First Stolperstein. Installed on 16 Dec 1992 in front of the City Hall in Cologne , Germany.
Over the past 30 years the team of German artist Gunter Demnig installed over 100,000 Stumbling Stones – ‘Stolpersteine’ – across 26 countries in Europe – the world’s largest memorial.
Demnig’s Stolpersteine are small, cobblestone-sized brass memorials for the victims of National Socialism. Set into the pavement of sidewalks in front of the buildings where Nazi victims once lived or worked, they call attention both to the individual victim and the scope of the Nazi war crimes.
The very first Stolperstein, was installed on 16 December 1992 in front of Cologne City Hall , with Heinrich Himmler’s order for the initiation of deportations of all Roma (Gypsies) :
„Auf Befehl des Reichsführers SS vom 16.12.42 – Tgb. Nr. I 2652/42 Ad./RF/V. – sind Zigeunermischlinge, Rom-Zigeuner und nicht deutschblütige Angehörige zigeunerischer Sippen balkanischer Herkunft nach bestimmten Richtlinien auszuwählen und in einer Aktion von wenigen Wochen in ein Konzentrationslager einzuweisen. Dieser Personenkreis wird im nachstehenden kurz als ‚zigeunerische Personen‘ bezeichnet. Die Einweisung erfolgt ohne Rücksicht auf den Mischlingsgrad familienweise in das Konzentrationslager (Zigeunerlager) Auschwitz.“
Notes
Photo : First Stolperstein at the Cologne City Hall, Germany. Photo Jan. 1, 2008, by Willy Horsch, CC-BY .
Citation info : First Stolperstein | 20240520 | michelvanderburg•com
Marc Michiels – expert author on the history of Transport XX and coordinator for many years of the annual Transport XX commemorations in Boortmeerbeek, Belgium – unfortunately passed away April 2021 . Some months later his web site ‘holocaust’ (at telenet.be) dedicated to Transport XX was taken offline. Now — when searching for info on Robert Korten – Marc’s predecessor as the first coordinator and founder of the XXth convoy-commemorations – I was happy to to find Marc’s website is back online, now at the appropriate new domain : transportxxboortmeerbeek.be
Citation info : Transport XX Boortmeerbeek – Marc Michiels | 20240309 | Miracles•Media | TakeNode fd808fa3-09f2-4c0d-b9c8-f711a47b05ba | URL 1-memo.com/2024/03/09
Filmmaker Rudolf Breslauer also filmed two of his children in the Westerborkfilm…
Stefan (left) & Ursula Breslauer, children of Rudolf Breslauer, the filmmaker of the Westerbork film at the farm of Camp Westerbork in 1944 – identified by the dutch photographer Sake Elzinga, who received Breslauer’s family photo albums last year when the family of Ursula – the only survivor – visited an expo on Breslauer in the Westerbork museum in the Netherlands.
Camp commander (SS-Obersturmführer) Albert Gemmeker ordered the Westerbork film , made by the German Jewish prisoner, photographer, Rudolf Breslauer in the spring of 1944.
Today 80 years ago – March 5, 1944 – the camp is an ‘Arbeitslager’ – a work camp – when Rudolf Breslauer starts filming the daily life of the Westerbork prisoners — inside : in the barracks, for example a religious service, cabaret, workshops, factories, aircraft and battery recycling, medical care, and outside the barracks : construction of a greenhouse, a football match, women working out, chopping wood, incoming transports, and eventually also the departure of a deportation train. After Breslauer films the deportation of Jews, Roma and Sinti to Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz on May 19, 1944 the filming stops. The haunting image of the 9-year-old dutch Sinti-girl Settela, standing in the closing doors of the goods train, and the unique footage of that deportation train that leaves the Westerbork camp, became iconic after the war.
Deportation Breslauer family
Werner Rudolf Breslauer , his wife Bella Weihsmann, sons Stefan and Max Michael (Mischa), and daughter Ursula were deported autumn 1944 from Westerbork to Theresienstadt and Auschwitz. Only Ursula survived.
Stefan & Ursula Breslauer in Westerborkfilm | 20240305 | Settela•Com | Frame 127475 from Westerbork Film 🎦 2021 | 20220302 | Settela•Com | ISSN 2949 9313 | Footage filmed by Rudolf Breslauer in 1944, courtesy of NIOD | Sound and Vision
Scene with Stefan & Ursula Breslauer, starting at 56:13 in the 1986 RVD edition of the Westerborkfilm: Stefan & Ursula Breslauer in Westerbork Film RVD | 20240305 | Settela•Com | URL https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxfNzA72JeGgVoOFp_VTI4EQQr3yTwXu6_
Settela Film | 20220630 | Michel van der Burg | Settela•Com
Deportation Westerbork Film | 20210719 | Michel van der Burg | Settela•Com
The 1st Brussels Balloon’s Day Parade and opening of the BRUSSELS 2009 BD COMICS STRIP year. The giant balloons representing Brussels folklore, Belgian comic strip (Bande dessinée) with Manneken Pis here in front in the city of Brussels , Belgium , February 28, 2009. Camera Sony DSC-T500 , Super HAD CCD 1/2.3″ .
CitySkip Featured Video – April 20, 2009 | Short film TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels | 20240229_1 | Miracles•Media | TakeNode deab5515-d0de-453d-9c8d-f4074a39d03b
April 20th, 2009 , TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels was featured as the most popular video at CitySkip.
CitySkip was one of the Web 2.0 communities – a network about all aspects of urban life, from city planning to street art, a forum for “cool people who dig cities” for posting messages, sharing photos and videos – at Ning.com in addition to the mainstream social networks MySpace, Facebook, YouTube. It existed from 2007 untill February 2010.
CitySkip Featured Photo – April 20, 2009 | Storyboard film TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels | 20240229_2 | Miracles•Media | TakeNode 0af46f73-5df8-4aaf-812a-355553775dd3
TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels February 28th, 2009, Brussels. Day two, of my encounter with the TRANSPORT XX installation outside in the Royal park in Brussels, that presented 1200 photographic portraits of Jews deported from Malines (Belgium) to Auschwitz in 1943. One of the stills and establising video shots made that Saturday morning after finishing long take video recordings of the installation, during a walk from our hotel in the Leopold (European) Quarter via the Royal park direction the historic centre of Brussels. That weekend break in Brussels, today 15 years ago, turned out to be a turning point in my life. Two months later – April 19, 2009 – the film TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels was published.
8. First Encounter TRANSPORT XX … | 20240227 | Michel van der Burg | Miracles•Media | URL https://michelvanderburg.com/2024/02/27 | TakeNode cf0dd64d-4512-4846-8bce-6b2d8cca24ef
9. Camera used for both photo and video (720p HD video) of the TRANSPORT XX installation in Brussels is the Sony DSC-T500 which has a CCD sensor – with global shutter – thus not affected by rolling shutter distortion while panning the installation.
Citation info : Encounter TRANSPORT XX … | 20240228 | Michel van der Burg | Miracles•Media | URL https://michelvanderburg.com/2024/02/28 | TakeNode a8317838-7470-4538-b788-40e6cc07b55a
