The "1939" Club Lecture Series

The complexity of the Holocaust and its ethical challenges continue to concern scholars around the world. Launched in fall 2000, The "1939" Club Lecture Series brings distinguished historians, ethicists, and artists to campus to share their scholarship and to engage students, faculty, and community members in discussion and debate.

"1939" Club Series Lecturers

Steven T. Katz
Director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Judaic Studies, Boston University
Author of The Holocaust in Historical Context and Post-Holocaust Dialogues
Jewish Resistance during the Holocaust

Dr. Robert Krell
Co-editor, And Life is Changed Forever: Holocast Childhoods Remembered
Co-author, The Children of Buchenwald
Life Journeys: Child Survivors of the Holocaust
Child Survivors of the Holocaust:
The Children of Buchenwald

Christopher Browning
Frank Porter Graham Professor of History, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Author of The Origins of the Final Solution and Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and The Final Solution in Poland
Ordinary Men: Explaining the Perpetrators

Daniel Anker
Emmy Award winner
Producer and director of Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust
Orange County Premiere
Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust

Michael Berenbaum
Director of the Sibi Ziering Institute at the University of Judaism, Los Angeles
Orange County Premiere
Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust

Debórah Dwork
Rose Professor of Holocaust History
Director of the Strassler Family Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Clark University
Author of Children with a Star
Co-author of Holocaust: A History
Children with a Star

The Honorable W. Michael Blumenthal
President and Chief Executive, Berlin Jewish Museum
Former United States Secretary of the Treasury
Germany and the Jews: Past, Present, and Future

Thomas Blatt
Sobibor survivor and author of From the Ashes of Sobibor
From the Ashes of Sobibor

Gerda Weissmann Klein and Kurt Klein
Authors of The Hours After: Letters of Love and Longing in War's Aftermath
Lessons of Love and Loss:
From the Holocaust to Columbine

The "1939" Club Lecture Series is made possible by The "1939" Club, including Shoah Survivors of Orange County and Long Beach. The "1939" Club is one of the largest and most active Holocaust survivor organizations in the United States.

Inaugural speakers in The “1939” Club Lecture Series, the Kleins have educated and inspired people throughout the world.

For the first time in its history, at the 2001 commencement ceremony, Chapman University awarded an honorary doctorate to a couple, Gerda Weissmann Klein and Kurt Klein (1920 – 2002).

The following are excerpts from their acceptance speeches:

“My thoughts go back to the darkest years of my life, to those nameless heroes who stood fast in retaining their principles of decency. They shone brightly in a world of brutality and betrayal. They comforted and guided me. In their blessed memory I accept this priceless honor with awe, humility, and gratitude.”

Gerda Weissmann Klein

“There are few moments in life that can compare to his one. It leaves me overcome by emotion, a combination of gratitude and humility.… Like Chapman University, we, too, are dedicated to the spirit of unfettered thinking… and we are immeasurably honored to be included in your aim to bring better understanding to humanity.”

Kurt Klein