Traveling Holocaust exhibit to open at Hattiesburg library Jan. 9

HATTIESBURG, Miss. (WDAM) - A traveling exhibit that focuses on America’s reaction to the Holocaust opens Monday at the Library of Hattiesburg, Petal and Forrest County Monday.

“Americans and the Holocaust” runs from Jan. 9-Feb. 10 and is free to the public.

Hattiesburg was selected as one of 50 sites to host the touring version of the exhibit, which opened in April 2018 at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D. C.

State and local leaders joined several Hattiesburg residents for a news conference about the exhibit Friday afternoon.

Some of those attending lost family members in the Holocaust.

“The idea of them having this traveling exhibit, it’s just educational,” said David Shemper of Hattiesburg.

Shemper said members of his grandmother’s family died in the Holocaust.

“The hope is something like this never happens again, although genocide has happened since the Holocaust, just not to the extent of the Holocaust,” he said.

The exhibit was originally scheduled to make a stop in Hattiesburg in 2020, but was postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I have members of my family who are part of that Jewish community and so, to be able to have this exhibit and tell the stories and ask the questions that in present day, because the lessons of the past are every bit as important today as they were generations ago,” said state Rep. Missy McGee of Hattiesburg.

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