PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Berkshire Community College (BCC) and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) at BCC will present "Shattered Crystals: A Talk by Holocaust Survivor Eve Kugler" via Zoom on Wednesday, October 19 at 12:30 p.m. 

 

The free talk is open to all; registration is required. To register and receive a Zoom link, visit www.berkshireolli.org/event-4977519.  

 

According to a press release, now age 91, Eve Kugler is one of the few still living who witnessed first-hand the atrocities of the 1930s and 40s. She was born in 1931 in Halle, Germany, where her father owned a department store. Eve grew up alongside her sisters, Ruth and Lea, in a period of ever-increasing repression against Jews. Though her father applied for a visa to Palestine in 1935, the family's application was repeatedly refused. 

 

In October 1938, Eve's 79-year-old grandfather was arrested, along with thousands of other Polish Jews living in Germany, and was returned to Poland in the first Nazi deportation. Ten days later, Kristallnacht occurred. Nazis rampaged through the family home, destroying household possessions and her grandfather's sacred Jewish books before marching Eve's father out to transport him to Buchenwald.  

 

In this talk, she recalls the terror, desperation, determination and series of miraculous tales of survival — including her father's daring escape from a concentration camp — that eventually allowed her family to reunite in America in 1946. 

 

Eve worked as a journalist in the United States until she moved to London in 1990. She created and edits the publication "Shattered Crystals," which contains testimonies of child survivors who attended her high school and is used by educators in the United States and Great Britain. Her book by the same name details her family's Holocaust history. 

 

Eve speaks regularly in schools, synagogues and to civic groups about this history, and she has given presentations throughout the United Kingdom and Europe. She regularly accompanies young people to Poland on the annual March of the Living.