FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — Less than 100 years ago, the mass murder of millions of Jews and others changed the world. Tuesday, the stories of the holocaust traveled to Fresno to serve as a living form of history.
The images are startling, showing life during the holocaust as millions were murdered by Nazis. The pictures and their stories came to Fresno High as part of the traveling Holocaust memorial exhibit, “The Courage to Remember.”
Fresno High Student Marta Morales said, “I really like it because it teaches us a lot about what happened back in the day and what they had to go through and the struggle was super bad. It made me upset to see them treat people like this.”
Morales was one of the many, who got a chance to look at the exhibit after learning about the holocaust in class. Students looked at pictures, watched videos and even interacted on computers for a look at what unfolded during the 1930s and 1940s. 6,000,000 people were killed and many others sent to concentration camps. Librarian Sue Navarro says it’s history that didn’t happen that long ago.
“The targeted hatred and not just one group of people, but many groups of people,” said Navarro. “That’s one of the things that I tell students if we lived back at that time, many of us would have been targets.”
While students learned about history, they were also charged not to be a bystander and to focus on kindness. A message that hit home.
Morales explained, “I think it motivates people here to standup for themselves and standup for their people and what they believe in.”
Each student was handed a bracelet to remind them of a way to learn from history and help change their world.
In addition to Fresno High, several other schools are expected to come out and take a look at these exhibits. It runs until March 20