Holocaust Survivor visits Trinity Prep of Loganville

Trinity Prep of Loganville has developed a Living History Program for its students. In this program our goal is to teach about events that have occurred in our history. For this, we feel it is important to bring in special guest speakers that can share their life story and offer details of what life was like for them during that time in their lives. Last week we were blessed to meet Mr. Ben Walker, a Holocaust survivor, and were given the opportunity to hear what life was like for children during that horrific time and then his life until now. Our students, visiting parents and staff were so moved by his story and most wanted to get a picture or just have a moment to talk with him! Several were brought to tears and we feel that due to this experience, the Holocaust and the tragedy of events will have a much deeper meaning because of Ben's decision to begin telling his story. The following is his biography

Ben Walker was born near Czernowitz, Romania, an area that is now the Ukraine. Romanian authorities pursued a policy of harsh, persecutory anti-Semitism--particularly against Jews living in eastern borderlands, even before the country fell into the orbit of Nazi Germany. In September 1940, after King Carol II was forced to abdicate, a coalition government of radical right-wing military officers came to power in Romania and requested the dispatch of a German military mission. On November 20, 1940, Romania formally joined the Axis alliance. In 1941, Ben and his family were deported to Transnistria. Romanian authorities established several de facto ghettos and two concentration camps in the region. Between 1941 and 1944, German and Romanian authorities murdered or caused the deaths of between 150,000 and 250,000 Romanian and Ukrainian Jews in Transnistria. Ben and his mother were the only members of his family to survive. His father, sister, uncles, and grandparents perished. After the war, Ben and his mother immigrated to Israel. Ben served in the Israel Defense Forces. In 1956, Ben joined his mother in Florida where he attended college and met his wife. The couple moved to Atlanta in the late 60s. They have two daughters and two grandchildren.