Modern day Kentucky and WWII-era Austria may seem worlds apart, but the far-flung locales and distant timeframes came together last month at a series of educational workshops at the Iroquois Branch Library in south Louisville. Over the course of five weeks, a group of young children and their caregivers gathered each Saturday morning for a special educational series sponsored by the National Center for Families Learning (NCFL) and The Willesden Project, a program of USC Shoah Foundation and Hold On To Your Music Foundation, with support from the Koret Foundation. 

The more than 1,000 interviews will constitute the largest non-Holocaust-related collection to be integrated into the Institute’s Visual History Archive. It will also be the Archive’s first audio-only collection.

Jewish Holocaust survivor Agnes Adachi shares a story about the antisemitic name-calling she endured as a child attending school in Hungary during World War II.

Shony Braun a violinist, recalls being selected to play music for the SS officers at Dachau. He believes that he would’ve been killed if not for his ability to play music. 

Jewish Survivor Agnes describes her experience working in the camp hospital at Auschwitz II-Birkenau and her good fortune for her work assignment as a medical assistant. She attributes her survival to her cousin, a prisoner doctor, for giving her this opportunity. DOB: 5/3/1926 City of birth: Satu Mare Country of birth: Romania Ghettos: Satu Mare (Romania) Camps: Salzwedel (Germany), Auschwitz (Poland), Braunschweig (Germany)  

Agnes Kun worked in the hospital at Auschwitz II-Birkenau as an assistant nurse. She recalls Josef Mengele, particularly his presence at the hospital.

Harry Haft survived through his skills as a boxer for the entertainment of the Nazis in Auschwitz. Others imprisoned at the camp—including Benjamin Jacobs, a dentist—have mentioned in their testimonies that their professional usefulness to their captors may have saved their lives. Besides boxing, another form of entertainment for the Nazis at Auschwitz was the camp orchestra. The Visual History Archive has the testimonies of several musicians who recount their experiences playing in the orchestra.

Dr. Street currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Association of Holocaust Organizations and as a member of the Education Working Group of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.

Kori Street is the Interim Finci-Viterbi Executive Director. They came to the Institute in 2011 from Mount Royal University, where they were an associate professor and served as chair of entrepreneurship, nonprofit studies, international business and aviation in the Bissett School of Business. After completing a master’s in the History of Education and Gender/Feminism at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education/University of Toronto, Dr. Street received their PhD in history from the University of Victoria in 2001. Dr.

Two Holocaust survivors and friends of USC Shoah Foundation, Max Eisen and Dr. Agnes Kaposi, have been recognized by Queen Elizabeth II for their work in Holocaust education. Eisen was appointed to the Order of Canada for his “contributions to Holocaust education, and his promotion of transformational dialogue on human rights, tolerance and respect.”

Alan Rose was repeating himself. He was stuck in a particularly difficult part of his story about being deported from a labor camp to Buchenwald Concentration Camp. Josh Turnil and the guests he had invited to hear Alan’s story in Josh’s Paris living room that January 2019 evening – about 20 people of all ages tucked into sofas and folding chairs – gently helped Alan along. After Alan had finished speaking, Josh’s teenage son sat at the piano and played a slow, jazzy melody with a repeating refrain that reflected the circularity of memory.

A pilot collection of 20 testimonies of survivors and witnesses of the 1995 genocide that took place in Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina has been added to USC Shoah Foundation’s 55,000-strong Visual History Archive (VHA) thanks to a new collaboration with the Srebrenica Memorial Center. 

Two weeks into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, USC Shoah Foundation is extremely concerned for its partners, survivors and friends in both countries and strongly condemns the senseless loss of life. USC Shoah Foundation has strong roots in Ukraine, having conducted 3,432 interviews in the country that form the basis for a collection of testimony-based educational programs that have reached tens of thousands of Ukrainian teachers and students.

On staff since 2011, strategic communications manager Aaron Zarrow joined the organization for the first time in 1995 as a production assistant. In 1996 he became Associate Producer ofThe Last Days feature documentary. His later credits include Senior Year, a 13-part PBS series; Funny Old Guys, an HBO special presentation; Sir! No Sir! winner of the 2005 LA Film Festival Audience Award for Best Documentary; and Healed: Music, Medicine and Life with MS, a 2014 PBS documentary.

Amy Marczewski Carnes, PhD, completed her doctorate in French at UCLA in 2007 and worked at Human Rights Watch in Los Angeles before starting at USC Shoah Foundation in 2008.  Since then, she has overseen educational projects throughout Europe, curated two exhibitions of testimony, developed and oversaw the Institute's monitoring and evaluation systems, and taught a course at USC titled Rebuilding Rwanda:  Memory, Testimony, and Living Together after Genocide.  In her current role, she oversees visitor experience and supports development projects to sustain the Ins

Ryan Fenton-Strauss manages the video archive and post-production team.  He joined the USC Shoah Foundation in 2003, and oversees the digitization and restoration of Visual History Archive.  He earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in film production, from Chapman University and a Bachelor’s degree from Brandeis University.

Susan Popler is Director of the Visual History Archive Program where she is driving initiatives to reimagine how audiences access, engage with and learn from testimony with the goal of expanding global reach, increasing interactions and impact. Prior to joining USC, Susan was Executive Director of Production Operations at Time Inc. During her 18 year tenure, she worked with magazines such as Time, Life, People, InStyle, and Fortune.

Daphne Yang is an annotation specialist in the Dimensions in Testimony program. She began working at USC Shoah Foundation while earning her bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University in Southern California, and is currently working towards earning a Master of Library and Information Science.

Svetlana Ushakova provides the service of research, annotation, and evaluation to the Dimensions in Testimony program. In 2014-2018, she worked at USC Shoah Foundation as an indexer and research assistant. Before she moved to the USA, she worked for ten years as a researcher at an academic institution in Russia and has several publications. Svetlana received her doctorate in Russian History from Novosibirsk State University, Russia, and her master in Library and Information Science from San Jose State University.

Jenna Leventhal is the Deputy Director of Education and Operations at USC Shoah Foundation. She earned a BA in history from UC Santa Barbara and an MA in public history from University of Houston, with an emphasis in Holocaust education and oral history. She joined the Institute in 2011 and worked for many years leading the development of the IWitness website.  She currently oversees program management and strategic partnerships for the education department. 

Zach Larkin supports the Institute’s Managing Director and Executive Office through his involvement in stewardship strategies, content development, topical research, writing, and meeting planning. Prior to the Institute, Zach worked in several film & television production companies and networks as an Intern in their Development and Current Series departments. Zach joined USC Shoah Foundation as an Intern in the Executive Office and Media Production department while completing his USC History Department Honors Thesis about Holocaust Resistance Movements in Budapest.

Larina Palacpac supports the financial management of the Institute by assisting in account reconciliation, budget development and financial reporting. Prior to joining USC Shoah Foundation, Larina worked as a Budget/Business Technician at the USC Dornsife Business Office for six years where she was responsible for processing procurement orders and reimbursement requests for a high-volume research intensive department. She received her bachelor’s degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Marketing from the University of Southern California.

With the Institute since 1996, Karen has led an international and multilingual staff to successfully catalog and index the archive and has been instrumental in developing the indexing and cataloging methodology and software applications.