Holocaust+Survivor

Otto Frank Holocaust Survivor By: Micaela Stanly

Otto Heinrich Frank was a Jewish man, born on May 12, 1889 (One month before Adolf Hitler was born) in Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. Otto grew up in a wealthy German/Jewish household. Later on during World War I, Otto Frank served in the German Imperial Army on the Western front. By the end of the war, he was promoted to Lieutenant. He served in an artillery unit as an enlisted man and received a field promotion to Lieutenant in 1918. After World War I, Otto met a woman named Edith Hollander in 1924. They married on Frank's thirty-sixth birthday on May 12, 1925 in Frankfurt-am-Main, and moved to the outer suburbs of Frankfurt-am-Main. Only one year later on February 16, 1926 - The Frank's first daughter, Margot Frank was born, and the Frank family was progressing greatly. Three years later, on June 12, 1929 - Anne Frank was born.

Anne & Margot Frank went to attended Montessori School for Jews. On Anne's thirteenth birthday, Otto bought her a diary that she had asked for. The diary was taken with Anne to the secret annex, when Otto made the decision at the start of World War II to put him and his family into hiding. So, as desired, the Frank family went into hiding into an old warehouse in Amsterdam & hid upstairs in the secret annex. The secret annex was basically a separate floor upstairs. The doorway to get up there was covered by a bookcase. The family's good friend Miep Gies was the one who put them into hiding, and covered for them. Everything was going well, and when it had been announced on the radio that the war was almost over, they thought that they had made it through. Workers in the warehouse had become suspicious of why windows were painted black and covered with boards. Someone had found out and called the police about the Jews in hiding in the warehouse, and the Franks were then discovered. When the Franks were discovered, Anne’s diary was taken from her, and wasn’t discovered until later on after the war.

The Frank family was first taken to the Dutch Transit Camp of Westerbork, then later on they were transferred to Auschwitz - where Otto was separated from his wife and two daughters. personally, I believe that Otto was one of the luckiest people to have survived Auschwitz. Auschwitz was one of the biggest death camps to be known. When Otto & his family arrived to the death camp, everything was taken from them, and then they we're separated. All of their belongings were taken, everyone's head was shaved, no one was able to bathe, and no one was fed. After a long desperate time of sorrow, but still having hope, the War ended and everyone was released from the camps. Otto had made it through, and he is lucky, because out of **405,000** registered prisoners, only **65,000** survived Auschwitz. It isn't really known how he survived, but he did. I personally just think he was very lucky. After the war, Otto headed home and went to try to find information about his wife and two missing daughters. That summer, he was informed that the rest of his family had been killed, and he was the only one left.

After the tragic finding of the loss of his family, Miep was still alive, and the whole time she had kept the diary of Anne Frank. Miep survived because she was Austrian just as Hitler was. When Otto came back and went to visit her, Miep had given the diary to Otto. He read through everything and had decided to edit it out and publish it into a book. It is one of the most read books worldwide, and is still read greatly. After the publishing of the book, Otto married Elfriede Geiringer-Markovits (a former neighbor from Amsterdam & a fellow Auschwitz survivor). They married in Amsterdam on November 10, 1953, and then both moved to Basel, Switzerland, where he had a family. Later on after the new marriage, he opened up the Anne Frank Foundation on May 3, 1957. Until his death, Otto Frank continued to promote Anne Frank's message of tolerance and compassion throughout the world. On August 19, 1980, Otto Frank died from lung cancer at the age of 91.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Frank

http://www.harpercollins.com/author/authorExtra.aspx?isbn13=9780060520830&displayType=readingGuide

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margot_frank