Restoring a lost piece of history
One day, last summer, we were at the end of my Jewish Amsterdam Tour, by the Holocaust Names Monument. Upon the request of one of my clients, a delightful lady from Canada, I went with her to see the building in which her Jewish mother had lived in her childhood years before and after WWII and in which her grandfather had had his business, a wholesale in all ice necessities.
It’s located just across the street from the Holocaust Memorial. Once we stood in front of its facade, the lady shared the following moving story with me.
She had traveled to Amsterdam in 2015 with her parents so see this place. They had found the facade bare, with no particular details.
Four years later, in 2019, her mother received an email, sent by a worker of an Amsterdam organization that restores prewar facade signage and lettering on buildings in Amsterdam.
During the Second World War and Nazi occupation, these Jewish owned properties were stolen by the Nazi’s who scraped off or painted over facade advertisements, so as to erase any evidence of prior Jewish ownership.
One day, that organization’s worker was biking past this building and faintly noticed some weathered lettering.
Searching in the Holocaust Names Monument’s database, among the 102.000 listed murdered Dutch Jews, he found the name that appeared on the wall of that building.
After a 2 year inquiry he was finally able to trace a relative of this Holocaust victim: my client’s mother.
Amsterdam, summer 2019. My client, ushered by the restorationist, turns the corner to be overwhelmed by a crowd of organization members, reporters and photographers in front of that building.
They are all waiting for her to single-handedly rewrite her grandfather’s name on the wall, nearly eight decades from when it was erased.
While she restored this lost piece of history, the lady honored her grandfather whom she never relished to meet in life.
As a result of the newspaper coverage that day, the family was able to connect with relatives who had survived the Holocaust.
Restoring signage
on prewar Jewish owned property
in Amsterdam
Descendant of former Jewish owner
by restored signage
on prewar Jewish owned property
in Amsterdam
Restored signage
on prewar Jewish owned property
in Amsterdam