BUY THE BOOK HERE.

Battle-hardened veterans learn to contain their emotions, but it was difficult then, and I cry now to think about it. What stamina and regenerative spirit those brave people showed! –Tank commander George C. Gross

*

There were two tanks. I still get tears in my eyes. Right now, I have tears in my eyes and I always will when I think about it. –Holocaust survivor Steve Barry

*

I had no idea who they were, where they had come from, where they were going – nothing. No idea. All I knew, here’s a train with these boxcars and people jammed in those boxcars!  No, I had no idea. –Tank commander Carrol ‘Red” Walsh

*

What if you find a train loaded with Jews, what are you going to do? Nothing was ever said about anything like that. –Frank Towers, LT, 30th Infantry Division

*

My parents couldn’t understand why I couldn’t sleep at times. –Walter ‘Babe’ Gantz, U.S. Army medic who cared for the survivors

*

Over 40,000 copies in circulation! Soon to be a PBS documentary!

Magdeburg - 02Cv2FINAL

Maybe you’ve seen the photograph before. It has been used by Holocaust museums and memorials all over the world, in books, magazines, and documentaries. It’s all over Facebook, Pinterest, Reddit, BuzzFeed, etc.

But no one ever saw it publicly until I sat down to interview the World War II veterans who were present when it was taken. They were there. They saw what happened. And they acted-in the middle of a shooting war.

George Gross and Carrol Walsh, tank commanders, 743rd Tank Battalion, 1945.
George Gross and Carrol Walsh, tank commanders, 743rd Tank Battalion, 1945.

More importantly, I have the whole story behind what it really means, and the work I have done has helped to reunite the soldiers with the people that they saved, six decades after that fateful spring morning in 1945.

And now it is time to tell the true story of how we tripped the wires of the cosmos.

”It’s not for my sake, it’s for the sake of humanity, that they will remember” ~Holocaust survivor and friend Steve Barry, 2009

Reunion, 2009. Liberator 'Red' Walsh greets survivors Ariela Rojek, Paul Arato, Elisabeth Seaman, and Fred Spiegel.
Reunion, 2009. Liberator ‘Red’ Walsh greets survivors Ariela Rojek, Paul Arato, Elisabeth Seaman, and Fred Spiegel. AP

Give me a hug, you saved my life! – Holocaust survivor Paul Arato

You can also learn more at my blog, http://teachinghistorymatters.com.