Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 47, No. 9, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 4, 1993 Page: 2 of 28
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Feature 2
TEXAS JEWISH POST, THURSDAY, MARCH 4,1993-IN OUR 47TH YEARI
Holocaust Museum Opens in L.A. with State-of-Art Technology
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Simon Wiesenthal Center's Beit Hashoah-Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles
By Tom Tugend
LOS ANGELES (JTA) -
The Beit Hashoah-Museum
of Tolerance opened its doors
to the public on Feb. 9, cul-
minating 10 years of plan-
ning and building by the
Simon Wiesenthal Center
and its supporters.
What the first of an antici-
pated 350,000 annual visi-
tors encountered was a high-
tech museum that combines
hands-on computer stations,
interactive displays, banks of
television screens, imagina-
tive graphics, films and video
monitors.
All of this wizardry is
meant to drive home the
message that without a per-
sonal commitment, a per-
sonal sense of responsibil-
ity, the past horrors bom of
racism and prejudice can
confront humankind again.
In line with its high vis-
ibility and flair for mixing
showmanship with serious
purpose, the Wiesenthal Cen-
ter gathered an impressive
international list of guests at
two events leading up to the
opening.
At the Sunday evening
banquet, Hollywood paid its
respects through actor
Arnold Schwarzenegger,
CB S Television “This Morn-
ing” co-anchor Paula Zahn,
and the heads of the Walt
Disney and Universal stu-
dios.
The world of politics and
power was represented by
such speakers as Frederico
Mayor Zaragoza, the direc-
tor-general of UNESCO, and
Gov. Pete Wilson and Sen.
Dianne Feinstein of Califor-
nia.
Nazi-hunter Simon
Wiesenthal termed the mu-
seum “a place of collective
remembrance,” while Presi-
dent Clinton, appearing via
video, described it as “im-
portant to all Americans,”
and said he and Hillary hoped
to pay a visit soon.
Much of the same cast re-
turned for the dedication cer-
emony, augmented by aU.S.
Marine Corps band and a roll
call of local politicians and
foreign consuls representing
25 nations from Argentina to
Turkey.
When ground was broken
for the museum in 1986, the
projections were that it would
cost $ 15 million and open by
1988.
Through enlargements and
unforeseen natural and man-
made obstacles, the job took
six instead of two years to
complete and the final bill is
close to $55 million.
The California legislature
provided $5 million of that
amount, triggering one of a
number of disputes that have
accompanied the project.
The completed glass and
granite complex is four sto-
ries high and surmounted by
a dome, with four additional
underground levels for park-
ing.
Inside, the two major
themes reflect the dual name
of the institution—House of
the Holocaust and Museum
of Tolerance — with the lat-
ter dealing mainly with the
American experience, from
the early treatment of Native
Americans to the Rodney
King beating that ultimately
led to the Los Angeles riots
of last April.
The welcome to the
“Tolerancenter” gives an in-
kling of the state-of-the-art
technology and in-your-face
irreverent approach that char-
acterizes the museum.
A man composed of 10
stacked video monitors and
equipped with a huckster’s
voice, confides that you’re
above average, obviously.not
prejudiced, really his kind of
people.
“Of course, there’s alimit,
like those market clerks who
can’ teven speak English, and
the way those others always
stick together, not to men-
tion the sharp business prac-
tices of you-know-who —
but, of course, none of us can
be called “prejudiced,” says
the video man.
The first choice facing a
visitor is whether to walk
through a door marked
“Prejudiced” or “Unpreju-
diced,” only to find that the
“Unprejudiced” door is
locked. Everyone has to go
through the “Prejudiced”
door.
Other sections of the Tol-
erance exhibit leads to a whis-
per gallery of ethnic slurs, a
visual history of the civil
rights struggle, an interac-
tive map of hate crimes and
groups, a cartoon mural on
the high school confronta-
tion between black and
Latino students, and videos
on the genocides perpetrated
on Armenians, Cambodians
and Indians in Latin America
To begin the tour of the
Holocaust sections, each visi-
tor is issued a plastic pass-
port of a child survivor or
victim, whose journey is up-
dated regularly until his or
her fate is sealed.
The rise of Nazism is illus-
trated through a series of di-
oramas, a powerful film of a
massive Nuremberg rally, a
recreation of the Wansee
conference, where the “Fi-
nal Solution” was put into
execution, and a replica of
the gates and some of the
barracks of Auschwitz, with
separate exhibits for “Able-
Bodied” and “Children and
Others.”
The Hall of Testimonies
offers oral histories of survi-
vors, testaments of those who
perished, and an area devoted
to righteous gentiles.
Wire services and satellite
feeds in the Global Situation
Room update reports on cur-
rent hate crimes and the “eth -
nic cleansing” campaign in
Bosnia.
On the second floor, a
multimedia learning center
contains 30 computer work
stations, where through
cross-indexed data, photos
and video, the visitor can
extract information on virtu-
ally every aspect of World
War II and the Holocaust.
On the upper floors are a
library, archives and data-
bases for professional re-
searchers, and two gift shops.
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Wisch, J. A. & Wisch, Rene. Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 47, No. 9, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 4, 1993, newspaper, March 4, 1993; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth754961/m1/2/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; .