Hanna Perlstein Marcus's Blog

Sidonia’s Thread Museum Exhibition

Cherished Family, Friends, and Colleagues,

I am excited to share my new venture with you. After working with a wonderful team, including professors, students, and consultants during a worldwide pandemic, we have finally completed our preparatory work for the traveling exhibition, Sidonia’s Thread: Crafting a Life from Holocaust to High Fashion.

Sponsored by Eastern Connecticut State University, the exhibition embodies the creative work described in my first two books, Sidonia’s Thread and Surviving Remnant. It includes thirty-five of my mother, Sidonia’s, high fashion designs and narratives, artifacts, and audio/video offering insight into my mother’s fascinating character. If you read the books, or remember Sidonia, you know her masterful touch with a needle and thread.

After a highly successful run in 2019, we will be offering the exhibition to interested venues for a three-month period on a traveling basis starting in the fall of 2021. Our aim is to make the exhibition very available and accessible to many visitors who are interested in this heartwarming story.

For a preview of the exhibition, please check out our impressive new website here. You will note that not only does the website offer a glimpse into the exhibition itself, but includes a complete Exhibition Catalogue and comprehensive Educators’ Guide. I know you will enjoy perusing the website.

Feel free to share the news with your friends and colleagues and let me know if you are familiar with a venue that might be interested in displaying the exhibition.

All the best,
Hanna

$300 Amazon Giveaway Begins on Father’s Day

Happy Father’s Day! RED, WHITE, and BOOM! Would you like to win $300 in Amazon cash!? Here’s your chance from The No. 1 Site for #Reader #Giveaways~~The Kindle Book Review. Just click the link and enter the $300 Home of the FREE Giveaway! It’s easy & fun. If you love #reading, I hope you will look for my second book, Surviving Remnant, among the choices and give it a try. I know you will love it. Enter the giveaway now; giveaway lasts for two weeks ending July 4th, 2021. Click here and enter every day ~> http://ow.ly/YEz450Feg4D

The Important Hebrew Month of Nissan

The Hebrew month of Nissan has special meaning to me. Not only is it the month which includes Passover and Holocaust Remembrance Day (Yom HaShoah), but it is also the month in which I commemorate the passing of my maternal grandmother, Hani. This year, they all appear close to one another, in late March and early April. Yom HaShoah starts tomorrow night and ends the following evening, the earliest I can ever remember.

I never met my maternal grandmother nor, for that matter, any of my ancestors, including aunts, uncles, first cousins, or many extended family members. I only have some second and third cousins, whom I cherish. My grandmother passed away on the eighth of Nissan just prior to the Shoah, in the late 1930s, of breast cancer. Yet I feel as if I knew her well. She was the oldest of seven siblings and mother of six children, one of whom died in the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. An expert needle pointer, she was asked each Easter by her fellow village residents to inspect the stitching on the cloth covers of their Easter baskets. Her approval of their handiwork meant their Easter preparations were complete.

As an extension of her needlework, she was a fine seamstress and taught all four of her daughters to excel at the sewing machine. She also loved flowers and planted extensive gardens surrounding her home in a small village in Hungary. Remnants of some of her long-dead flower gardens remained many years later. Hani spoke fluent German as well as Hungarian, having spent her childhood around the vineyards, many owned by German companies, which were known all over the world for their sweet Tokay wines. I am named after her and was frequently referred to as “Hani” by my mother during most of my adolescence and early adulthood. I am proud to bear her name and to remember her and all her family, all lost in the Shoah.

And so it is fitting that we commemorate Passover, when we remember our ancestors, who claimed their freedom from bondage; Yom HaShoah, as we remember those who perished during the brutality and horror of the Holocaust; and for me, my grandmother Hani, who, thankfully, was spared the sight of losing her family during the Shoah. She stands as a beacon representing home, loyalty, love, and devotion to family and community.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day

Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the day the United Nations has declared as a day to remember the sad events of the Holocaust and the lessons and truths it conveys. It was today in 1945 that the Auschwitz death camp was liberated by the Russian Army. There has never been a more urgent time to remember the dangers of unbridled bias and unimaginable violence than now with the rise of antisemitism, racism, and ethnic hatred around the world. The past year’s pandemic experience has only assisted in bringing out the worst instincts of man. Yet, we must also remember those who upheld their moral convictions and better angels during the Holocaust to save Jews and other victims and those today who risk their lives to save those who are suffering from Covid and assisting in the prevention of the virus. They shall inherit the earth. My mother, Sidonia, would have been proud that we remembered. https://www.ushmm.org/online-calendar/event/veintlremday0121

Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Presidential Inauguration

It is an auspicious week when Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the Presidential Inauguration occur only two days apart. We should take note that Martin Luther King Jr. spent his life advocating for non-violence and human and civil rights. King’s words are often quoted but none ring more true now than, “The time is always right to do the right thing.” We know that the right thing now is to turn away from the violence and insurrection that has occurred on American soil and look forward to the prospect of a more peaceful time when we can heal the divisions that separate us. The inauguration of a new Presidents allows us to open our hearts and minds to a new chapter in our nation’s history. However, it won’t succeed unless we all steer it in the direction of unity and understanding. No president, congress, or court can do it on their own. We need to make our voices ring in unison for mutual understanding and respect for one another. Let us all do the right thing.

Future Teachers of America

Today is Future Teachers of America Day! During the Covid pandemic, teachers have shown their resilience and commitment to their work in taking on new methods of teaching their students. I know it has not been easy, either for teachers, administrators, or their students. It is then especially important to remind kids that teaching is one of the most important professions that exists. It lays the foundation not only for our future careers but to know more about the earth in which we all live, the nature of human behavior, the meaning of commitment, and the tools we need to build effective neighborhoods and a united country. As I work with the great creative team that is developing our traveling version of the Sidonia’s Thread Exhibit, we can have no greater goal than assuring that our work will help to teach children and adults more about the human condition and the ways in which knowledge of those who have come before us can inform our present world. Stay tuned for more about the Sidonia’s Thread Traveling Exhibit soon!

Free EBook for Sidonia’s Thread

Starting Monday, September 21 to Friday, September 25, 2020, my first book, Sidonia’s Thread, which continues to inspire the world, will be free in ebook version for five days. Here’s your chance to read the book that started it all. Surviving Remnant, the sequel, continues the story, and the last book in the trilogy will be launched some time next year if all goes well! Enjoy your reading.

Nineteenth Anniversary of 9/11

Nineteen years have passed since the tragic death of 3,000 souls on September 11, 2001. The bravery of all those who lost their lives in Washington, New York, and on Flight United 93 will stay in our memory forever. It was sad to see a world that could cause such needless pain and it is still sad that our world today can still inflict such violence. We should remain diligent in maintaining our values, our vision of a world that can overcome its differences without violence, and our commitment to finding ways to bring people together. We remember.

International Literacy Day

I bet you did not know that September 8th is International Literacy Day! It’s one of the most important days of the year. As a writer, I know that it would be impossible to write without having read the work of other writers, including poets, historians, essayists, short story writers, novelists, and memoirists, among others. Today is a day to pick out a book that you have always wanted to read and start reading, even if it is only a few pages at a time. I guarantee that you will learn something that you have never known and it might even change your perspective on life—if only a little. Some suggestions: To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, John Adams by David McCullough, All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, The Swerve by Stephen Greenblatt, The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom, and a new book by my colleague, Barbara Bergren, called, Witness for My Father. I hope you will also check out my books, Sidonia’s Thread and Surviving Remnant, the first two volumes in the Sidonia’s Thread trilogy!

Super H, an Author with Unusual Talent

An unexpected storm hit the Northeast recently. Ancient trees that have endured many storms in the past just could not make it through this one. As a result, power was disrupted for residents, some for more than a week, and trees were uprooted along streets, residential property, wooded areas, and on the byways of hiking trails. When Super H viewed all the destruction, she immediately decided to use her strength to help out. Pushing back uprooted trees to protect innocent hikers was the least she could do. It’s amazing the strength one can find when faced with adversity!