As a 13-year-old boy, Gerry Manko found himself in the center of intense violence generated by the German Kristallnacht pogrom that led to the imprisonment of 30,000 Jewish men and boys, hundreds of synagogues burned, and hundreds of Jewish businesses decimated. The year was 1938. Manko’s father was one of the men torn from his family and taken away.
Manko will share these experiences and the rest of his amazing life story during a free Commemoration Service at Samuel Lutheran Church in downtown Muskegon on Sunday, April 27 at 3:30 p.m. and again on Monday, April 28 at 6:30 p.m. during a fundraising Commemoration Dinner at First Evangelical Lutheran Church in North Muskegon.
Between the two public events, about 60 high school students and their teachers will gather at Muskegon Community College on Monday, from 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., to hear Manko speak and ask questions. The students will examine how Hitler and the Nazis could rise to power and reflect on the world’s response. A variety of activities are planned to help students consider deep, difficult questions of core values. Muskegon Area Intermediate School District Social Studies Consultant David Klemm and Fruitport High School World History Teacher Sarah Woycehoski will facilitate the day’s work.
Manko is the featured speaker for the annual commemoration event sponsored by the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies of Muskegon. Their purpose is to teach others about the Holocaust and the rise of Nazism in order to prevent the proliferation of racism, hatred, and xenophobia. The Center annually commemorates the six million Jews and five million others who were murdered because of race, creed, mental and physical condition, and sexual orientation. The commemoration also honors the four million men, women and children murdered between 1978 and 2002 in genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Kosovo.
A reservation for the Commemoration Dinner buffet, which includes both meat and vegetarian options, is $35 before April 25 or $40 at the door. Entire tables may also be reserved for $240 for a table of eight, or $300 for a table of ten. Dinner reservations are available by sending a written check to the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at PO Box 452, Muskegon, Michigan 49440 or by calling 231-722-2702 or by emailing shoahrcm@yahoo.com. All proceeds will benefit the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. The Center is solely funded through fundraisers and gifts from members of the Muskegon community and religious communities.
Klemm said he is excited that area high school students will have an opportunity to hear Manko speak. “There will come a day when the living voice of witnesses will no longer be among us,” added Klemm.
For more information, contact, David Klemm, MAISD Social Studies and Special Projects Consultant, at (231) 767-7255.