I would also like to thank a few people. From the u. S. Holocaust Memorial Museum whos the reason this program is here today, she arranged the speakers and had the idea for the program. Roberta schafer, associate librarian of congress. Beecher wiggins, our aba director, Audrey Fisher and the staff of the Public Affairs office, suvita who let us have the wonderful pavilion, and galena of the ij section. Also, of course, marvin kalb and our panelists, Martin Goldsmith and Diane Afoumado. I will be stepping aside as soon as i introduce mr. Be kalb, and he will take over the program. Marvin kalb spent 30 years as an awardwinning reporter for cbs news and nbc news. Hes written or coauthored 11 nonfiction books and two fiction books, and hes currently working on a new book, the soviet spring the rise and challenge of putins russia. Hes a nonresident senior fellow with the Foreign Policy programs at brookings and is a Senior Adviser to the Pulitzer Center on crisis reporting. He focuses on the impact of media and on Public Policies and politics and is an expert on National Security with a focus on u. S. Relations with russia, europe and the middle east. And it is with great pleasure i introduce marvin kalb. Thank you. [applause] thank you very much. And thank you all for coming to this program. Very quickly to set the stage, hitler came to power in germany this 1933 in 1933, and five years later in the fall of 1938 there was the crystal when the nazis decided to destroy as many jewish sin goings as they could in synagogues as they could in searchny, and the german jews got the message very quickly. Many of them had the message earlier, and they decided that it would be good to get out. And more than 900 of them managed to get on the st. Louis, and i notice the title here, voyage of the st. Louis. And, of course, that entire journey has been written about as the voyage of the damned. And that is probably an understatement. Because they never were able to land in cuba be, their destination. Had to go back and roughly i dont know the exact numbers twothirds of them somehow managed to survive world war ii. A third of them did not. So when they could not land in cuba, they went back to their deaths at different times and at different places. Were really privileged to have two people who know about this subject and will talk to us about it. One of them is Martin Goldsmith, to my left. Martin is the host and Classical Music programmer for Symphony Hall on siriusxm satellite radio, and he hosted nprs Performance Today from 19891999 hes the author of two books, the first the inextinguish bl similar to beny. And the second is alexs wake, which has to do with his grandfather and uncle who were two of the more than 900 on the st. Louis. Also joining us today, dr. Diane afoumado. She received her ph. D. In contemporary history from the university of paris. She had a fellowship at the Holocaust Museum. She has written extensively on this subject, and shes conducted research especially on the st. Louis odyssey through the eyes of captain schroeder who was the captain of the boat, the st. Louis. And i would like to ask dr. Afoumado to start first and then martin to pick it up after that. Please, doctor. [applause] thank you very much. First of all, i want to thank the organizer, thank you, gayle, for putting this program together, and thank you i want to really thank my colleague and dear friend for organizing this. So im going to present a powerpoint to you and try to summarize in 20 minutes the whole story of the st. Louis. So, please, if you have any question, i can talk more about this at the end. So first of all, i want to say a few words about the Jewish Population in germany just before world war ii. The Jewish Population in germany before the war was about 1 of the total population of germany. And as you know, you know, you mentioned this already, but as you know, the jewish refugees fled germany mostly, half of them mostly between 1938 and 1939 and especially after the evian conference, and you can see one of the photographs of the conference there on the powerpoint. The evian conference in july 1938 that, basically, tried to solve the problem of the refugee crisis but ended up being sort of a failure. And im going very fast here because, you know, there is a lot to say about the evian conference. But roughly in 1938 and 1939, there were not many options for the refugees and for the jews, and they could go mostly to shanghai and cuba. And you can imagine that when you were, when you were a jew there germany or austria, that was probably not your first choice, shanghai or cuba. But that was the only choice you basically had when you were thinking of massive immigration. Im not talking about individual immigration, no. Im talking about really a large number of people fleeing germany. So before i start really telling you the whole story, i want to say a few words about the company that owned the st. Louis boat. It was not the only company at that too many. In the 1930s there were many others. The Hamburg Company was german, but there were many other companies in france, Great Britain, the netherlands, and most of them actually carried jews onboard, jews who were trying to flee germ in 1938 and 1939. What im trying to say is the Hamburg Company was not the only one, and the refugee crisis really touched all those companies of cruise liners at the end of the 1930s. Hamburg was created in 1847, and it was mostly a commercial fleet that was destroyed during world war i and rebuilt afterwards and reached its gold been age in the golden age in the 1920s. So imagine, you know, this company that was really, that had a lot of boats, a lot of vessels, a lot of luxurious liners. And the st. Louis was one of the most luxurious boats at that time. What is interesting is that in order to immigrate to cuba in the 1930s at the end of the 1930s, you needed a lot of documents. Im not going to go through the whole list, but it was actually a lot of documentation that you had to gather in order to be able to enter the country, let alone, you know, buy the ticket on the boat. So this is an example of the immigration identification card of one of the st. Louis passengers. And, basically, most of the st. Louis passengers had what we call a landing permit. This is not a visa per se, and this is i mean, this is a good document, this is certainly a legal document, but this is not a visa. And, but just, you know, remember that term, landing permit, because thats what most of the passengers had. This is a photograph of some of the passengers boarding the st. Louis. And i really like this photograph because it, you know, gives me a chance to tell you more about the passengers themselves and the world that they are stepping in. Most of the passengers were families, so the oldest passenger on the st. Louis was born at the end of the 19th century in the 1980s, 1990s. And then the youngest one [inaudible] sorry, 1880s. Sorry, im not good at dates and numbers. [laughter] especially english is not my native speaker, so thank you for correcting me. So 1890s, 1880s, backward. And the youngest passenger was actually a baby born in january 1939. But what im trying to say is that we are not in, you know, illegal immigration here. This is a perfectly legal immigration, you know . Those people had legal documents to immigrate to cuba. So they were leaving germany with the whole family. And also what is interesting is that by boarding the st. Louis, theyre going to step into a world of luxury that they at no time have access to. I mean, even, you know, the wealthiest passengers on the st. Louis, they were basically, they belonged to most of the categories, social categories of the jews in germany and austria, but even the most wealthy passengers on the st. Louis didnt have access anymore to that kind of luxury because of the persecutions in germany. So when they board the st. Louis, this is basically what theyre going to see. I show that photograph on purpose because im, of course, there are many other locations on the boat that were actually photographed by the passengers, but this is really one of the most beautiful photographs of the dining room in the st. Louis. So just imagine a very luxurious vessel, one of the most beautiful of that fleet. Imagine the titanic but with the decoration of the 1930s, you know, just to make it short. And theyre going to have a lot of possibilities to try to enjoy the voyage, but you can imagine that its going to be difficult for them, so they need some time because they go from the persecution since 1933 to this kind of, you know, atmosphere by just boarding the boat. But after 24 hours, 48 hours for some of them, theyre going to try to relax and to enjoy as much as possible, you know, the pleasure of that journal incentive. Journey. I want to say a few words about the crew on the st. Louis and the captain. This is a photograph of the ship, the st. Louis, and you have to imagine that the crew is about 200 people. The captain of the boat, captain gustav schroeder, is a german who is very crowd of his country. I usually define him as a romantic german because he really is in love with germany. He really loves his country, and he hates the nazis, and he hates what the nazis are doing to germany. And he is the captain onboard. So he tells, you know, he gathers the crew just before the departure of the st. Louis to tell them them that onboard it t of question to persecute those passengers because they are jewish. So the nazi laws dont have any room onboard, i mean, you know, the crew will be at the service of the passengers like, you know, they would be at the service of any other passengers who would go on a cruise. This is not a cruise per se, but they would be at the service of the passengers on the st. Louis, so they will serve them like anyone else. And he also gives the crew members the choice to leave the boat if anyone disagrees with this, and no 40 one left. And no one left. So the whole crew is at the service of the passengers, and the passengers are going to be able to enjoy the facility on the boat including the menus, and this is one of the menus on the boat. And, you know, the menus were absolutely outstanding. They can also relax by, you know, dancing in the ballroom, you can see those people smiling and dancing and trying to do the best they can and to enjoy as much as possible that journey between hamburg and the avana. Some others would play shuffleboard on the deck of the st. Louis, but what is interesting in here is that we have documentation about most of the passengers, and two of my colleagues at the Holocaust Museum traced the fates of the passenger, each of them on the st. Louis, so we know exactly what happened to them. So here you can see werner lenneberg, but he was previously to that voyage arrested probably, most likely sent to dachau, and on that document which is a document from the International Tracing Service collection that we have at the museum, you can see his prisoner number on the top of this card. And this is, hes housed this dachau. So he was able to leave the camp on one condition, it was not to return to germany ever. So this is just to show you that all the categories of the passengers were on the st. Louis. There were also about 200 children on the st. Louis, and i specifically enjoy the photograph, i really like the photograph with the Swimming Pool be because that gives me a chance also to tell you what happened, you know, in germany. You know, during the 1930s the jews were not allowed in Swimming Pools in germany, so those children who are enjoying, swimming in that little Swimming Pool on the st. Louis, for the youngest ones, they probably didnt even know how to swim because they never had a chance to learn. So you can imagine that, you know, this is very important. And everything would be done onboard thanks to the captain and the crew to make the journey be, you know, as enjoyable as possible. So when they arrive in cuba on may 27, 1939, this slide actually gives me a chance to talk about the political crisis in cuba. The st. Louis, when the st. Louis arrives in cuba, they actually, the passengers kind of disembark. But no one tells them why they cant disembark. Because there is a political crisis in cuba, and also no one explains anything to them. But the political crisis is the following. So you probably dont know much about the president , the cuban president because you have absolutely no reason to know anything about him. But you probably, you know, heard about baa thies that. Maybe not in the 1930s, but baptiste that was already doing something. The landing permits that the passengers acquired were actually sold thanks to huge traffic of documents that was organized by the secretary of immigration, and he was supported by the president s men, opponent, political opponent, baptiste. So baptiste was trying to destabilize the president behind the scene through the secretary of immigration, and in order to establish his political power, the president wanted to put an end to immigration. So he decided to issue a degree just a few days before the st. Louis actually left hamburg. This is not against the st. Louis passengers. The president didnt even know anything about the st. Louis passengers. They were just immigrants or they were just, you know, legal passengers that would come to cuba. But he wants to put an end to immigration, so thats why he issued the decree. Facing that crisis, the American Jewish joint Distribution Committee decided to send one of its representatives in to negotiate with the cuban authorities. But nothing would happen, and even the captain of the st. Louis, gustav schroeder, would actually put on civilian clothes and try to negotiate with the cuban authorities as well, but nothing good come from this. So basically, the captain cannot do anything, but you can imagine that for the family members and for the friends of the st. Louis passengers who are already in cuba, its very difficult because they dont know anything, they dont know whats going on. They try to communicate with their families onboard. So they would hire little boats like this one, and they would try to go around the boat and try to communicate with their families and friends trying to bring them, you know, exotic fruits and try to give them some news about whats going on. This is also another photograph of those boats. Im going quickly because i want to move on to the next step of the st. Louis. So after a while, you know, the negotiations were probably over in cuba, but the captain, so the captain reffed orders to leave the waters received orders to leave the waters, but he decides to navigate between cuba and the United States. More than 700 passengers were actually registered on the list of immigration in the United States. That means that anytime, you know, it could be a question of days or hospitals or years or months or years. Their number would come up, so eventually their final destination would be the United States. So the captain brings the st. Louis in front of miami in the harbor of miami, and the passengers can see the light of miami and the palm trees. But there is, you know, for the United States, i mean p im going to give you a little, all of you of the general political context so you can understand why, you know, the United States did not let the passengers in. You have to understand that it would have been just, you know, 900plus people. So its not a big deal for the United States to welcome those people. But just imagine that if thecountries has opened the, you know the country had opened the doors to those people, thousands of hundreds would have been full of them because there were more and more immigrants and jewish refugees who tried to escape from germany and the reich. So, you know, by anticipating that situation, it would have opened the door to her massive immigration, and the government didnt want to do this. Plus, in the United States dont forget that there was the immigration act of 1924, and so the quota were the quota. So it was out of question to make an exception and to raise the number, to raise the quota to accept more ref due refugees. There was also a certain level of antisemitism among the population and also among the state department. And if you, when you read the correspondence between among the state department, you can realize they were very much afraid of welcoming more refugees and especially jewish refugees because they were associating them with communism. So, i mean, im just giving you several reasons, but there are much more. But, you know, i dont want to talk too much about this. So the st. Louis had to go back to germany technically. So between i mean, you can imagine on the way back that the atmosphere onboard is no longer the same. But on the way back, the jdc would ask its representative in europe based in paris to negotiate with some european countries. In that case it was belgium, france, Great Britain and holland. And its a very long and complicated negotiation that involved also representatives of the jewish communities in those four countries, and its basically a race against the clock and almost like a [inaudible] to have those countries agree on accepting more refugees. So to make a very long and complicated story short, especially those negotiations, eventually belgium, france, Great Britain and holland would accept the passengers, and they would dispersed almost equally among the four countries. But just imagine that from the moment that cuba refused them or, you know, refused the st. Louis passengers to disembark, they became Illegal Immigrants because they had legal documents to immigrate into cuba, so they would be in europe with, basically, illegal documents and t