During the week of January 23rd, Clifton Elementary will focus on Remembrance of the Holocaust through our morning announcements in accordance with Senate Bill 1848. Included in the morning announcements will be quotes from Holocaust survivors who took the turmoil and tragedy of this time period to positively contribute to the human conciousness and hopefully avoid a repeat of the hate and evil experienced during this dark time in world history.
One of the featured holocaust survivors during our morning announcements will be Dr. Viktor Frankl who was born on March 26, 1905 in Vienna, Austria. Frankl was formally trained as a neurologist, psychiatrist and philosopher. He founded what is known as the third Vienesse School of Pshycotherapy, known as logotherapy, proposing that an individual's search for meaning is the ultimate purpose in a person’s life. Frankl proposed that through meaning individuals have direction, purpose and a driving force which strengthens and enables them to push through the adversities and struggles of life.
However, Dr, Frankl is perhaps most well-known for being a Holocaust survivor. It is his experences in the prison camps of the Holocaust that he proved his life's work. In 1942, Dr. Frankl and his family were sent to the Theresiennstadt camp, where his father perished from starvation and pneumonia. In 1944, Frankl and his remaining family were moved to Auschwitz where his mother and brother were killed. Frankl's first wife, Tilly, was taken to the Bergen-Belsen camp where she also died.
In 1945, afterbeing liberated by Allied forces, Dr. Frankl returned to his home city of Vienna where he wrote the book, Man’s Search For Meaning. In it he detailed his experience in the prison camps, the brutality of the conditions, and the despair and hopelessness of his fellow prisoners. He wrote that it was only his sense of meaning and purpose that gave him the strength to survive as he provided medical care and what little comfort he could to his fellow prisoners. He later wrote a companion piece, Man's Ultimate Search for Meaning, to further address this earlier work.
Dr. Viktor Frank died of heart failure in Vienna, Austria on September 2, 1997, at the age of 92.