By Julie McCay Turner
When Thea Aschkenase was a young girl, her life was dramatically different from those lived by the students in Ms. Curro’s 5th grade with whom she met at Lane School in late May.
Earlier in the year, the class had read Number the Stars, Lois Lowry’s 1989 Newbery Award classic about a family who conceals a young Jewish girl in their home during World War II in Denmark. Aschhenase, a young Jewish girl living in Germany, Italy and Poland before and during the war, shared a first-hand account of her life during those times, the losses her family suffered during the Holocaust, and how she and her mother survived.
Lane School Principal Rob Ackerman said the talk was “appropriately done, and certainly gave our students the type of firsthand account which will help them be culturallyaware members of our community.” Lori Alper, parent of a student in the class, is also Aschkenase’s step-granddaughter and arranged the talk.
Aschkenase has recently released her memoir, Remembering, the story of her happy Munich childhood, a less-than-happy time in hiding from the Nazis , her 1944 internment at Auschwitz where she lost her father and brother, then relocating to Israel before coming to the United States where she became a citizen committed to ‘giving back.’ With her distinctive accent and soft voice, Aschkenase was thoughtful in answering the students’ questions.
After joining a Worcester State University program for students over 60 in 1994, Aschkenase earned her degree in Urban Studies, cum laude, in 2007.
When hunger was a problem during her long odyssey, Aschkenase yearned for a simple piece of bread, “enough to stop the hunger.” That experience foreshadowed the work in which she is currently involved. A member of Worcester’s Hunger Outreach Team, Aschkenase has created a program where breakfast is available to students, every day and regardless of their ability to pay.
Watch the Bedford TV recording of Thea Aschkenase’s Lane School visit
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