Ken Burns and his team of directors have a way of weaving together powerful stories.
Yet when it came to the latest project, “The United States and the Holocaust,” he felt different.
“I feel so strong in my bones,” Burns says. “There will never be anything more important than this film. It speaks to us in the present and tells a hidden story of this world event.”
The three-part series by Burns, Lynn Novick, and Sarah Botstein explores the role of the United States before, during, and after the Holocaust. The first episode will air at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Sunday, September 18, on New Mexico PBS, channel 5.1. It’s also streaming on the PBS Video app. The second episode airs at 7 p.m. and 9:10 p.m. on Tuesday, September 20, and the third air at 7 o’clock. and 9:10 p.m. Wednesday, September 21.
Burns says the series is inspired in part by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s “Americans and the Holocaust” exhibit and supported by its historical resources, the film examines the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazism in Germany in the context of anti-Semitism and global racism, The eugenics movement in the United States and race laws in the American South. The series, written by Geoffrey Ward, sheds light on what the US government and the American people knew and did as the catastrophe unfolded in Europe.
The series combines first-person accounts from Holocaust witnesses and survivors, and interviews with leading historians and writers.
It helps dispel competing myths that Americans were either ignorant of the untold persecution that Jews and other targeted minorities faced in Europe, or that they viewed it with callous indifference.
The film tackles a number of questions that remain essential to our society today, including how racism influences policies related to immigration and refugees, and how governments and people respond to the rise of authoritarian states that manipulate the history and facts to consolidate power.
“History cannot be looked at in isolation,” says Burns. “While we rightly celebrate the American ideals of democracy and our history as a nation of immigrants, we must also face the fact that American institutions and policies, such as segregation and the brutal treatment of indigenous populations , are influential in Hitler’s Germany. And it cannot be denied that, although we have accepted more refugees than any other sovereign nation, America could do much more to help the millions of desperate people fleeing Nazi persecution “.
Novick says in a statement that exploring this history and putting together the pieces of what we know and what we have done is a revelation.
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“During World War II, millions of Americans fought and sacrificed to defeat fascism, but even after we began to understand the scope and scale of what was happening to the Jews of Europe, our response was inadequate and deeply flaw,” says Novick. . “This is a story with enormous relevance today, as we are still dealing with questions about immigration, refugees and who should be welcomed into the United States.”
“The United States and the Holocaust” features a fascinating array of historical figures including Franklin D. Roosevelt, Charles Lindbergh, Dorothy Thompson, Rabbi Stephen Wise and Henry Ford, as well as Anne Frank and her family, who asked but they don’t get it. See the article : High-tech Hyundai Ioniq 6 aims to make Gen Z entertain people. visa to the United States before they went into hiding. This unexpected aspect of the Frankish story highlights an American connection to the Holocaust.
The film also looks at American politics on issues ranging from Calvin Coolidge’s anti-immigration ideology to FDR’s Lend-Lease bill, and how these battles took shape on the home front, including the emergency of Nazi sympathizers. Some of America’s most famous leaders, such as Lindbergh and Ford, were also among the most vocal anti-Semites. Likewise, new light is shed on many of the well-known controversies surrounding the American response to the Holocaust, including the harrowing story of the more than 900 Jewish refugees aboard the MS St. Louis, who were denied entry to Cuba and the United States. 1939 and forced to return to an uncertain fate in Europe.
“At the center of our narrative is the moving and inspiring first-hand testimony of witnesses who were children in the 1930s,” says Botstein. “They share harrowing memories of the persecution, violence and flight they and their families experienced as they escaped Nazi Europe and came to America. Their survival attests to the truth of the remark made by journalist Dorothy Thompson that “for thousands and thousands of people a piece of paper with a stamp is the difference between life and death.”
Burns and the team felt this story had to be told.
“There are a lot of movies about the Holocaust,” says Burns. “By channeling what America did and did not do or should know, you have a clear and focused view. What we have done is put together compelling stories to add to the narrative. We must remember that the freedom we enjoy does not it should not be taken for granted. It can disappear and it needs vigilance to stay in place. We do not understand how fragile the institution is.”
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