TUE · 9:30am
Mornings at the Museum
CU Museum of Natural History
TUE · 11:00am
Hungarian-born Holocaust Survivor Gives Testimony on Campus
Tuesday, November 3 at Clare Small Arts and Sciences, Boulder
About this event
The CU and broader publics are invited to a lunchtime talk by Barbara Steinmetz, a Hungarian-born child survivor of the Holocaust, who managed to escape Hitler-controlled Europe to the Dominican Republic. More recently, she survied an antisemitic firebomb attack in downtown Boulder. Her on-campus testimony is part of a public program co-organized by CU professors P. Shankman and T. Pegelow Kaplan. Everyone is welcome. No tickets required. Barbara Steinmetz (née Bandler) was born in 1936 as the second of two children to an orthodox Jewish family in Gyor, Hungary. Shortly after her birth, the family returned to the northern Adriatic town of Lussinpiccolo, (fascist) Italy, where Alexander Samuel and Margaret Charlotte Bandler, Barbara’s parents, had been running a popular hotel since the late 1920s. The family stayed in Italy until 1939, when the implementation of the Italian Racial Laws, including the loss of employment and right to property ownership, forced them to leave the country. They first went to Southern France and, in 1940, managed to reach Lisbon. They secured visas for the Dominican Republic, one of the very few countries to announce immigration opportunities at the 1938 Evian conference. Margaret Bandler’s chemistry degree, specializing in milk products, met Dominican officials’ interest in immigrants with agricultural expertise. The family left Europe by boat in May 1941, first sailing to New York and then onwards to the Dominican Republic. They settled in Sosúa, where the Dominican Republic Resettlement Association (DORSA) had established a new settlement. Barbara stayed in the Dominican Republic with her older sister and parents until June 1945. With the help of relatives in the US, they managed to get visas that enabled them to return and, this time, disembark in New York. Her parents got jobs and moved the family to Detroit, where Barbara and her sister started or continued school.
Who's playing
Steinmetz was born in 1936 in Gyor, Hungary, and grew up partly in Lussinpiccolo, Italy, where her parents ran a hotel. Italy's racial laws forced the family out. They went through France and Lisbon, then sailed to the Dominican Republic and settled in Sosúa. They reached New York in 1945 and moved to Detroit. She has lived in Colorado for many years and was injured in the 2025 attack on a vigil on Pearl Street Mall.
What to expect
This is a talk by a survivor speaking in her own words, not a panel or a classroom lecture. It is organized through CU's History department and Program in Jewish Studies, with professors Shankman and Pegelow Kaplan behind it. Clare Small is an academic building from 1928 on the CU campus, and the talk is held in a classroom there.
Why go
Few people can speak first-hand about both the Holocaust and an antisemitic attack in Boulder. Steinmetz tells a refugee story that is less often heard, about a small settlement in the Dominican Republic that took in Jewish families when most countries would not. It is open to students and neighbors alike.
Where
Clare Small Arts and Sciences · 1725 Pleasant Street · Boulder CODirections
