Bearing Witness: The Story of the Nentershausen Synagogue



Bearing Witness: The Story of the Nentershausen Synagogue







A Wyner Family Jewish Heritage Center Event
Presented by Stephen Denker
Thursday, May 16, 8:00 - 9:15 PM
Adams Street Shul, 168 Adams Street, Newton, MA

Note: The entrance of Adams Street Shul includes the use of stairs.

On Kristallnacht, the synagogue in the small rural village of Nentershausen, in Hessen, Germany was damaged, but not destroyed. In 1987, the derelict building was redeemed. It was dismantled, moved to Hessenpark in Neu-Anspach, Germany and caringly rebuilt, the witness to Jewish presence. Its desecrated lintel above the Torah Ark is on exhibit at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM).

Join author Stephen Denker, who will discuss his book, The Nentershausen Synagogue, about a Jewish community in Germany — before and after the years of Nazi tyranny — told through the stories of the community’s cherished synagogue, and two of its surviving families.

Stephen Denker and his wife Elayne have been collaboratively researching family histories since 2000. In addition to The Nentershausen Synagogue, the Denkers have self-published several books about family history and genealogy. During a research trip to Havana, Cuba in 2007, the Denkers visited sites of importance to Stephen’s family, including the underwear factory owned by the family in the 1920s, and the United Hebrew Congregation’s Jewish cemetery, where the Denkers updated records on-site, and photographed 1,600 gravestones.

The Nentershausen Synagogue is currently available at the USHMM gift shop. To order your copy in advance, please call the museum directly at 1-800-259-9998 or 202-488-6144.
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