Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Nevada officials mark Holocaust Memorial Day

Henry Kronberg says he had nightmares for years of the time he spent in Nazi prisons and concentration camps during World War II and it must be prevented from ever happening again.

Kronberg was one of several speakers at the first Holocaust Memorial Day observance that attracted an overflowing crowd of more than 125 people Thursday at the governor’s mansion.

Those attending included Gov. Brian Sandoval, Reps. Dina Titus and Mark Amodei, Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki, members of the Nevada Supreme Court and the Nevada Legislature.

Speakers called this the darkest day in Jewish history in which 6 million people were killed because they were Jews.

Kronberg, who will be 93 next week, said, “We have a duty to tell it the way it was.”

He told the Sun, “We were slaves” who worked 12-hour days. “If we didn’t work, they shot us.” Kronberg, who worked in a quarry, said they were kicked and yelled at if they didn’t do as much as expected.

When he got to the United States in 1947 with his wife, he kissed the ground after getting off the boat.

There was a lighting of special memorial candles by state elected officials and Holocaust survivors, among them 96-year old Anne Milholland, who said she escaped to England before being imprisoned.

There was a music program presented by the Adelson Education Campus Choir, and Rebecca Reyes of the Jewish Repertory Theatre of Nevada presented a reading from “The Diary of Anne Frank.”

Sandoval called it the “darkest day” in Jewish history and said it is vital that children learn about it. The governor said plans an economic development trip to Israel in October and this remembrance will be “the cornerstone” of his visit.

“This is the first time in history we have done something like this in our state,” he said.

This first-ever Yom HaShoah (Holocaust memorial) was sponsored by the Jewish Federation of Las Vegas. Casino owner Sheldon Adelson paid for the transportation of many in Las Vegas to come to Carson City.

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