Illinois Holocaust Museum to open this weekend

Aaron Elster still recalls Oct. 10, 1942, as vividly as if it were yesterday.

He was waiting with his family to board a train for Treblinka, a Nazi concentration camp in Poland, when his dad bent down and whispered to him: "Run."

Elster ran, and because he did, he survived the Holocaust while nearly everyone else in his family was murdered.

Today, Elster believes it's his mission to educate people about the Nazi atrocities during World War II, which included the annihilation of 6 million Jews. One way he's doing that is by serving on the board of the new Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center at 9603 Woods Dr. in Skokie.

"If we have any purpose for our existence, it has to be this. It has to be that we teach people what happened," Elster said. "It's not just a Holocaust museum. It's a way for us, the survivors, to get to the young people. To teach them."

Education is the purpose of this architecturally stunning building, which opens to the public Sunday, April 19.

While it powerfully tells the story of the war's horrors, it also teaches visitors about Jewish resilience, the perils of hatred and bigotry, and about past and present genocide around the world. The 235-seat lecture hall, for example, will be the location for an upcoming lecture series focused on international human rights issues.

"There's a lot of hope in this building," said the museum's executive director, Rick Hirschhaut. "The universal lessons of the Holocaust continue to have relevance in the world today."

Museum highlights

The tour

Organized chronologically, the two-hour tour begins with the video introductions of a few victims, who you'll follow through the tour. Some survive, some don't. It also sets the scene for what life was like in Europe during that time.

Twenty-six audio/visual elements, photos and artifacts dot a winding sequence of rooms and are used to tell the story in powerful ways - the TV screens loudly blare footage of the war's outbreak, for example. A corral-styled area surrounds a real German rail car, which you can walk in or around, that may have transported Jews to the death camps.

"It's not like walking through an art gallery," Hirschhaut said. "You're in the atmosphere of the experience."

Other interesting visuals include a re-creation of the ornate room where "The Final Solution" was ratified, an almost pitch-black room to explain the crematoriums, a vandalized synagogue facade to tell the story of Kristallnacht, and a glass-covered pit containing actual Nazi memorabilia that visitors walk across, to mark the end of the war.

"The whole idea is that you walk on it, because it means nothing," he said.

As the tour ends, the rooms become brighter and higher, signifying the ascent into light and the return to life.

The Harris Family Foundation Lobby

The architectural style of the museum's lobby is called "brutal" for a reason. It's a dark, industrial-looking area with gray concrete block walls, a dark metal desk and no windows. It sets the tone immediately upon entering.

The Miller Family Youth Exhibition

Since the main museum is not recommended for children younger than 12, there is a large area for students that teaches age-appropriate lessons on character, such as standing up for others and being a responsible citizen. A unique feature is a high-tech virtual reality game where the player's behavior determines the outcome of a situation.

The Room of Rememberance

First names of many Holocaust victims - in English, Hebrew and Yiddish - adorn the circular walls of this emotionally powerful room. Written in different sizes and fonts, they rise all the way to the ceiling, where there are six candles to memorialize the 6 million Jews who were killed.

The Pritzker Hall of Reflection

Named for the local family who helped fund this $45 million museum, the bright, open circular room gives people a place to sit quietly and reflect.

The Brill Family Resource Center

Besides a library with thousands of books on the Holocaust, the resource center also has 16 computers with access to the 2,100 video testimonials from Holocaust survivors collected from Steven Spielberg's Shoah Foundation. Since each interview is anywhere from 21/2 to four hours long, you can use the technology to narrow your search, right down to the specific topics of each interview.

The longest film

It's an 11-minute film about genocide around the world and how it continues to be a reality in our world today.

"Today, it happened to me because I was a Jew. Tomorrow, it may be because you have blue eyes or because you're Catholic," said local Holocaust survivor Fritzie Fritzshall. "We need to teach people that we're all the same."

<div class="infoBox"> <h1>More Coverage</h1> <div class="infoBoxContent"> <div class="infoArea"> <h2>Related links</h2> <ul class="moreWeb"> <li><a href="http://www.ilholocaustmuseum.org/">Museum's home page</a></li> </ul> <h2>Video</h2> <ul class="video"> <li><a href="/multimedia/?category=9&type=video&item=330">Holocaust survivor Sam Harris </a></li> <li><a href="/multimedia/?category=9&type=video&item=328">Holocaust survivors on new museum </a></li> </ul> <h2>Photo Galleries</h2> <ul class="gallery"> <li><a href="/story/?id=287463">Illinois Holocaust Museum </a></li> </ul> <h2>Stories</h2> <ul class="links"> <li><a href="/story/?id=286807">Illinois Holocaust Museum to open this weekend <span class="date">[04/16/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=286408">Designer: Center the 'most important building I've ever done' <span class="date">[04/16/09]</span></a></li> <li><a href="/story/?id=283790">Holocaust museum 'a force for good' <span class="date">[04/03/09]</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div>