"stumbling
stones" -
Stones - Lest We Forget
Sixty
years after liberation from the National Socialist Regime the 'Peace
Week Action Group, Minden' (Friedenswoche Minden), is making a
special contribution in an effort to keep memories alive.
The
group has taken up the idea of Gunter Demnig, an artist from Cologne
who, in 1994, began laying 'Stones Against Forgetting' in his home
town.
Symbolic stones are laid to remind people of their former
neighbours who were deported and murdered, under the Nazi regime,
because they were Jewish, Gipsies (Sinti and Roma), victims of
euthanasia, homosexuals, or were persecuted because of their
political or religious beliefs.
"For me it is important
to bring the names of the murdered back to where they lived",
says Gunter Demnig. His project has been responsible for laying 9,000
Stumbling Stones in Germany, and other countries, in more than 160
towns.
The Peace Week Action Group, Minden, would like to
remind the Minden population of the names and fate of former
neighbours. Stumbling Stones are laid in front of their places of
residence, showing their names, dates of birth, year of deportation
and the location of their murder. At the end of the project, which
will last for several years, a memorial path of remembrance will have
been laid as a warning.
The Peace Week Action Group is
supported by the Society for Christian/Jewish Cooperation, the Jewish
community and the Town of Minden. The project is financed solely by
donations, and not by the use of public funds, to show the genuine
interest and participation of the general public.
Group
members have been working for many months establishing the names of
the victims, their places of abode and their final fates. The
sculptor, Gunter Demnig, laid Minden's first Stumbling Stone in the
old part of the City on 21st,
November, 2005.
More
information can be supplied by:
Aktionsgemeinschaft Friedenswoche
Minden e.V., Alte Kirchstr. 1a, 32423 Minden (Germany)
phone 00
49 571 - 2 43 39
or per E-Mail: "Peace
Week"
Donations
to the following account:
Int. Bank Account Number:DE52
4905 0101 0089 4007 25
Sparkasse Minden-Luebbecke
SWIFT-BIC.:
WELADED1MIN
DE: 89 400 725
Friedenswoche
Minden
"stumbling stones"
Last Update: 2012 Feb 14