To laugh at success is a true testament to the humility of a human’s character. For Jay Sommer, professor of Hebrew and Russian languages at Fairfield University, success used to be something unimaginable, but today it is the best way to describe his life.
In a speech Sommer recently gave to a group of about 50 students and admirers on Nov. 21, he described what it was like growing up in a world full of hate. Being brought up in Czechoslovakia during the rise of Nazi Germany was difficult for Sommer’s Jewish family, surrounded by poverty and religious persecution.
Sommer said his mother, who was the backbone of the family, has been his life-long hero. She was the one who gave Sommer the strength he would later need to overcome great hardships. “We laughed at poverty, some of the things I speak of today are sad, tragic, but some are funny. It is OK to laugh today, I like to hear laughter,” he said. And there was no shortage of laughter during Sommer’s two-hour talk on his experience as a Holocaust survivor. While this may sound surprising, at the time it seemed only natural. Sommer looks on the bright side and is thankful for what didn’t happen during his time under Nazi persecution.
At the age of fourteen, Sommer dropped out of school and started working to help the family earn money. He lugged hundreds of pounds of bricks on his back everyday until the Nazis invaded his homeland, driving all the Jews into Forced Labor Camps. There he worked under the worst conditions imaginable for seven months, not knowing where his family was or even if they were still alive.
Days before the camp was to be moved to Auschwitz, Sommer’s friend decided that they should try to escape and hide in Budapest with a family friend that had agreed to house them. They “borrowed” jackets and security badges from the guards and literally walked out the front door.
Until the war ended years later, Sommer did his best to avoid not only the officers of the Waffen S.S.,but also the Russian army who enrolled him for a short time.
“Two [Russian] solders stood on either side of me, big men. The one said ‘how would you like to join the Russian army?’ I said no. Then the second soldier took out a gun and held it to my head and said ‘How would you like to join the Russian Army? I said ‘This is what I have wanted to do all my life.” Sommer escaped from the Russians the first chance he had.
After the war had finally ended only one member of Sommer’s family survived, one of his brothers. The rest of the family had been killed in the camps, except for his mother, the “hero” of his life, who passed away shortly before the war began. Finally free, Sommer and his brother decided to head towards the refugee camps in Italy where they were greeted with open arms.
Later, after being healed physically and mentally by the Italian Monks and Nuns, Sommer traveled to the United States in hopes of finding a country with streets paved of gold. He hopped a freighter to New York. When he saw the inscription on the Statue of Liberty, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” he said, “They knew I was coming.”
After arriving, Sommer found a job in a factory where he began to learn Spanish and discover the true America, to him the greatest country on earth. Nine months after arriving, Sommer passed his high school equivalency test and started working on a Bachelors of Arts at Brooklyn College.
Today he teaches at Fairfield University and New Rochelle High School in New Jersey. He was awarded the National Teacher of the Year Award and will continue to keep teaching until he is unable. “I feel such an incredible debt to America I want to pay it back some how…I am absolutely delighted to have this honor teaching.”
Leave a Reply