Journey to Freedom

11 AM LOS ANGELES • 2 PM NEW YORK

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Filmmaker Tanja Dammertz followed the Sousa Mendes Foundation’s pilgrimage tour Journey on the Road to Freedom in 2023 and produced this wonderful documentary film for the European cultural television channel, ARTE. It chronicles both the physical and emotional journeys of the participants as they confront childhood memories and long-buried family secrets. xxxxx

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THE SCHEDULE

⇒ March 1-4, watch the film Saved by Sousa Mendes on your home device. A link will be provided to all who register.

⇒ Sunday, March 3 at 2:00 p.m. US Eastern Time, tune into the program with our distinguished panel of speakers. A link will be provided to all who register.

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MEET THE PANEL

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Tanja Dammertz (left) is a freelance journalist and the author of TV reports and documentary films including Saved by Sousa Mendes. After studying in Berlin and Montreal, she worked as an author, reporter and video journalist at SPIEGEL TV for ten years. Since 2014, she has been working as a freelance filmmaker for documentaries, which are mainly broadcast on ARTE and ZDF. Her films have taken her to places such as East Greenland, India, Brazil and China. She lives in Berlin and has two daughters.

Corinne Zimmerman Maginsky (right) is the daughter and granddaughter of Sousa Mendes visa recipients. Ten members of her family were rescued from Nazi-occupied Europe by Aristides de Sousa Mendes in June of 1940. She participated in the 2023 Journey on the Road to Freedom tour and is profiled in the film Saved by Sousa Mendes. After college she taught Special Education, and then moved into the garment industry. She worked for Neiman Marcus as a buyer and then transferred to the wholesale industry as a merchandizer and product development manager. Now retired, she lives in Florida and Pennsylvania.

Dr. Heidi Omlor (left) is a Holocaust educator who was one of the co-leaders of the Sousa Mendes Foundation’s 2023 Journey on the Road to Freedom tour. She earned a PhD in Holocaust and Genocide studies in 2021 from Gratz College. She has been a member of the Sousa Mendes Foundation’s Educational Initiative Committee since 2019, currently serving as its Chair. She is the author of “Aristides de Sousa Mendes do Amaral e Abranches: Diplomat, Christian, Savior, Hero.” She has been teaching for 25 years, currently teaching Social Studies in Ellsworth, Maine. 

Dr. Shulamit Reinharz, right, who will moderate, is the Jacob Potofsky Professor Emerita of Sociology at Brandeis University. While at Brandeis, she created a graduate program in Women’s Studies as well as the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute for the study of the intersection between Jews and gender. She was born in Amsterdam and grew up in the United States with intermittent stays in Israel. She is the author or editor of sixteen books, including the recent 100 Jewish Brides: Stories from Around the World and the forthcoming Hiding in Holland: A Resistance Memoir in Four Hands. She has spoken on numerous programs of the Sousa Mendes Foundation and participated in the 2023 Journey on the Road to Freedom.

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Registration for this program is closed.