United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: A World-Class Museum Experience in Washington, DC

My husband and I have wanted to visit the nation’s capital together for many years. This year, we decided to prioritize a visit there. We had a new world-class museum experience in Washington, DC every day. We got emotional so many times in that four-day period that it was hard to know where to start when I sat down to write. I try to avoid getting too political on this site, but due to the subject matter at hand, there will be times when that is unavoidable. The next several articles will profile some of the amazing experiences we had and I encourage all my readers to plan their own trips there as soon as possible.

A schedule for each world-class museum experience in Washington, DC

In fact, there are so many world-class museum experiences in Washington, DC that we had to pre-arrange a schedule for ourselves, which dictated that we would see two each day. By spending four hours in each museum before moving on, we were able to see most (not all) of each institution.

One day, we spent the morning in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the afternoon in the National Museum of African American History and Culture. It was an emotional day and I wouldn’t change a thing about it. Today, we talk about museum #1.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

The first thing to know about this museum is that you are required to reserve free tickets in advance. Those are completely gone at least one month in advance. In our case, we planned this trip with only 2-3 weeks’ notice, therefore, no tickets were available at all for the four days we were going to be in town. However, each day at 7:00am EST, the museum releases a limited number of tickets for that day. We knew exactly which day we wanted to go, so I logged on at exactly 7:00am and snagged a pair of tickets. This was a huge relief because this museum was one of the top three things we wanted to experience.

If you can’t make it to Washington anytime soon, and you live in the south or are traveling there soon, visit the VERY worthwhile Craig and Barbara Weiner Holocaust Reflection and Resource Center at Nova Southeastern University in Ft. Lauderdale instead.

From Groundwork to Implementation

Each visitor is given an Identification Card that tells the story of an actual person who was involved in the Holocaust. In some cases, your person survives, and in many cases, they do not. We were given the card of a young woman who bought a new identity (as a Christian) and, while she did have to complete many years of forced labor for the Nazis, she did survive the war. It is powerful to carry this ID card with you as you walk through history.

The exhibits here begin with artifacts from the early 1930s to explain how the political, economic, and society groundwork was laid for Hitler’s plans in the first place. Visitors are then taken all the way through the building of the camps, the categorization of prisoners, the operation of the camps, liberation of the camps, and, finally, displays on the numerous people who operated in resistance to evil.

Using Tech to Talk about the Pogroms

In addition, there is some explanation of the “pogroms” that occurred in Russia and Eastern Europe as well. As a Jew, these were talked about in my household, but many Americans were not ever taught about them. The pogroms were raids on Jewish shtetls (small town with a predominantly Jewish population) that took place in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The intention of each pogrom (raid) was, of course, to wipe out every Jewish resident.

In one breathtaking display, the museum displays a tower of pictures of the residents of one shtetl called Ejszyszki (in Polish)/Eishishok (in Yiddish). In 1941 the Jews of the town (approx. 3500) were rounded up. Most were shot at the edge of mass graves. Today, no Jews at all are known to live there.

One of the things that makes this institution a world-class museum experience in Washington, DC is the use of technology at key moments. For example, while standing inside the tower of photos, visitors can point a tablet at certain photos on the wall and the tablet will tell you that person’s life story. The goal is to humanize the Holocaust. The numbers are so big, that sometimes we get lost in them and we forget that every number represents a real human being with a family, a career, hobbies, and a home; even the number one.

What will stay with you forever?

Connecting with visitors on an emotional level is what makes for a world-class museum experience in Washington, DC or anywhere else. Each visitor will typically have one thing that stands out for them. There will be one thing that impacts you like nothing else in the museum. For my friends who visited a few months before me, it was the display of shoes removed from people before their murders.

“We are the shoes, we are the last witnesses. We are shoes from grandchildren and grandfathers from Prague, Paris, and Amsterdam. And because we are only made of fabric and leather – and not of blood and flesh – each one of us avoided the hellfire.”

Moses Schulstein – Yiddish Poet

For me, the moment that took my breath away was as follows. The museum was a bit crowded and the displays at a certain point were along both walls. The area seemed a little narrow considering the number of visitors. I had to keep jostling my may through the crowd as I ping-ponged from side to side to read the displays and see the photos. The crowd moved slowly along a wooden-floored slope and around a corner. As we rounded the corner, in front of us stood a train car with its doors open. . . waiting for us. There was no other path. All museum visitors had to come this way.

The whole experience had been slyly curated. Without our knowledge, we had just walked the same kind of walk that so many others experienced. And now, we were boarding a train car just like the ones so many others boarded.

The key difference, of course, was that the sliding doors on both sides of the train car were open, and in our situation, we simply passed through the interior and came out on the other side. Nevertheless, I had to pause and take a very deep, steadying breath before I walked through it. Not insignificantly, my husband and I had been separated in the crowd, and I had to pass through the train car alone.

How we can Reflect and Remember Today

On the second floor is a huge hexagonal room called the Hall of Remembrance. Here visitors can light candles in memory of those lives that were cut short by evil. The centerpiece of this room is a flame that burns continuously. On the wall is this from the book of Deuteronomy:

“Only guard yourself and guard your soul carefully, lest you forget the things your eyes saw, and lest these things depart your heart all the days of your life. And you shall make them known to your children and to your children’s children.”

Beneath the encased eternal flame is this information: “Here lies earth gathered from death camps, concentration camps, sites of mass execution, and ghettos in Nazi occupied Europe, and from cemeteries of American soldiers who fought and died to defeat Nazi, Germany.”

Perhaps the thing that I was the happiest of all to see, though, was the park next door crowded with school field trips. Young people from all over America sat in circles on the grass as their teachers asked probing questions and led them in critical discussions.

When the political landscape seems at its darkest, this is one thing that allows me to feel a tiny sense of relief; that there are still intellectual warriors out there who do their part every day to make sure the next generation does better.