Jack Gun - August 12, 1999
Talking about Experiences
I want to ask you one more question before we um, we stop for today. We may want to do more. What was it that turned you around to start talking? Was there a moment that you decided that it was time to break the silence?
Uh, as far as talking to friends or uh, one on one, you mean?
Just in general. You said you didn't talk very much even to your wife before.
Right. I don't know if it was age. I don't know why--I don't know what to attribute it. But uh, it came a certain time when I started to talk. Especially to tell my wife more or my kids more. But what made me speak to children in schools uh, actually I have to give credit to Erna Gorman.
Oh.
Yeah, she uh, uh, she called me one time and she couldn't speak at the Holocaust Center. And she asked me, she says, "Do me a favor, I need somebody to help me." And I--and she--as you know, she speaks an awful lot. She probably speaks too much. And I, I went and did it. And then, then uh, they started calling me so often and I couldn't refuse. And then I decided that it's--especially since I retired and--that it was a worthy thing to do. That if, if I don't and somebody else don't, who will? And we are the last, the last generation uh, to tell the story.
The hidden children.
The hidden children, definitely. Or--I mean, not only the hidden children, I mean, all Holocaust survivors. Uh, they are the last uh, generation. After we're gone, I mean, it's all going to be from tapes and. And our children, what they heard from us. But it's uh, no more the direct contact. That's what I tell them in the schools. I says, "You happen to be the lucky ones." I says, I says "You are the last, you are the one, last generation that can hear it from the Holocaust survivor." I says, "Your children will not be able to hear it." I says, "We count on you to tell them."
And you think it's doing a good thing.
I feel it's, I feel it's very important. I feel that we're accomplishing something with it. I don't know, like I told you before uh, I don't know what percentage we're hitting. But we're definitely hitting some.
And that will, that will produce what? They'll know about it.
Yes, it will produce a legacy, I guess, of, uh...
Of informed...
Of informed people. And hopefully they will inform their children.
I hope so. Okay, thanks Jack, for this afternoon.
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