Lory Gruenberger Cahn: Almost Saved by the Kindertransport, Part 2

by Cindy K. Stewart

Last month I shared the first half of Lory's story—Lori Gruenberger Cahn: Almost Saved by the Kindertransport. After Lory boarded the Kindertransport for England, her father couldn't part with her and pulled her out the window of the train while it was leaving the station. As a result, Lory didn't escape the holocaust with the nearly 10,000 other children who fled German-occupied territories on the Kindertransports. 

Last month's story ended in March of 1942 with the SS loading Lori and her mother into a cattle car with thirty-five to forty frightened people. The SS had removed a very ill Mr. Gruenberger from their home on a stretcher, and Lori and her mother didn't know his whereabouts. 

Theresienstadt - Prisoners Wait for Food Rations
Courtesy of YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, New York
& the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

After two days of traveling in the dark cattle car with 35 to 40 people and no food, the guards opened the door and ordered the prisoners to quickly disembark. The daylight blinded their eyes. Lory’s father waited outside the train for Lory and her mother, and he appeared perfectly fine. The prisoners traveled by truck to their final destination—Theresienstadt, a Jewish ghetto in Czechoslovakia. Because of his WWI service, Mr. Gruenberger had been given the opportunity to pay the German government to send him and his family to Theresienstadt, rather than to another camp or ghetto. 

Lory and her mother lived in a barrack with 300 other people. They slept on straw mattresses in bunk beds with three people per mattress. Lory’s father lived in a house with older, sickly prisoners. 

Lory contracted spinal meningitis and stayed in the camp hospital for four months. The doctors were also prisoners, but they were able to get medicine for her through the Swiss Red Cross. 

Theresienstadt Photo Taken During Red Cross Inspection
Courtesy of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

The Germans "beautified" the ghetto, dressed up the prisoners, and put on a good show for the representatives of the International Red Cross, visiting from Switzerland. Lory performed for them in a children’s choir. After the visit, more prisoners were crowded into Theresienstadt, and it became necessary to sleep in shifts, one group sleeping during the day and the other at night. 

One day Lory was ordered to report to the railroad station and meet with an SS officer. He informed her she wasn’t going on the transport and sent her back home. This happened four times, and each time she said goodbye to her parents. The fifth time she was called she told the SS officer that she wanted to go. He gave her the chance to back out, but she had made up her mind. He crossed her name off the list and loaded her on a cattle car. Her trip ended at Auschwitz.

Selection of Jews for the Gas Chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau
Courtesy of Yad Vashem & the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

The guards opened the door, and Dr. Josef Mengele stood outside the car with his stick, hollering and cursing at the prisoners. The officers chased the prisoners out of the train, and Lory's glasses fell off and broke. Since having spinal meningitis, Lory wore glasses to take the pressure off her nerves. Her inner voice told her not to pick up the glasses, and she obeyed. Mengele divided the prisoners, sending those with defects to the left, including those wearing glasses. This group went directly to the gas chambers, but Mengele sent Lory to the right, and she lived.

After a six to eight-week stay at Auschwitz, the Nazis transferred Lori to several different camps—Buchenwald, Dachau, Kurzbach and Gross-Rosen. At the beginning of 1945, she arrived at Bergen-Belsen where people died by the hundreds.

Courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

One month before Lory’s twentieth birthday, the prisoners hollered and many ran outside. The British Army had arrived to liberate Bergen-Belsen. Lori only weighed fifty-eight pounds and was so weak she could only crawl halfway out on her hands and knees. She lay on the ground and prayed to God. A soldier approached and asked if he could assist her. The liberators wanted to help the inmates and gave them chocolate and chicken soup, but more people died from consuming the rich food.

Survivors & British Soldiers outside Bergen-Belsen
Courtesy of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum & Lev Sviridov

Attachments of soldiers from the French, Russian, and American Armies accompanied the English Army when they liberated Bergen-Belsen. They put together lists of the names and nationalities of the internees. Lory was fascinated when an American soldier from Germany spoke to her in German. The soldiers took her to a hospital for treatment, and she was surprised to see many people she knew, even folks from her hometown of Breslau.

One month after liberation, the British soldiers burned the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp to the ground to prevent the spread of Typhus. The survivors were relocated to a former German Army camp nearby. 

The British Burn Bergen-Belsen
Courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Lory traveled by bus to Hanover, a city nearby, to register as a survivor. There she found a man who had lived in the same building with her father at Theresienstadt. He recognized her but said she didn’t look too good. He shared that her father was still at Theresienstadt, but her mother had been transported to Auschwitz three months earlier and had gone to the gas chamber. He pointed out a bus driver whose route went to Theresienstadt once a week. Lory spoke with the driver, and he promised to ask about her father on his return trip. Lory wrote her name on a slip of paper so Mr. Gruenberger would see her handwriting and believe the bus driver. 

Bergen-Belsen Displaced Persons Camp
Courtesy of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum & Herbert Steinhouse

Lory took the bus back to Hanover the day before the Theresienstadt bus was scheduled to return. She didn’t have a watch, so she waited on the street all night long to meet her father's early morning bus. The bus arrived, but Lory’s father didn't. The driver had checked on him and learned that he had left on a bus for Berlin two or three days earlier. Lori had no way to travel to Berlin and didn’t know how she would ever find her father.

Lory met two young men who’d been traveling around Germany on foot, looking for family. They had come across a little town in Bavaria that wasn’t damaged, and the officers at the American military installation in charge of the area told the young men they’d be happy to have Jewish people locate there. The fellows asked Lory and her girlfriend to join them, and they traveled for a couple of days, begging for food along the road and sleeping with animals, including pigs, to stay warm.

Lori and her group rode into the Bavarian town on an army truck and were sent to a very nice furnished house. Jewish American soldiers, originally from Germany, brought them food the next morning. One of the soldiers was Walter Cahn, and Lory recognized him as the soldier who had taken her information right after the Bergen-Belsen liberation. She was astounded to see him again.

Walter helped Lory locate her father through the Red Cross and Military Intelligence, but it took eight months. After four more months, her father traveled to see her. They had been apart for four years. Lory was thrilled to receive his hugs and kisses.

One year later, in 1947, Lori immigrated to the United States and married Walter Cahn. Over the years she corresponded with her father, but they didn’t see each other again until Lory returned to Germany with her son in 1962. She and her family visited her father two or three more times before he died in 1972.

Lory often pondered what would have happened if her father hadn't pulled her off the Kindertransport and if she hadn't been able to help her parents through the tragedy they had faced. She didn't want to hurt her father, so she never brought the topic up with him. But Lory realized she wouldn't have a normal, happy life if she hated the Germans. She spent many years speaking at universities, schools, and organizations, encouraging others not to forget what the Germans had done, but not to hate them. Lori had a wonderful, happy marriage to Walter Cahn for sixty-one years. She passed away in 2008.

***

Source: Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport by Mark Jonathan Harris and Deborah Oppenheimer. Warner Bros., 2000.

***

Cindy Stewart, a high school social studies and language arts teacher, church pianist, and inspirational historical fiction author, semifinaled in the American Christian Fiction Writer’s 2017 Genesis contest, and won ACFW’s 2014 First Impressions writing contest in the historical category. Cindy is passionate about revealing God’s handiwork in history. She resides in North Georgia with her college sweetheart and husband of thirty-five years and near her married daughter, son-in-law, and three adorable grandchildren. She’s currently writing a fiction series set in WWII Europe.

The History of Word Puzzles

For over sixteen years, I’ve been a fiction author, but recently, I decided to try my hand at something else—a U.S.A. word find puzzle book. Creating this book made me wonder about the history of word games, so I decided to do some research and create this month’s post about them. Although there are many types of word puzzles—arrowords, acrostics, jotto, rebus, and more—I’ll be giving you a brief history of three of the more popular word games.

Crosswords are considered the most popular type of word puzzles. Journalist Arthur Wynne from Liverpool, England, is the first person known to have published a crossword puzzle. His puzzle appeared in the New York World on December 21, 1913. Wynne's puzzle was diamond shaped and contained no internal black squares, differing from today's crosswords. During the 1920’s, other newspapers quickly picked up the newly discovered pastime, and within a decade, crossword puzzles were featured in almost all American newspapers. During this time, crosswords began to assume the shape we’re more familiar with.

Considering crosswords puzzles were invented over a hundred years ago, you would think word search/find/seek puzzles—whatever you call them—have been around almost as long, but no. Not true. Norman E. Gibat created the first word find puzzle in 1960. He published it in a small want-ad's type newspaper called the Selenby Digest in Norman, Oklahoma. Selenby's original size was 8.5 by 5.5 inches, and it was distributed free at Safeway and other stores in Norman. Teachers in the area soon realized what a great educational tool the puzzles were and began to use them in their classrooms. Before long, word searches were being syndicated nationally.

Here's a Famous Inventors Word Search I made for you. :) You don't have to read it in such a small font. It's a jpg image so you should be able to right click on it and save it. Then open it and print it.

Note: Leave a comment below with your email if you'd like the solution or are unable to save the puzzle.

Cryptograms—a type of puzzle that consists of a short piece of encrypted text—is one of the oldest word games in existence. Monks from the Middle Ages are credited with being the first to use cryptograms for entertainment. Before that, they were used personally and for military for security purposes. Around the thirteenth century, Roger Bacon, an English monk, penned a book in which he listed seven different cipher methods. In the 19th century Edgar Allan Poe helped to make cryptograms popular in many newspapers and magazines.

I created a cryptogram for you from a humorous quote about history by David Ben-Gurion, first Prime Minister of Israel. 

GKADKH XBD THWPHUHI ADJ YGK'Z YBGKEH BPIZDVA BGI KHUHV ZVPHF ZD XVPZH BPI SHSDPVI.

E = G

Note: Leave a comment below with your email if you'd like the solution.

My favorite type of word puzzle is the word search. How about you? Do you like working word puzzles? Do you have a favorite kind?

Hours of mentally stimulating word search fun! USA Word Find contains 75 easy-to-read large print word search puzzles. These engaging puzzles feature United States topics such as state capitals, state nicknames, animals and birds found in the U.S., actors born in the U.S., and much more. Test your knowledge of the United States while enjoying hours of word find fun. 

This book will be available on Amazon in August. 

Bestselling author Vickie McDonough grew up wanting to marry a rancher, but instead, she married a computer geek who is scared of horses. She now lives out her dreams penning romance stories about ranchers, cowboys, lawmen, and others living in the Old West. Vickie is a best-selling author of more than 40 published books and novellas, with over 1.5 million copies sold. Her novels include End of the Trail, winner of the OWFI 2013 Best Fiction Novel Award. Whispers on the Prairie was a Romantic Times Recommended Inspirational Book for July 2013. Song of the Prairie won the 2015 Inspirational Readers Choice Award. Gabriel’s Atonement, book 1 in the Land Rush Dreams series placed second in the 2016 Will Rogers Medallion Award. Vickie has recently stepped into independent publishing. To learn more about Vickie’s books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit her website: www.vickiemcdonough.com

HHH Book Day

Yoana Armenta’s reckless behavior results in her being captured by bandoleros, Yoana fears her impulsive nature has caused irreparable disaster. Amado Castro gave a death bed promise that he intends to keep – at all costs - even if he must break a childhood vow. When his choice endangers Yoana’s life, he struggles with the decision to honor his word, or to protect Yoana, whom he has come to care for more than he could have imagined. Now as the bandoleros threaten to sell Yoana and her tía to a fate worse than death, and the rancheros want to hang Amado, they must make choices. Will they trust God, or will they do what seems right to them? 

Hours of mentally stimulating word search fun! USA Word Find contains 75 easy-to-read large print word search puzzles. These engaging puzzles feature United States topics such as state capitals, state nicknames, animals and birds found in the U.S., actors born in the U.S., and much more. Test your knowledge of the United States while enjoying hours of word find fun.  

Penelope Beatty made up her mind long ago she would live and die a Scottish warrior not a wife. But when nearly all her clan is killed and she is betrayed, she loathes doing the unthinkable, but must seek the help of an Englishman who owed her father’s his life. Thomas Godfrey never married, but when a Scottish warrior lass shows up needing his aid, he finds her both annoying and irresistible. But the last thing he wants is to marry a woman who fights alongside him. If he was going to marry—which he isn’t—it would be to a soft, submissive woman. But when the Lady Brithwin meets the Scottish lass, she’s sure she’s found the perfect match for Thomas and nothing is going to stop her from seeing a summer wedding.

Natchez, MS; 1791

Anxious for his brothers to join him on the rugged frontier along the Mississippi River, Connor O’Shea has no choice but to indenture himself as a carpenter in exchange for their passage from Ireland. But when he’s sold to Isabella Bartholomew of Breeze Hill Plantation, Connor fears he’ll repeat past mistakes and vows not to be tempted by the lovely lady. Soon, though, Connor realizes someone is out to eliminate the Bartholomew family. Can he set aside his own feelings to keep Isabella safe? 

Seven Brides for Seven Mail-Order Husbands, by Susan Page Davis and six other authors. Meet seven of Turtle Springs, Kansas’, finest women who are determined to revive their small town after the War Between the States took most of its men. . .and didn’t return them. The ladies decide to advertise for husbands and devise a plan for weeding out the riff raff. But how can they make the best practical choices when their hearts cry out to be loved? 

Looking forward to a quiet life and a full stomach, mail-order bride Rebecca Rice is pleased to marry her shopkeeper intended, Mr. Fordham, until the justice of the peace calls him Thaddeus, not Theodore—proceeded by the title Deputy.When the newlyweds realize they’ve married the wrong partners with similar names, an annulment seems in order—and fast, since Rebecca’s true intended is impatient to claim her as his own, not to mention Rebecca would never marry a lawman like her father. But when the legalities take longer than expected, Rebecca wonders if Tad wasn’t the right husband for her all along. . . 

Through the ages, men have told many stories about Mary, Joseph, and the birth of the Messiah. Stories of shepherds and sheep, kings, angels, and stables. But one story no one has ever told. One story hidden in the fabric of time. The story of The Swaddling Clothes. Mentioned not once, but several times in the Scriptural text, what is the significance of these special cloths? And how did they make their way into a stable in Bethlehem? From the author that brought you the Days of Messiah series comes a whole new adventure critics are calling "intriguing...thought provoking... a fresh twist on an age old story." 

Seven pink envelopes, addressed in Wanda Taylor’s spiky handwriting, represented her legacy to seven people she held dear. Legacy letters—that’s what they were. A last gift, though some might call it interference. People often sought her advice and her God-given gift of discernment. But not these seven, and her heart ached for them. They were good people who loved God and their families, but she saw patterns in their lives that could harm them in the future if left unchecked. Monica was the lynch pin to the entire project. The mantle of the matriarch fit her, and everyone in the family recognized it. But she needed to learn how to let go before she could take charge.