By Mary O’KEEFE

CVW was able to speak with Holocaust survivor Joseph Alexander on his birthday on Nov. 20:

When asked what it feels like to be 103 years old, Alexander replied, “The same thing as when I was 102 – just a year older.”

Alexander recently returned from Orange County where he continued his mission of reaching out to as many young people as possible to share his story of the Holocaust. 

Alexander was born in Poland and in 1939 and was caught up in what Nazi Germany called The Final Solution. When Germans marched into Poland they divided the area into restricted and non-restricted areas. Eventually Alexander and his family were separated, and he was put into one labor camp after another. The work was backbreaking and endless. 

Then he, along with hundreds of other Jews, were loaded into a cattle car [train box car] and taken to Auschwitz. He survived more camps, met Josef Mengele and, as the war was coming to an end, he and others were marched by Nazi soldiers to a mountain where it was certain they would be killed. Thankfully the Americans liberated them before they were killed. 

Alexander said the story of the Holocaust, especially for those few survivors, is important to share with young people. He has been sharing his story for decades and said this generation has received the information with a lot of interest – and responding to it. 

“After [the talk] I get a lot of questions,” he said. 

He said the persecution of some individuals he sees in today’s world is not exactly like what happened in Nazi Germany but “it is close.” 

Alexander has been sharing his message with students and plans to continue to travel to school after school to share the story.

“The message to people now is to let them know what happened, and the rest of my message is that I hope that is does not happen again,” he said.