Holocaust Survivor who Shares Apartment with Descendant of Nazis to Speak at Homestead High School

Holocaust survivor Ben Stern will address students in a closed event at Homestead High School in Cupertino, CA on Wednesday, May 24 as part of JCC without Walls educational programming from the Oshman Family JCC.

“I’m proud of the teachers and leadership at Homestead, Palo Alto and other high schools who are bringing Ben Stern and the film his daughter produced to their schools," says Ronit Widmann-Levy, Director of Arts and Culture at the Oshman Family JCC.

The 95-year-old Stern is the subject of the documentary Near Normal Man, produced and directed by his daughter Charlene Stern, which will be screened at the high school with a post-screening discussion as part of the Oshman Family JCC program. The film traces Stern’s journey through Jewish ghettos, concentration camps and a public battle thirty years later against Nazis in Skokie, IL. In spite of his experiences, Stern, whose family perished in the Holocaust, professes tolerance and compassion.

"This event is a testament to the strength of this community and its willingness to be a platform for teaching love and understanding of the other," says Widmann-Levy.

Near Normal Man is told in the first person by Stern who survived two ghettos, nine concentration camps and two death marches. Stern emerged alive to confront the Nazis again 30 years later in Skokie, Illinois when he decided to protest their march in his adopted hometown. Leading with a small group of survivors, he waged a public battle against the Nazis, the ACLU and Chicago Jewish leadership and obtained 750,000 signatures opposing the Nazi march.

The Illinois Supreme Court upheld the Nazis’ right to march based on freedom of speech but the event had already garnered 60,000 people planning to attend in order to counter-demonstrate. As a result, the march did take place with only 20 Neo-Nazis whose voices were massively overpowered by a democratic counter-demonstration that left a major impact on the community.

Today, Stern lives in Berkeley with 31-year-old German student Lea Heitfeld, the granddaughter of Nazis.

Widmann-Levy states, “This is a testimony to the resilience of the human spirit. Its capacity to decide change is more important than harboring resentment for the past."

The Homestead High School film screening will be attended by hundreds of students for whom it may be the only opportunity to hear from a Holocaust survivor.