Her mother and grandparents survived the Holocaust. Her father fled his home after Nazis forbid him from getting an education or working. Now, Chula Vista resident Sandra Scheller is making sure people remember their stories along with those of other South Bay Holocaust survivors, through RUTH: Remember Us The Holocaust, a year-long exhibit opening at the Chula Vista Civic Library Jan. 12.
“I was born out of the ashes of the Holocaust,” Scheller said.
The Holocaust was the systematic murder of six million Jews by the Nazis during World War II after they came to power in Germany in 1933 and claimed that Germans belonged to a “superior race.”
They also persecuted the Roma people, people with disabilities, some Slavic peoples, Soviet prisoners of war, Black people, communists, socialists, Jehovah’s Witnesses and gay people according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum website.
Scheller’s grandparents and her mother were the only family unit, and three of 200 to survive from their village, where 11,000 people were persecuted.
The exhibit will be San Diego County’s first Holocaust exhibit and feature the stories of Mark Fishauf, Onya Yufe, Bela Mark, Lilly Rosenfeld Stern Hecht, Salomón Schlosser, Zyndel “Sid” Wapner, The Schauders, Ursula Israelski, Renee Haber Vogel, Max Weinstock, and Scheller’s parents, Kurt Sax and Ruth Sax, who the exhibit is named after.
The exhibit is one of the many ways Scheller is sharing her mother’s survival story with the world. She’s also written a book, Try to Remember Never Forget, produced a 25 minute documentary with the same title and frequently volunteers to give educational talks to elementary, middle school and high school students about the Holocaust and her mother’s story.
Ruth would accompany Scheller to give talks at schools — a newfound calling that fulfilled her for the final years of her life. She passed away in December 2018 at 90 years old.
“When my mom started speaking she came to life, she was like Benjamin Button… She couldn’t wait to do the next talk,” Scheller said.
They spoke to thousands of students, primarily in Chula Vista but also throughout San Diego County, often revisiting the same schools to talk to a new generation of students. Sometimes they’d give three or four talks in a week.
With them, they’d bring the dress that Scheller’s grandmother wore during the Holocaust, which Ruth acquired during a visit to Czechoslovakia for the 50th anniversary. Scheller said no one has one like it in southern California.
“You see kids with tears in their eyes in elementary school and they come up to her and they’re hugging her… it was just the most precious thing,” Scheller said.
She still goes from school to school to give presentations about her mother’s life, and explained that she adjusts it based on the age of the students, making it relevant to them by honing in on Ruth’s experiences when she was their age.
“I have a college degree and I’m trying to explain the Holocaust to somebody who is seven years old because that’s the next voice. I care about the voice that’s on the same level as me, but give me the youth,” Scheller said.
Scheller is determined to continue doing what she can to share her mother’s story — with the exhibit “completing the peace sign,” along with her book and documentary.
From traveling to other Holocaust museums to finding photographs to designing and gathering glasses, shoes and other items, Scheller has been curating the exhibit for about two years, dedicating time everyday to work on some aspect of it and interviewing the South Bay survivors that were willing to speak with her.
“I cried every single time I came home, because all I could do was feel my mother… they all went through the same thing but they were such individuals doing it. Each story was different,” Scheller said.
In retrospect, Scheller explained it feels like she has a postage stamp to display their stories, when it should be an entire museum. Eventually, she hopes to create an exhibit or awareness center that focuses on the Holocaust in addition to the Armenian and Rawndan genocides and other genocides that have taken place throughout history.
“The book was a stepping stone, the film was a stepping stone, the exhibit is a stepping stone but everyone works together and I don’t want to stop,” Scheller said.
She added that she is extremely grateful to live in Chula Vista and have Mayor Mary Casillas Salas be so supportive of the exhibit.
During the year that the exhibit is up at the library, Scheller said she plans on being there about three days a week. Schools can contact her at sscheller@cox.net to schedule tours. Each month, a documentary will be screened or a speaker will give a talk at the library while the exhibit is up.
