Vilna, Lithuania : Shtetl to Ghetto when a population of 60,000 became 0.
Since the 1790s, Vilna, Lithuania was a bustling Shtetl. (Small densely Jewish populated town.) It remained through the normalcy of triumph and tragedy, Russian pogroms and hardships amid the lesser trials and tribulations not unlike the daily lives we all live. But nothing would shake the lives quite like the coming storm, so unexpectedly as they could not beleive the then sought rumours of the Reich's horror. It's entire population was consumed in the Nazi holocaust. Reduced was the once nearly 60,000 Jews, Converts, and seemingly 'Aryan' - some even interfaith spouses to 0. In the all too short length of time nearly two centuries of Jewish heritage and history was completely consumed - daily lives and familiar faces - age old songs and books and spoken lore; simply gone. Upon becoming the Vilna Ghetto in September of 1941, 40,000 of the Jews (those who had not fled) forcibly awaited their deportation to death within the Ghetto. The remnants that are this exhibit are subtle reminders of what once was home to those 60,000 souls. Cabinet cards, and figurines remind us of the good times, the simple things like the sought insignificant photographs pushed to the back of that 'everything drawer' we all have. Figurines - old dusty things like those found on grandmother's shelf we never even give as much as a passing glance .Reminders of that very normalcy - an entire reality - everything they'd ever known. Its no better said than by the silent face in the lonely backdrop of the exhibit. The hand painted portrait of a child from the Vilna Ghetto. It reminds us of a mothers lament in the Ghetto - once the very town she loved - a home still whilst awaiting the death of her child, family and self - not to mention every aspect of the world around her in which she would never grow old.
