At the annual Yom HaShoah events held across our communities each spring, we strive to remember and to better understand both the horrors of the Holocaust and bravery of the righteous gentiles who saved their neighbors.
The 2025 Yom HaShoah/Holocaust Remembrance Program held by the Center for Holocaust, Human Rights, & Genocide Education (Chhange) at Brookdale Community College on April 22 featured a Holocaust historian whose remarks enabled attendees to broaden their perspective on these aspects of this dark chapter in Jewish history.
Dr. Deborah Dwork is the founding director of the Center for the Study of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Crimes Against Humanity at the Graduate Center of City University of New York. She is credited with helping to establish the first doctoral program anywhere in the world specifically on Holocaust history and genocide studies.
Dwork is the author of the new book “Saints and Liars: The Stories of Americans who Saved Refugees from the Nazis.” The book shares the stories of American aid workers who led rescue efforts in Europe before the U.S. joined World War II.
In her talk at the Chhange Yom HaShoah event, Dwork shared the story of Martha and Reverend Waitstill Sharp of Wellesley Hills, Massachusetts, emissaries from the American Unitarian Association who arrived in Prague in February 1939. They were there in response to reports that 250,000 refugees were displaced in the area, faced danger, and were looking for aid and safe passage. Rumors said that Nazi Gestapo agents had infiltrated the area and that many people, especially Jewish families, had not registered with local authorities so as to stay hidden.
Waitstill assessed the situation in the area and told his superiors in the Unitarian Association that all the finances of his office in Prague had to be shrouded in complete secrecy, to prevent the Nazis from learning about whom they were assisting. The Unitarian Association accepted this highly unusual arrangement.
Martha got very involved in the rescue efforts as well, and went on to escort 30 families, many wanted by the Nazis, in a convoy to London as the parents had received visas to become domestic workers in England. On a few occasions in this journey, she was forced to bravely bluff to Nazi officers that the people in the convoy had all the correct paperwork. In her time in Prague, Martha aided the immigration of 3,500 families. She and Waitstill fled the area in August, days before she was to be arrested by the Nazis.
Martha’s efforts in Prague ignited in her an interest in activism and public speaking, which led her to become a speaker for Hadassah and a candidate for Congress. Sadly, this new career contributed to her estrangement from her husband and the two divorced in 1957.
The Yom HaShoah program was also notable for the candle lighting by Holocaust survivors, two performances of the Cedar Drive Middle School Chorus, the presentation of colors by the Colts Neck High School Navy JROTC, greetings from Brookdale Community College President Dr. David Stout, and remarks by Dr. Asya Darbinyan, executive director of Chhange. All were moving.
For this attendee, the presentation by Dr. Dwork stood out as it highlighted how small acts of bravery—which often involved deceit—had remarkable ripple effects and saved thousands.
Harry Glazer is the Middlesex County editor of The Jewish Link. He welcomes reader feedback and can be reached at [email protected]. Harry is also keenly interested in stories about the vibrancy of Jewish life in Monmouth County.
