23 July 2015 - ELIE WIESEL

ELIE WIESEL

G'day folks,

Welcome to a very interesting and distinguished man who is a professor, author, humanitarian and Nobel Peace Prize winner.

Eliezer Wiesel is a Jewish American professor, writer and political activist. He was born in Sighet, Transylvania, Maramures, and Kingdom of Romania on 30th September 1928. In 1986, recognizing his struggle for peace, atonement and human dignity Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded him The Nobel Peace Prize. He is also famous for his arguably most powerful and renowned book in Holocaust literature, “Night” which is inspired by his personal experience as a prisoner in Auschwitz, Buna, and Buchenwald.

Since Elie Wiesel’s early age his father implanted in him a sense of humanism. Wiesel recalls that his father always taught him reasoning, his mother on the other hand represented faith. Growing up in a tiny village, his only affection was his family, religious study and community. His father always encouraged him to study the Modern Hebrew language and concentrate on his literature. 

In 1944 Nazis invaded Sighet and destroyed the once secure childhood world of Wiesel. All the Jewish families were placed in camps. Wiesel and his father were separated from his mother and sisters. They were forced to work almost to death and were shuffled between different camps mostly bare footed without food or proper clothing in driving snow. He lost his father on January 29th 1945 only months before the US army rescued him from the camps. 

 After the war Wiesel, reunited with his two surviving sisters, settled in France. There he taught Hebrew and mastered the French language. He also studied philosophy at the Sorbonne. He became professional journalist and wrote for newspapers both in France and Israel. In 1955, after ten years of utter silence about his experience in the camps and war in general, Wiesel met Francois Mauriac, a Nobel Prize awarded French author who later became his close friend for life. Mauriac is credited to have encouraged Wiesel to write about his experiences. “La Nuit” was the result of this persuasion which was later translated in English Language as “Night”. Wiesel had to struggle several years to find a publisher for his book and even when he did only few copies were sold initially. However, as yet, Night has been translated in more than 30 languages and by 1997 the book was selling over 300,000 copies annually in the US alone. 

 In 1956, Wiesel visited New York for his report on United Nations. During his visit, he was struck by a cab driver and was confined to a wheelchair for nearly a year. He applied for the renewal of his French permit which had allowed him to travel, upon denial of his request he successfully applied for US citizenship. 

He started his career in US as feature writer for The Jewish Daily Forward. Wiesel used his international fame earned by his publications, to win justice for oppressed people and societies in different parts of the world. In 1978 he was appointed Chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council by President Jimmy Carter. 

1985 brought him a Congressional Medal of Freedom, followed by the Nobel Prize of Peace in 1986. Wiesel has given many guest appearances and lectures in a number of universities all over the world. Despite his growing popularity as a humanitarian, Wiesel has not discarded his passion for fiction and continues working on his books and semi auto-biographical novels.

Clancy's comment:  What can I say?

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17 October 2014 - JANE GOODALL

JANE GOODALL

G'day folks,

It's a pleasure today to feature an amazing woman. I guess everyone has heard of Jane Goodall, who was recently in Australia. Wow, what an outstanding woman; a person who made heaps of sense every time she said something.

Who Is Jane Goodall?

Jane Goodall is a renowned British primatologist and ethologist, who expanded our understanding of chimpanzees and the scientific world’s way of conducting research in the wild. Best known for her decades of living among the chimps of the Gombe Stream Reserve in Africa, she is also well known for her efforts toward conservation and activism on behalf of animals and the natural environment. 

Dates: April 3, 1934 –

Also Known As: Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall, V.J. Goodall, Baroness Jane van Lawick-Goodall, Dr. Jane Goodall

Growing Up

Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall was born in London, England, on April 3, 1934. Her parents were Mortimer Herbert Morris-Goodall, a businessman and race-car driver, and Margaret Myfanwe “Vanne” Joseph, a secretary when the pair married in 1932, turned housewife, who would later become a novelist under the name Vanne Morris Goodall. A younger sister, Judy, would complete the Goodall family four years later. 

With war declared in England in 1939, Mortimer Morris-Goodall enlisted. Vanne moved with her two young daughters to her mother’s home in the seaside town of Bournemouth, England. Jane saw little of her father during the war years and her parents divorced in 1950. Jane continued to live with her mother and sister at her grandmother’s home. 

From her very earliest years, Jane Goodall loved animals. She received a stuffed-toy chimpanzee named Jubilee from her father when she was a toddler and endlessly carried it with her (she still has the well-loved and worn Jubilee today). She also had a menagerie of living pets including dogs, cats, guinea pigs, caterpillars, snails, and a hamster. 

Along with an early love of animals, Goodall seemed fascinated by them as well. As a young child, she kept a wildlife journal detailing observations from such research as hiding out for hours in the henhouse to witness how hens lay eggs. Another story reports she brought a pocketful of earth and worms into her bed to start a colony under her pillow to observe the earthworms. In both of these instances, Goodall’s mother did not scold, but encouraged her young daughter’s interest and enthusiasm. 

As a child, Goodall loved to read The Story of Dr. Dolittle by Hugh Lofting and Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burrough. Through these books she developed a dream to visit Africa and study the abundance of wildlife there. 

Fortuitous Invitation and Meeting

Jane Goodall graduated from high school in 1952. With limited funds for further education, she enrolled in secretarial school. After some time working as a secretary and then as an assistant for a filmmaking company, Goodall received an invitation from a childhood friend to come for a visit. The friend was living in Africa at the time. Goodall abruptly quit her job in London and moved back home to Bournemouth where she secured a job as a waitress in an effort to save money for fare to Kenya. 

In 1957, Jane Goodall sailed to Africa. Within weeks of being there, Goodall started work as a secretary in Nairobi. Shortly thereafter, she was encouraged to meet Dr. Louis Leakey, famed archeologist and paleontologist. She made such a positive first impression that Dr. Leakey hired her on the spot to replace his departing secretary at the Coryndon Museum. 

Soon thereafter, Goodall was invited to join Dr. Leakey and his wife, Dr. Mary Leakey (an anthropologist), on a fossil digging expedition at Olduvai Gorge in the Serengeti National Park. Goodall readily accepted. 

The Study

Dr. Louis Leakey wanted to complete a longitudinal study of chimpanzees in the wild to obtain possible clues of human evolution. He asked Jane Goodall, who had no advance education, to oversee such a study at the Gombe Stream Chimpanzee Reserve at Lake Tanganyika in what is now known as Tanzania . 

In June 1960, Goodall, along with her mother as a companion (the government refused to allow a young, single woman to travel alone in the jungle), entered the reserve to observe wild chimps in their natural environment. Goodall’s mother remained about five months but was then replaced by Dr. Leakey’s assistant. Jane Goodall would stay in the Gombe Reserve, off and on, conducting research for more than 50 years. 

During her initial months at the reserve, Goodall had difficulty observing the chimps as they would scatter as soon as they detected her. But with persistence and patience, Goodall was shortly granted access to the chimpanzees’ daily behaviors. 

Goodall took careful documentation of physical appearances and mannerisms. She recorded individual chimps with names, which at the time was not practice (scientists at the time used numbers to name research subjects so as not to personify the subjects). Within the first year of her observations, Jane Goodall would make two very important discoveries. 

Discoveries

The first discovery came when Goodall witnessed the chimps eating meat. Prior to this discovery, chimpanzees were thought to be herbivores. The second came a short time later when Goodall observed two chimps strip leaves off a twig and then proceed to use the bare twig to “fish” for termites in a termite mound, which they were successful at doing. This was an important discovery, because at the time, scientists thought only humans made and used tools. 

Over time, Jane Goodall would go on to observe the chimps stalking and hunting small animals, large insects, and birds. She also recorded acts of violence, use of stones as weapons, warfare, and cannibalism among the chimps. On the lighter side, she learned that chimps have the ability to reason and problem-solve, as well as have a complex social structure and system of communication. 

Goodall also found that chimpanzees demonstrate a range of emotions, use touch to comfort one another, develop significant bonds between mother and offspring, and maintain generational attachments. She recorded the adoption of an orphaned chimp by an unrelated adolescent male and saw chimps demonstrate affection, cooperation, and helpfulness. Due to the study’s longevity, Goodall witnessed the life stages of chimpanzees from infancy to death.

Personal Changes

After Goodall’s first year at the Gombe Reserve and her two major discoveries, Dr. Leakey advised Goodall to obtain a Ph.D. so she would have the ability to secure additional funding and continue the study on her own. Goodall entered the ethology doctoral program at Cambridge University in England without an undergraduate degree and during the next few years would split her time between classes in England and continuing research at Gombe Reserve. 

When the National Geographic Society (NGS) provided funding for Goodall’s research in 1962, they sent Dutch photographer Hugo van Lawick to supplement the article Goodall was to write. Goodall and Lawick soon fell in love and were married in March 1964. 

That fall, NGS approved Goodall’s proposal for a permanent research center at the reserve, which allowed the ongoing study of chimpanzees by other scientists and students. Goodall and van Lawick lived together at the Gombe Research Center, although both continuing their independent work and travelled as needed. 

In 1965, Goodall completed her Ph.D., a second article for National Geographic Magazine, and starred in a CBS television special, Miss Goodall and the Wild Chimpanzees. Two years later, on March 4, 1967, Jane Goodall gave birth to her only child, Hugo Eric Louis van Lawick (nicknamed Grub), who would be raised in the African jungle. She also published her first book, My Friends the Wild Chimpanzees, that year. 

Over the years, the traveling demands of both their careers seemed to take its toll and in 1974, Goodall and van Lawick divorced. A year later, Jane Goodall married Derek Bryceson, the director of the Tanzania National Park. Unfortunately, their union was cut short when Bryceson died five years later from cancer. 

Beyond the Reserve

With the Gombe Stream Research Center growing and a need for fundraising increasing, Goodall began to spend more time away from the reserve during the 1970s. She also spent time writing, with her internationally successful book, In the Shadow of Man , released in 1971. 

In 1977, she founded the Jane Goodall Institute for Wildlife Research, Education, and Conservation (known simply as the Jane Goodall Institute). This nonprofit organization promotes the conservation of primate habitat and the well-being of chimpanzees and other animals, as well as fostering positive relationships among all living things and the environment. It continues today, making an extra special effort to reach young people, who Goodall believes will be more responsible leaders of tomorrow with conservation education. 

Goodall also started the program Roots & Shoots in 1991 to assist young people with community projects that are attempting to make the world a better place. Today, Roots & Shoots is a network of tens of thousands kids in more than 120 countries. 

Another global program was started by the Jane Goodall Institute in 1984 to improve the lives of captive chimps. ChimpanZoo, the largest research study of chimpanzees in captivity ever undertaken, observes captive chimps’ behavior and compares it to that of their counterparts in the wild and makes recommendations for improvements for those in captivity. 

From Scientist to Activist

With the release of her lengthy book, The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior , which detailed her 25 years of research at the reserve, Goodall attended a large conference in Chicago in 1986 that brought scientists together from around the world to discuss chimpanzees. While at this conference, Goodall developed a deep concern for their shrinking numbers and disappearing natural habitat, as well as the inhumane treatment of chimpanzees in captivity. 

Since that time, Jane Goodall has become a dedicated advocate for animal rights, species conservation, and habitat protection, particularly for chimpanzees. She travels more than 80 percent of each year, speaking publically to encourage individuals to be responsible caretakers of the natural environment and animals. 

Messenger of Peace

Jane Goodall has received a number of recognitions for her work; among them are the J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize in 1984, the National Geographic Society Centennial Award in 1988, and in 1995 she was given the status of Commander of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II. Additionally, as a prolific writer, Jane Goodall has published numerous well-received articles and books about chimpanzees, her life with them, and conservation. 

In April 2002, Goodall was named a UN Messenger of Peace by Secretary-General Kofi Annan for her commitment to creating a safer, more stable, and harmonious natural world. She was re-appointed by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in 2007. 

Jane Goodall continues her work with the Jane Goodall Institute promoting conservation education and awareness for the natural environment and its animals. She travels yearly to the Gombe Stream Research Center and though she is no longer involved in the day-to-day field research of the longest unbroken study of an animal group, she still enjoys time with the chimpanzees in the wild.

Clancy's comment: What an outstanding human. Go, Jane! Love ya work.

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8 September 2014 - SIR NICHOLAS WINTON

SIR NICHOLAS WINTON

G'day folks,

Welcome to a great story of a humanitarian who saved hundreds of kids prior to the outbreak of war. He also is 105 years-of-age.

Nicholas Winton is known for organising the rescue of 669 Czech children from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia during the 9 months before war broke out in 1939. The story became known to the public in 1988 when it featured on That’s Life, a BBC TV programme hosted by Esther Rantzen. In 2003 he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for Services to Humanity for this work.

In December 1938, Nicholas Winton, a 29-year-old London stockbroker, was about to leave for a skiing holiday in Switzerland, when he received a phone call from his friend Martin Blake asking him to cancel his holiday and immediately come to Prague: "I have a most interesting assignment and I need your help. Don't bother bringing your skis." When Winton arrived, he was asked to help in the camps, in which thousands of refugees were living in appalling conditions.

In October 1938, after the ill-fated Munich Agreement between Germany and the Western European powers, the Nazis annexed a large part of western Czechoslovakia, the Sudetenland. Winton was convinced that the German occupation of the rest of the country would soon follow. To him and many others, the outbreak of war seemed inevitable. The news of Kristallnacht, the bloody pogrom (violent attack) against German and Austrian Jews on the nights of November 9 and 10, 1938, had reached Prague. Winton decided to take steps.

"I found out that the children of refugees and other groups of people who were enemies of Hitler weren't being looked after. I decided to try to get permits to Britain for them. I found out that the conditions which were laid down for bringing in a child were chiefly that you had a family that was willing and able to look after the child, and £50, which was quite a large sum of money in those days, that was to be deposited at the Home Office. The situation was heartbreaking. Many of the refugees hadn't the price of a meal. Some of the mothers tried desperately to get money to buy food for themselves and their children. The parents desperately wanted at least to get their children to safety when they couldn't manage to get visas for the whole family. I began to realize what suffering there is when armies start to march." 

In terms of his mission, Winton was not thinking in small numbers, but of thousands of children. He was ready to start a mass evacuation.

"Everybody in Prague said, 'Look, there is no organization in Prague to deal with refugee children, nobody will let the children go on their own, but if you want to have a go, have a go.' And I think there is nothing that can't be done if it is fundamentally reasonable."

Nicholas Winton set up his own rescue operation. At first, Winton's office was a dining room table at his hotel in Wenceslas Square in Prague. Anxious parents, who gradually came to understand the danger they and their children were in, came to Winton and placed the future of their children into his hands. Soon, an office was set up on Vorsilska Street, under the charge of Trevor Chadwick. Thousands of parents heard about this unique endeavor and hundreds of them lined up in front of the new office, drawing the attention of the Gestapo. Winton's office distributed questionnaires and registered the children. Winton appointed Trevor Chadwick and Bill Barazetti to look after the Prague end when he returned to England. Many further requests for help came from Slovakia, a region east of Prague.

Winton contacted the governments of nations he thought could take in the children. Only Sweden and his own government said yes. Great Britain promised to accept children under the age of 18 as long as he found homes and guarantors who could deposit £50 for each child to pay for their return home.

Because he wanted to save the lives of as many of the endangered children as possible, Winton returned to London and planned the transport of children to Great Britain. He worked at his regular job on the Stock Exchange by day, and then devoted late afternoons and evenings to his rescue efforts, often working far into the night. He made up an organization, calling it "The British Committee for Refugees from Czechoslovakia, Children's Section." The committee consisted of himself, his mother, his secretary and a few volunteers.

Winton had to find funds to use for repatriation costs, and a foster home for each child. He also had to raise money to pay for the transports when the children's parents could not cover the costs. He advertised in British newspapers, and in churches and synagogues. He printed groups of children's photographs all over Britain. He felt certain that seeing the children's photos would convince potential sponsors and foster families to offer assistance. Finding sponsors was only one of the endless problems in obtaining the necessary documents from German and British authorities.

"Officials at the Home Office worked very slowly with the entry visas. We went to them urgently asking for permits, only to be told languidly, 'Why rush, old boy? Nothing will happen in Europe.' This was a few months before the war broke out. So we forged the Home Office entry permits."

On March 14, 1939, Winton had his first success: the first transport of children left Prague for Britain by airplane. Winton managed to organize seven more transports that departed from Prague's Wilson Railway Station. The groups then crossed the English Channel by boat and finally ended their journey at London's Liverpool Street station. At the station, British foster parents waited to collect their charges. Winton, who organized their rescue, was set on matching the right child to the right foster parents.

The last trainload of children left on August 2, 1939, bringing the total of rescued children to 669. It is impossible to imagine the emotions of parents sending their children to safety, knowing they may never be reunited, and impossible to imagine the fears of the children leaving the lives they knew and their loved ones for the unknown.

On September 1, 1939 the biggest transport of children was to take place, but on that day Hitler invaded Poland, and all borders controlled by Germany were closed. This put an end to Winton's rescue efforts. Winton has said many times that the vision that haunts him most to this day is the picture of hundreds of children waiting eagerly at Wilson Station in Prague for that last aborted transport.

"Within hours of the announcement, the train disappeared. None of the 250 children aboard was seen again. We had 250 families waiting at Liverpool Street that day in vain. If the train had been a day earlier, it would have come through. Not a single one of those children was heard of again, which is an awful feeling." 

The significance of Winton's mission is verified by the fate of that last trainload of children. Moreover, most of the parents and siblings of the children Winton saved perished in the Holocaust.

After the war, Nicholas Winton didn't tell anyone, not even his wife Grete about his wartime rescue efforts. In 1988, a half century later, Grete found a scrapbook from 1939 in their attic, with all the children's photos, a complete list of names, a few letters from parents of the children to Winton and other documents. She finally learned the whole story. Today the scrapbooks and other papers are held at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority, in Israel.

Grete shared the story with Dr. Elisabeth Maxwell, a Holocaust historian and the wife of newspaper magnate Robert Maxwell. Robert Maxwell arranged for his newspaper to publish articles on Winton's amazing deeds. Winton's extraordinary story led to his appearance on Esther Rantzen's BBC television program, That's Life. In the studio, emotions ran high as Winton's "children" introduced themselves and expressed their gratitude to him for saving their lives. Because the program was aired nationwide, many of the rescued children also wrote to him and thanked him. Letters came from all over the world, and new faces still appear at his door, introducing themselves by names that match the documents from 1939.

The rescued children, many now grandparents, still refer to themselves as "Winton's children." Among those saved are the British film director Karel Reisz (The French Lieutenant's Woman, Isadora, and Sweet Dreams), Canadian journalist and news correspondent for CBC, Joe Schlesinger (originally from Slovakia), Lord Alfred Dubs (a former Minister in the Blair Cabinet), Lady Milena Grenfell-Baines (a patron of the arts whose father, Rudolf Fleischmann, saved Thomas Mann from the Nazis), Dagmar Símová (a cousin of the former U.S. Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright), Tom Schrecker, (a Reader's Digest manager), Hugo Marom (a famous aviation consultant, and one of the founders of the Israeli Air Force), and Vera Gissing (author of Pearls of Childhood) and coauthor of Nicholas Winton and the Rescued Generation.

Winton has received many acknowledgements for his humanitarian pre-war deeds. He received a letter of thanks from the late Ezer Weizman, a former president of the State of Israel. He was made an Honorary Citizen of Prague. In 1993, Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, awarded him the MBE (Member of the British Empire), and on October 28, 1998, Václav Havel, then president of the Czech Republic, awarded him the Order of T.G. Masaryk at Hradcany Castle for his heroic achievement. On December 31, 2002, Winton received a knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II for his services to humanity. Winton's story is also the subject of two films by Czech filmmaker Matej Mináč: All My Loved Ones and the award-winning Nicholas Winton: The Power of Good.

Today, Sir Nicholas Winton, resides at his home in Maidenhead, Great Britain. He still wears a ring given to him by some of the children he saved. It is inscribed with a line from the Talmud, the book of Jewish law. It reads: "Save one life, save the world."

Now check out this short video:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_nFuJAF5F0

Clancy's comment: Love ya work, Sir Nicholas. Well done.

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