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North Coast resident recognized at State Capitol in Holocaust Remembrance Ceremony
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – Sonoma County resident Tauba Weiss was recognized Monday in the State Capitol at the annual Holocaust Remembrance Ceremony.
Every year during Holocaust Remembrance Week the state Assembly holds a special ceremony to recognize a Holocaust survivor, liberator or a child of a survivor from each of the Assembly districts in California.
At the Capitol, Tauba Weiss spoke in memory of her late husband and in remembrance of all lives lost during the Holocaust.
“I can never forget what I saw,” Weiss said. “Sometimes you wonder, ‘Why did I survive?’ I am here to tell you that this happened, and I need to tell the world it will never happen again. We shall never forget.”
Born in Lask, Poland in 1926, Tauba Weiss was the fourth of 10 children. She was only 12 when the war broke out in 1939. She and her family were placed in a ghetto for two years.
In 1942, a selection was made in a moving some people to the right and some to the left. Weiss, along with her father and brother went to the right, while the rest of her family went to the left. The people to the left were trucked away and killed. She never saw her mother and siblings again.
“I don’t think anyone can fully understand the horrors Tauba Weiss and other victims of the Holocaust had to endure, but we must never forget those who suffered through the Holocaust,” said Assemblymember Bill Dodd. “Tauba’s perseverance is truly inspiring, and we’re lucky she chose to become part of our community.”
Weiss was transported to the Lodz ghetto with her father and brother. For two years she was forced to work with straw, making boots for Nazi soldiers. She would often hide to avoid other selections.
From 1944 to 1945, she was transported by cattle car, without food or water, to Auschwitz, Birkenau and Stuttoff.
Eventually she was put to work in an ammunition factory in Germany, which was bombed by the Allies. Weiss hid in the basement for three days among the rubble until her father found her.
In May of 1945, she was finally liberated by Russian forces, who prevented her Nazi guards from shooting her and her fellow prisoners.
Weiss spent time in six different concentration camps during the Holocaust. In 1951 she arrived in America with her husband, father and her two sons.
She settled in Petaluma because she heard that it was a good place to raise a family and that there was a local Holocaust survivor community.
Tauba Weiss and her son, Alan Weiss, were instrumental in the establishment of a Holocaust memorial in San Francisco, overlooking the Golden Gate.