Oral Histories: Testimonies and Interviews
The show is based on the true events in the lives of Lorch Family and and their time at the Althoff Circus during WWII. On this page we've gathered testimonies and interviews from different sources, including some we've conduced ourselves as part of this project, about the Lorch family and their saviors. This page will continue to grow as we publish more testimonies.
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Interview with Jano Bento, 2018
(with thanks to the Pfungstadt Museum) This interview has been conducted by Stav Meishar and edited for clarity purposes. Asterisks (*) denote comments and footnotes; brackets ( [...] ) denote filling in the blanks. Grammatical errors, for the most part, were not corrected, and segments in German have been kept as part of the interview. * The Book Jano refers to is Der Clown und die Zirkusreiterin by Ingeborg Prior, published in 1998. The book includes interviews with Irene, Peter and others from the Althoff Circus, as well as comments from Prior herself.
* The Blumenfelds, mentioned in this interview, were one of the most prominent pre-WWII Jewish circuses in Germany, and many of its members were killed in the Holocaust. * I was inaccurate in my memory of the fall of the Berlin Wall. It fell in 1990, not 1989. Nonetheless, Jano refers to "the end of the war" as the time when the divide between East and West Germany ceased to exist |
Interview with Mary & Astrid Bento, 2018
(with thanks to Renate Dreesen) An interview conducted by Stav Meishar with Mary & Astrid Bento, daughters of Peter Bento and Irene Bento (nee Danner, descended from the Lorches). Transcript of the interview available here. (linguistic errors were not corrected for sake of authenticity.) |
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The 1880 Elephant Incident at the Circus Lorch
(putting a puzzle together for two Lorch descendants) What happened when two Lorch descendants had each a piece of the puzzle without knowing about each other, and Stav helped them piece the picture together. Filmed and edited in 2019. |
Finding refuge in Circus
(A short documentary film from the 90s) A documentary film from the 90s by Micha Terjung and Ingeborg Prior, featuring Irene, Peter, Adolf, Mohamed and others. German audio with English translation by Christopher Thinius and Zowie Alexandra, subtitles by Stav Meishar. |
Peter, Irene and their families
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Interview with Adolf Althoff, 1994
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