The Barnes County Historical Society Lecture Series Season 20 Presents: Dr. Gilbert Kuipers (VCSU) “A Visit to the Holocaust Museum” 7PM Thursday November 15th at the Barnes County Museum.

“Last summer I had a chance to visit the National Holocaust Museum while attending a national meeting of physics teachers in Washington, D.C.”

“The Holocaust was the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million  Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators.”  However, additional millions of non-Jews were also persecuted and murdered.  And I believe that an attempt to understand the Holocaust should include the other similar events in history and their underlying causes.  Most historians indicate that there wasn’t a single cause or simple explanation.  The museum is not an answer, but a question, “Why?”

My presentation will include pictures taken at the museum and other information I learned about the museum.  The experience was overwhelming.  I’ll also include some of my personal beliefs about the causes and solicit ideas from the audience.

“Never Again Needs You NOW” is a phrase the museum uses in soliciting donations.  “When the world is in turmoil, this Museum fights back using its most powerful tool: education. It is urgent that we teach people about the consequences of hate and antisemitism and empower them to stand up to it.”

Dr. Gilbert Kuipers teaches physics and math at Valley City State University.  As far as he is aware, his ancestry wouldn’t have made him a target in Nazi Germany, but he is a card-carrying member of three of the organizations whose members were generally on the arrest lists.  They wore the inverted red triangle in the concentration camps to distinguish them as political prisoners.

The public is cordially invited

All Lectures are at the Barnes County Historical Society Museum and held in conjunction with Valley City State University.  They are free and open to the public.

For more information contact Wes Anderson at 701-845-0966

Barnes County Historical Society

315 Central Ave N

Valley City, ND 58072