Jennifer Mann P'23, '25 Speaks about her Family's Holocaust Experience

Thanks to MBS parent Jennifer Mann P’23, ’25, who led a presentation in Kirby Chapel on Wednesday night about her family’s incredible story of survival and reunion during the Holocaust.

Jennifer is a third-generation Holocaust survivor and a trained speaker for the 3GNY Organization, an educational nonprofit organization founded by the grandchildren of Holocaust survivors whose mission is to educate diverse communities about the perils of intolerance and to provide a supportive forum for the descendants of survivors.

Growing up, Jennifer only knew that her grandmother, Lucille, was the youngest of six kids living in a small village in Poland.  Her father was able to secure one visa to the United States for the family and she was the only sibling not married. Grandma Lucille was given the visa to immigrate to the United States in 1938 on one of the last ships of immigrants to leave Poland.  In 1988, the incredible story of her Grandma Lucille’s reunion with her first cousin, Jonasz Stern unfolded.  

While searching for a gift for Grandma Lucille’s 70th birthday, Jennifer and her aunt randomly came across the perfect gift, a book entitled Remnants: The Last Jews of Poland.  When the large book filled with portraits and short biographies of men and women who survived the Nazi death camps arrived, Grandma Lucille couldn’t put it down.  When she turned to page 187, she saw the picture of well-known Polish artist Jonasz Stern. The photo didn’t mean anything, but the name meant everything. Jonasz Stern was her first cousin whom she was extremely close with as a child.  

Jennifer told the incredible story of the miraculous survival of Jonasz Stern and his reunion with Grandma Lucille after 50 years of not knowing the other’s fate.