SCRANTON — Bernard Schanzer, M.D., and Henry Schanzer, J.D., will present “A Twin Tale of Survival in the Holocaust” for The University of Scranton’s Judaic Studies Institute Lecture on Tuesday, Nov. 12, at 7:30 p.m. in the PNC Auditorium, Loyola Science Center. The Schanzers will tell their story of survival, which was made possible through the help of a righteous non-Jew.
Twin brothers, the Schanzers were born in 1935 in Belgium. Their family was forced to flee from the German invasion in 1940, eventually settling in St. Etienne, France. However, by 1942, the French government began participating in the arrest and transportation of Jews, and for their safety, their parents sent the twins to live with a Christian acquaintance and sent their older sister, Anna, to a boarding school in Lyon. Shortly after, their apartment in St. Etienne was seized, and their father Bruno was sent to a French detention camp and ultimately died in Auschwitz.
The twins shuffled from place to place until their mother found them an arrangement at the farm of Adolphine Dorel in St. Pal de Mons, whom they came to love. They remained there until the end of the war, after which they reunited with their mother and sister. Finally, in 1946, the family moved across an ocean to New York City. Bernard eventually became a neurologist and Henry, a patent lawyer.
The Schanzers have lectured across the country, including at Baylor College of Medicine, Yeshiva University, the New Jersey Holocaust Commemoration (Yom HaShoah) Program and Torah Links of Middlesex County. Bernard currently lives in West Orange, New Jersey and Henry lives in Edison, New Jersey.
For further information, contact Marc Shapiro, Ph.D., professor of theology/religious studies and the Weinberg Chair of Judaic Studies at The University of Scranton, at 570-941-7956 or marc.shapiro@scranton.edu.
