MTCS Hosts Holocaust Survivor Agi Geva for "Living Legacy Day"

Middle Tennessee Christian School once again hosted a Holocaust survivor as the featured speaker for their Living Legacy Day on Thursday. Mrs. Agi Geva survived two stays at Auschwitz, a stay at Plaszow, and a Death March from 1944 to 1945.  She was only 14 at the time.  Agi says it’s important that future generations continue to be reminded of the horrors she and do many others endured, so that it never happens again.

 

Mrs. Geva says one of her biggest motivations for speaking is to refute those who deny the Holocaust took place…

 

One thing she offers among her proof is the tattoo she still bears as a reminder of her time in the camps…

 

But she believes that, as awful as it was, the conditions still do exist in the world for something of that magnitude to happen again in certain countries…

 

Agi says she often gets many of the same questions at her speaking engagements, which she’s happy to answer…

She says her goal is to eventually speak in every single state.  So far, she’s got about 10 under her belt, with no signs of slowing down.

 

By the way, this event last year officially set a record for the largest ever audience for a Holocaust survivor, at over 2,000 guests.

Bio:

Agi (Laszlo) Geva was born on June 2, 1930, in Budapest, Hungary. When the Germans occupied Hungary on March 19, 1944, Agi, her younger sister, Zsuzsanna, and her parents, Rozsa and Zoltan Laszlo, were living in Miskolc, Hungary. Zoltan, who had been ill for a long time, died that day. 

Deported to Auschwitz, Then Plaszow
Agi, Zsuzsanna, and Rozsa were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, the notorious killing center in German-occupied Poland. Despite many selections, they managed to remain together throughout their ordeal.

Several weeks after arriving at Auschwitz, they were transferred to the Plaszow concentration camp, where conditions became worse. When Plaszow was liquidated, the SS authorities transported them back to Auschwitz. Harsher selections followed, yet Agi, Zsuzsanna, and Rozsa still succeeded in sticking together.

A short time later, the camp authorities selected them, along with 180 Hungarian and 20 Polish women, for transport to a small labor camp in Rochlitz, Germany, near Leipzig. There, they were trained to work at a factory that manufactured spare parts for airplanes, before being sent to a factory in Calw, near Stuttgart, Germany.

Liberated from a Death March
After working in Calw for several months, all of the women were forcibly evacuated on foot. On April 28, 1945, US troops liberated them from their march. Agi remained with her mother and sister in Innsbruck, Austria, for eight months, and then they all returned to Hungary.

After the War
In 1949 Agi and Zsuzsanna immigrated to Israel, where they each got married—Zsuzsanna to a fellow survivor. Agi had two children. Her sister had three and went to live in Kibbutz Haogen, where she still lives today. Their mother, Rozsa, who had remarried in Miskolc, immigrated to Israel with her second husband, Dr. Sugar Gyula, in 1956. Rozsa died at the age of 98. She is survived by her two daughters, five grandchildren, and 17 great-grandchildren.

After living in Israel for 53 years, Agi came to the United States to live with her daughter. She has volunteered at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum since 2002.

Source:

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Office of Survivor Affairs