The New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston, Massachusetts is a place to reflect and honor the lives affected by evil and bigotry from World War II to this day.
Steve Ross, born Smulek Rozental, survived ten Nazi concentration camps. Ross, was an 8-year-old boy who lived in Lodz, Poland. In the fall of 1939 until the end of WWII in 1945 he endured beatings, starvation, sexual abuse, and cruelties.
Steve Ross worked as a licensed psychologist with at-risk kids for the City of Boston for nearly 40 years. Ross inspired, conceived of, and founded the New England Holocaust Memorial, erected in 1995. The New England Holocaust Memorial remains one of Boston’s most visited landmarks.
Before his death, in February 2020, Ross authored From Broken Glass: My Story of Finding Hope in Hitler’s Death Camps to Inspire a New Generation.
Look at these towers, passerby, and try to imagine what they really mean – what they symbolize – what they evoke. They evoke an era of incommensurate darkness, an era in history when civilization lost its humanity and humanity its soul… We must look at these towers of memory and say to ourselves, No one should ever deprive a human being of his or her right to dignity. No one should ever deprive anyone of his or her right to be a sovereign human being. No one should ever speak again about racial superiority…We cannot give evil another chance.
Elie Wiesel – Writer, Educator, Political Activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust Survivor
After serving the city of Boston for over 40 years, Ross wanted to create a memorial to honor the six million lives lost, and serve as a lesson to future generations. With the support of the city of Boston and over 3,000 individuals, they dedicated the memorial on October 22, 1995.
The New England Holocaust Memorial consists of six luminous glass towers, shining light from the top towards the black pit of “glowing fire” dug under each tower. Etched on the glass are millions of numbers that were once tattoos, flickering in the light of the tower. These etched towers depict the six million people who lost their lives, the six main death camps, and the six years the most deadly phase of the Holocaust took place.