Varian Mackey Fry (October 15, 1907 – September 13, 1967) was a Hotchkiss School and Harvard University educated American journalist who ran a rescue network in Vichy France that helped approximately 2,000 to 4,000 anti-Nazi and Jewish refugees to escape Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. Events 533 - Byzantine General Belisarius makes his formal entry into Carthage, having conquered it from the Year 1907 ( MCMVII) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year Events 509 BC - The Temple of Jupiter on Rome 's Capitoline Hill is dedicated on the ides of September Year 1967 ( MCMLXVII) was a Common year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar of the 1967 Gregorian calendar. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the A journalist (also called a newspaperman) is a person who practices Journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events trends Vichy France, or the Vichy regime are the common terms used to describe the government of France from July 1940 to August 1944 PLEASE TAKE NOTE************ Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the common English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers The Holocaust (from the Greek el ''ὁλόκαυστον'' (el-Latn holókauston holos, "completely" and kaustos, "burnt" also known as
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Early life
Varian Fry founded Hound & Horn, an influential literary quarterly, in 1927 with Lincoln Kirstein while an undergraduate at Harvard. Hound & Horn, originally subtitled "a Harvard Miscellany" was a literary quarterly founded by Harvard undergrads Lincoln Kirstein Lincoln Edward Kirstein ( May 4, 1907 - January 5, 1996) was an American He married Kirstein's sister, Eileen.
While working as a foreign correspondent for the American journal The Living Age, Varian Fry visited Berlin in 1935 and personally witnessed Nazi savagery against Jews on more than one occasion. Berlin is the capital city and one of sixteen states of Germany. Nazism, which was a short name for National Socialism (Nationalsozialismus refers primarily to the Ideology and practices of the National Socialist German
Greatly disturbed by what he saw, he helped raise money to support European anti-Nazi movements. Following the occupation of France, in August 1940 he went to Marseille as an agent of the newly formed ([1]) Emergency Rescue Committee in an effort to help persons wishing to flee the Nazis. Marseille, ( English alt Marseilles mɑrˈseɪ — French: maʁsɛj locally — Provençal Occitan: Marselha maʀˈsijɔ Fry had $3,000 and a short list of refugees under imminent threat of arrest by agents of the Gestapo. The ( contraction of ge heime Sta ats' po' lizei: "Secret State Police" was the official Secret police of Nazi Germany Clamoring at his door came anti-Nazi writers, avant-garde artists, musicians and hundreds of others desperately seeking any chance to escape France. Avant-garde (avɑ̃gaʁd in French) means "advance guard" or "vanguard [1]
Emergency Rescue Committee
Beginning in 1940, in Marseille, despite the watchful eye of the collaborationist Vichy regime, he and a small group of volunteers hid people at the Villa Air-Bel until they could be smuggled out. Vichy France, or the Vichy regime are the common terms used to describe the government of France from July 1940 to August 1944 More than 2,200 people were taken across the border to the safety of neutral Portugal from which they made their way to the United States. Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic (República Portuguesa is a country on the Iberian Peninsula.
Others he helped escape on ships leaving Marseille for the French colony of Martinique, from which they too could go to the United States. Martinique is an Island in the eastern Caribbean Sea, having a land area of 1128 km² Among Fry's closest associates were Americans Miriam Davenport, a former art student at the Sorbonne, and the heiress Mary Jayne Gold, a lover of the arts and the "good life" who had come to Paris in the early 1930s. Miriam Davenport (b June 6 1915, Boston Massachusetts &ndash d The historic University of Paris (Université de Paris first appeared in the second half of the 13th century Mary Jayne Gold ( 1909 - October 5, 1997) was an American heiress who played an important role helping European Jews and Intellectuals Paris (ˈpærɨs in English; in French) is the Capital of France and the country's largest city
When the Nazis seized France in 1940, Gold went to Marseille, where she worked with Fry and helped finance his operation. Also working with Fry was a young academic named Albert O. Hirschman, who eventually went on to a distinguished career in America. Albert Otto Hirschman (b April 7[[ 915]] in Berlin, Germany) is an influential American Economist who has authored several books on
Especially instrumental in getting Fry the visas he needed for the artists, intellectuals and political dissidents on his list was Hiram Bingham IV, an American Vice Consul in Marseille who fought against State Department anti-Semitism and was personally responsible for issuing thousands of visas, both legal and illegal. A visa (short for the Latin carta visa, lit "a document that has been seen" is a document issued by a Country giving an individual Hiram "Harry" Bingham IV ( July 17 1903 &ndash January 12 1988) was an American diplomat
Among those Fry aided were the following:
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Back home in the United States, Fry published in 1945 his book about his time in France under the title, Surrender on Demand. Janos Békessy, better known under his pen name Hans Habe ( February 12, 1911 Budapest, Hungary - September 29, 1977 Jacques Salomon Hadamard ( December 8, 1865 – October 17, 1963) was a French Mathematician best known for his proof of Konrad Heiden ( 7 August 1901 &ndash 18 June 1966) was an influential journalist and historian of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Wilhelm Herzog ( January 12 1884 in Berlin - April 4 1960) was a German historian of literature and culture dramatist Siegfried Kracauer ( February 8, 1889, Frankfurt am Main &ndash November 26, 1966, New York) was a German Wifredo Oscar de la Concepción Lam y Castilla (b December 8, 1902, Sagua La Grande, Cuba; &ndash d Jacqueline Lamba Breton (sometimes "Jacqueline Lamba" or "Jacqueline Lambra-Breton"(1910 - 1993 was a French (one source has "American" painter Wanda Landowska ( Warsaw, July 5, 1879 &ndash Lakeville, Connecticut, August 16, 1959) was a Polish Jacques Lipchitz ( August 22, 1891 - May 16, 1973) was a Cubist sculptor Alma Maria Mahler-Werfel (born Schindler) (31 August 1879 &ndash 11 December 1964 was a Viennese-born socialite well known in her youth for her beauty and vivacity Golo Mann ( March 27, 1909 &ndash April 7, 1994) born Angelus Gottfried Thomas Mann, was a popular German Historian Luiz (Ludwig Heinrich Mann ( 27 March 1871 &ndash 12 March 1950) was a German novelist who wrote works with social themes whose André-Aimé-René Masson ( January 4, 1896 &ndash October 28, 1987) was a French Artist. Roberto Antonio Sebastián Matta Echaurren ( November 11, 1911 – November 23, 2002) usually known as Matta, was one of Walter Mehring ( April 29 1896 &ndash October 3 1981) was a German author and one of the most prominent satirical authors Otto Fritz Meyerhof ( April 12, 1884 &ndash October 6, 1951) was a German -born Physician and Biochemist. Hans Namuth (March 17 1915 – October 13 1990 was a German-born photographer Max Ophüls (born Maximillian Oppenheimer, 6 May 1902, Saarbrücken, Germany - 25 March 1957, Hamburg Benjamin Péret ( 4 July 1899 - 18 September 1959) was a French poet and Surrealist. Denise Restout ( November 24, 1915 - March 9, 2004) - keyboard teacher expert on German and French Baroque performance Anna Seghers ( November 19, 1900, Mainz – June 1, 1983, Berlin) was a German Writer famous for depicting Victor Lvovich Kibalchich (ВЛ Кибальчич ( December 30 1890 - November 17 1947) better known as Victor Serge, was Sophie Taeuber-Arp ( January 19, 1889 - January 13, 1943) (often ˈtɔɪbɚ ˈɑrp in English) was a Swiss Artist, Franz Werfel ( September 10, 1890 &ndash August 26, 1945) was an Austrian - Bohemian Novelist Playwright Kurt Wolff ( 3 March 1887 &ndash 21 October 1963) was a German publisher editor writer and Journalist. In 1968, the US publisher Scholastic (which, as implied by its name, markets mainly to children and adolescents) published a paperback edition under the title Assignment: Rescue, and subsequent reprints have appeared under both of the above titles. The Scholastic Corporation (or sometimes referred to as Scholastic Press; in other cases Scholastic Inc
He wrote and spoke critically against U. S. immigration policies particularly relating to the issue of the fate of Jews in Europe. In a December 1942 issue of The New Republic, he wrote a scathing article titled: "The Massacre of Jews in Europe". The New Republic ( TNR) is an American Magazine of politics and the arts
Later life
In 1967, the government of France recognized his heroic contribution to freedom with the Legion of Honor. Mary Jayne Gold's 1980 book titled Crossroads Marseilles 1940 sparked an interest in Fry and his heroic efforts.
Known as The American Schindler, in 1995 Varian Fry became the first United States citizen to be listed in the Righteous Among the Nations at Israel's national Holocaust Memorial, Yad Vashem (in 2006, fellow Americans Waitstill Sharp and Martha Sharp were added to the list). Oskar Schindler ( 28 April 1908 &ndash 9 October 1974) was a Sudeten German Industrialist credited with saving almost 1200 Righteous among the Nations (חסידי אומות העולם Chassidey Umot HaOlam) which may at times refer to the B'nei Noah or Noahides as well is a term used A number of organizations museums and monuments are intended to serve as Memorials to The Holocaust and its millions of victims Yad Vashem (יד ושם also spelled Yad VaShem; "Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority" is Israel 's official memorial to the Jewish Waitstill Hasting Sharp (1902-1984 was a Unitarian minister With his wife Martha Sharp, helped hundreds of Jews escape Nazi persecution in Czechoslovakia Martha Ingham Dickie Sharp-Cogan (1905 - 1999 was an American Philanthropist who along with her husband Waitstill Sharp, helped hundreds of Jews He was awarded the additional honor of "Commemorative Citizenship of the State of Israel" on 1 January 1998. New Year See also New Year The Ancient Romans began their consular year on January 1st since 153 BC Year 1998 ( MCMXCVIII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1998 Gregorian calendar)
On the initiative of Samuel V. Brock, the U. S. Consul General in Marseille from 1999 to 2002, the square in front of the Consulate was renamed Place Varian Fry. A consul general heads a Consulate general and is a consul of the highest rank serving at a principal location and usually responsible for other consular offices within A street in the newly reconstructed East/West Berlin Wall area in the Berlin borough of Mitte was named Varian-Fry-Straße in recognition of his work in the Nazi period. In 2005, a street in his home town of Ridgewood, New Jersey was renamed Varian Fry Way [2]
In 1997 Irish film director David Kerr, made a documentary entitled Varian Fry: The America's Schindler, that was narrated by actor Sean Barrett. Ridgewood is a village in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. Sean Barrett may refer to Seán Barrett (Irish politician (born 1944 former Irish Fine Gael Party TD and government minister Sean Barrett Varian Fry's story was also told in dramatic form on film in 2001 when Barbra Streisand co-produced the made-for-television motion picture, Varian's War, written and directed by Lionel Chetwynd and starring William Hurt and Julia Ormond
See also
Bibliography
- Varian Fry, Surrender on Demand, first published by Random House, 1945. Barbra Streisand (ˈstraɪsænd "STRY-sand" born April 24 1942 is an American Singer, Film and Theatre Actress Lionel Chetwynd (born January 29, 1940 in Hackney in London, England UK) is a Canadian - American Screenwriter William M Hurt (born March 20, 1950) is an Academy Award - and BAFTA Award -winning American Actor. Julia Karin Ormond (born 4 January 1965) is a British Actress who like her fellow thespian Britons Helena Bonham Carter and Early life Chiune Sugihara was born January 1, 1900, in Yaotsu, a rural area in Gifu Prefecture of the Chūbu region in Random House Inc is the world's largest English-language general trade book publisher Later edition published by Johnson Books, in 1997 in conjunction with the U.S. Holocaust Museum. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is a national institution located adjacent to The National Mall in Washington D
- Cynthia Jaffee McCabe, “Wanted by the Gestapo: Saved by America – Varian Fry and the Emergency Rescue Committee” 79-91 in Jarrell C. Varian Mackey Fry (October 15 1907 &ndash September 13 1967 was a Taft School and Harvard University educated American Journalist who ran Jackman (editor) and Carla M. Borden (editor) The Musses Flee Hitler: Cultural Transfer and Adaptation 1930-1945 (Smithsonian, 1983)
- Rosemary Sullivan, Villa Air-Bel, The most comprehensive account of Fry's work set in its political and historical context, published in 2006 by HarperCollins. The Smithsonian Institution (smɪθsoʊnɪən is an educational and research institute and associated Museum complex administered and funded by the Government of Rosemary Sullivan (born 1947) is a Canadian Poet, Biographer, and Anthologist. HarperCollins is a Publishing company owned by News Corporation.
- Sheila Isenberg, "A Hero of Our Own", (Random House 2001), is a comprehensive and well-written biography of Fry's life. Random House Inc is the world's largest English-language general trade book publisher
- Tad Richards, The Virgil Directive, a novel, (Fawcett, 1982) was based on Fry's work in Marseilles. Marseille, ( English alt Marseilles mɑrˈseɪ — French: maʁsɛj locally — Provençal Occitan: Marselha maʀˈsijɔ
References
External links
- [2] Article about Fry at the US Holocaust Museum
- Varian Fry Institute
- online biography retrieved Feb. 15, 2008
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