World Report: November 5, 2004 Vol. 10 Iss. 8
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Grades 4-6
Keeping Memories Alive
What does 6 million look like? Students of Whitwell Middle School, in Whitwell, Tennessee, wanted to know after they learned about the Holocaust. The murder of 6 million Jews and millions of others by Germany's Nazi party from 1938 to 1945 is known as the Holocaust.
In 1998, school officials decided to focus on the Holocaust to teach students about tolerance and diversity. "I never studied the Holocaust in school, so there was something for me to learn as well," says assistant principal David Smith.
The students learned that during World War II, people in Norway wore paper clips on their lapels to protest the Nazis. The paper clip was invented in Norway. Smith, teacher Sandra Roberts and 23 students decided to collect 6 million paper clips to represent each victim of the Holocaust.
The students wrote thousands of letters to actors, politicians and others asking for paper clips. By the end of the school year, the Holocaust Project had collected more than 100,000 paper clips. President Bill Clinton, Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg contributed to the effort.
Whitwell students set up a Holocaust museum on school grounds with the help of two German reporters, Peter Schroeder and Dagmar Schroeder-Hildebrand. They took a railcar that had been used to transport prisoners to Nazi death camps and turned it into a small museum. "This is the only Holocaust memorial in the world dedicated, built and managed by children," says Roberts.
The Holocaust Project has collected 32.5 million paper clips from all 50 states and 40 countries. A documentary, Paper Clips, will open in theaters around the U.S. this month.
