Fred Flatow was just ten years old when Nazis burned down his synagogue in Königsberg, Germany, during the violent riot known as Kristallnacht
Fred Flatow was just ten years old when Nazis burned down his synagogue in Königsberg, Germany, during the violent riot known as Kristallnacht—the "Night of Broken Glass”—in November 1938. Kristallnacht was the culmination of anti-Jewish harassment and violence that followed Fred throughout his childhood. Just a few years before, Fred had been subjected to antisemitic bullying by his non-Jewish classmates at a German public school. The synagogue became a refuge for Fred after he transferred to a Jewish school there. After Kristallnacht, Fred squeezed through a hole in the fence next to the destroyed synagogue and visited the ruins. “Why I went [back], I cannot recall,” Fred reflected. “It was maybe to say goodbye to the synagogue that had been such a home to us … . One day when I was in there, I found a small children's Torah.” In the summer of 1939, Fred’s father, Erich, had a close call: one of his employees framed and denounced him to Gestapo. The Gestapo officer gave Eric...
