Daisy Miller, Holocaust survivor and one of the driving forces behind World Federation of Jewish Child Survivors of the Holocaust & Descendants
The USC Shoah Foundation mourns the loss of Daisy Miller, Holocaust survivor and longtime champion of the Institute.
Miller was among the first child survivors of the Holocaust to share her experiences in a group setting. She helped to mobilize the formation of the World Federation of Jewish Child Survivors of the Holocaust & Descendants in 1985. Miller recorded her testimony with USC Shoah Foundation in 1999 in Studio City, California. Her testimony is contained in the Visual History Archive.
In 1994, while the USC Shoah Foundation was in its early stages, Daisy became involved as a volunteer and a guiding force. She provided the much-needed perspective of a child survivor. She soon came to work full-time for the foundation, leading the volunteer corps and then joining the community relations team helping to build important partnerships. Daisy was a natural leader, and she would later apply this skill in the area of fundraising as a major gifts officer. She was a pillar of the foundation, and a friend and inspiration to the staff and leadership for decades. After nearly 20 years as a key member of the organization, Daisy retired from the Shoah Foundation in 2013.
Miller was born Daisy Bettina Hirsch on October 5, 1938 in Zagreb, Yugoslavia. Her parents, Georg and Lilly, and older sister, Inge, had escaped from Austria just months before she was born. As Daisy’s earliest memories were being formed, the daily lives of Jews in Zagreb were becoming increasingly difficult. Her family, forced to display yellow stars on their clothing, understood that life was only going to become more dangerous. Daisy recalls in her testimony, “I know that my father was very aware and very conscious, thank goodness, of the need to get out—to get away. Because he knew that there was something terrible coming.”
After multiple attempts to leave Yugoslavia, Daisy and her family were able to cross the border into Italy in 1941. They found a temporary home in Montecatini, a small city outside of Florence, and were kept under strict surveillance by the local authorities. Over the next two years, the family was forced to relocate several times. They moved from town to town and relied on the help of local landowners to provide them with asylum.
Daisy’s family became greatly threatened when Germany broke their alliance with Italy in 1943 and were rumored to have invaded the country. Diligent planning on behalf of her father led the family of four to a new house in Quarrata, where they stayed in a room upstairs at all times. Georg would paint on the walls and tell Daisy stories, and Lilly was dedicated to caring for her husband and children. After 6 months in this house, there was a rumor that someone had reported them to the authorities. The family fled in April of 1943 and were reunited with cousins in a new house.
After years in hiding, Daisy and her family were liberated by Allied forces in September of 1944. Daisy noted the new sense of freedom that she and her cousins felt as they played outside in daylight.
Daisy’s family began a new life in Florence, but her father soon fell ill with tuberculosis and spent the next three years in various sanitariums. He passed away from his illness in 1948, when Daisy was 10 years old. As they mourned this great loss, Daisy continued Hebrew School in Florence and her mother worked odd jobs to make ends meet. They soon began mobilization on the family dream to come to America.
In March of 1951, Daisy and her mother boarded a ship, and after nine days of sailing they arrived in New York City. Four months later, Daisy relocated to Los Angeles with her mother and worked hard to learn English and assimilate with those in her class. She eventually graduated high school and married her first husband Bernard, with whom she had two daughters: Andrea and Karen. Daisy met her second husband, Herman Miller, and the two were happily married until he passed away in 1999.
Daisy spent much of her adult life in leadership positions for various causes. As she once described, her work “tended to always be dealing with the underdog.” Daisy notably contributed to the popularization of the child Holocaust survivor movement when she helped form the World Federation of Jewish Child Survivors of the Holocaust & Descendants in 1985. This organization paved the way to allow child survivors to share and process their experiences during the war. After receiving a special certificate in pre-retirement planning at the USC Andrus Gerontology Center, she began her own consulting business in which she helped people with the financial and mental aspects of the aging process for over 20 years.
In her 1999 testimony with the Shoah Foundation, Daisy reflected on her work with the organization: “it has brought me closer to my roots. It has brought me closer to that part of me that is so important to me. And it has also provided me with an opportunity to not be a passive victim, but to do something in a very active and proactive way to counter that piece that was the victim. So I'm doing something to fight back by being part of this foundation.”
Daisy Miller is and will always remain an indelible part of the USC Shoah Foundation. Her indefatigable strength, and her commitment to community, and her care for fellow survivors were second to none. She helped shape our work. Always one to support work for the underdog, she understood that the purpose of life is to be proactive and to push for a better future. For us, Daisy’s memory and her legacy is a guiding light that gives us strength and purpose to protect and sustain the future of Holocaust remembrance.
—Robert Williams, CEO, on behalf of the USC Shoah Foundation
Daisy is lovingly remembered by her daughters, granddaughters, great-grandsons, her beloved partner, Burton Taylor, and her many Shoah Foundation colleagues.