the labor camp, Hoffmann’s father had special privileges to come between the camp and town at certain times to complete road work. Eventually, Hoffmann and his mother escaped the labor camp to hide with a Ukrainian family his father found.
Hoffmann’s father chose to stay behind in an attempt to break others out of the labor camp by smuggling grenades and disassembled handguns from Hoffmann’s uncle into the camp. However, the attempt was “betrayed,” and his father was arrested and killed at the end of June of ’43.”
In a vivid description of the Ukrainian schoolhouse’s attic, Hoffmann recounted five family members living in silence and fear inside a cramped, cold space for over a year. Their hosts provided food, information and safety. Of the 4,000 of Jewish people in their community, only 200 survived.
In addition to Hoffmann’s account of survival, he shared the lessons learned from his experience, urging students against the dangers of groupthink and emphasizing the need for individual moral courage.
“We should not go through this again,” Hoffmann said, emphasizing that these lessons are the key to avoiding history repeating itself.
Laster shared a similar sentiment, emphasizing the necessity of reflecting on the Holocaust.
“Given the horror of the Holocaust, it would be easy to be frozen in time, traumatized and unable to heal or to look forward,” Laster said “We remember because each of these humans was a world lost unto themselves, deserving of honor, each deserving of honor … and we must study the past in order to prevent its return.”
Miriam Murphy ’28 expressed the importance of hearing Hoffmann’s story in an interview with The Sun before the event.
“I’m interested in hearing this talk especially because we are one of the last generations who are able to hear from survivors themselves about their stories,” Murphy said.
As a local, Hoffmann has the opportunity to share his story throughout the region. In March 2024, Hoffmann shared his life story for Trumansburg middle schoolers. He did so again for Ithaca College students as part of International Holocaust Remembrance Day on Jan. 27.
87-year-old Hoffmann recalls these talks as part of his mission to share the stories of those fallen in the Holocaust with younger generations.
“The remembering fills me with a certain sadness,” Hoffmann said. “But then I think of the other people who did not survive. … Who will speak for the dead?”
