Holocaust Stamps Project to open --- finally

Collages made by students at the Foxboro Regional Charter School art part of the exhibit.

Nearly four years after the 11 million stamps collected as part of the Foxboro Regional Charter School’s Holocaust Stamps Project were shipped to a Pennsylvania museum, the exhibit’s permanent home will be opened to the public later this month.
The stamps were collected by students of the Foxboro, MA school from 2009 to 2017. Support for the project --- and mountains of stamps --- poured in from across the globe.
This story on the project was published in the May 30^th edition of The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro, MA, and a similar story on the project was published in the June edition of Jewish Rhode Island of Providence, R.I.
The links to those stories appear at the end of this story, along with a fact box should you decide to visit the American Philatelic Center in Bellefonte, Pa.
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BY LARRY KESSLER
FOR THE SUN CHRONICLE
FOXBORO --- The long wait is finally over for the Foxboro Regional Charter School’s Holocaust Stamps Project.
More than 3 ½ years after the project was shipped to its new home at a Pennsylvania museum operated by the American Philatelic Society, a national stamp-collecting organization, a new exhibit featuring the project’s material will be open to the public.
The 11 million stamps collected from 2009 to 2017 in memory of both Jewish and non-Jewish Holocaust victims, along with 18 student-made collages depicting moments and people from the Holocaust, were moved to the American Philatelic Center in Bellefonte, Pa. in November, 2019.
Planning for the exhibit, however, was put on hold a few months later when the coronavirus pandemic hit, but the exhibit will finally open next month. A formal dedication will take place May 31 at an invitation-only event, and the exhibit will open to everyone on June 11.
The project was the brainchild of the school’s now-retired teacher Charlotte Sheer. She conceived of it in 2009 when her fifth-grade class began collecting stamps after reading the best-selling children’s book “Number the Stars” by Lois Lowry. That book tells the story of a Danish girl helping to smuggle Jewish families out of German-occupied Denmark in World War II.
The project soon took off, and donations poured in from around the globe before collecting its 11 millionth stamp in the fall of 2017. Stamps were donated from 48 states and the District of Columbia and 29 countries.
Sheer, in an email interview, explained how and why Lowry’s book touched a nerve with her elementary school class.
“Fourteen years ago, my class was reading “Number the Stars” by Lois Lowry when I responded with my Jewish heart to a fifth-grade student who asked, ‘Why were Nazi soldiers so mean to the Jewish families?’ The question planted a seed for an activity that grew to become the nine-year-long Holocaust Stamps Project,” she said.
Sheer, who has stayed involved in the project despite her retirement, said she’s extremely pleased with the project’s final destination.
“When the American Philatelic Society assumed stewardship of the completed project four years ago, I was excited that the work, begun in my own classroom, had found the perfect public venue for its unique student-created materials to begin serving as universal teaching tools.
“Today, I couldn’t be more grateful for the teamwork at the American Philatelical Society that went into developing the Holocaust Stamps Project into a world-class museum exhibit of Holocaust remembrance,” she said.
The exhibit, called “A Philatelic Memorial of the Holocaust,” was assembled in partnership with Penn State University’s Hillel and its Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights Education Initiative.
Speakers at the May 31 dedication ceremony, besides Sheer, will include  Boaz Dvir, an award-winning filmmaker and director of the Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights Education Initiative; a representative from Penn State Hillel; and American Philatelic Society Executive Director Scott English.
Eleven million stamps were chosen as a goal for the project, Sheer said, to represent the 6 million Jewish victims of the Holocaust as well as the 5 million other people from 21 European countries who also were Holocaust victims. The 11 million figure included 1.5 million children killed as part of the Holocaust.
The American Philatelic Society built the exhibit from the project’s stamps and educational materials. The exhibit also includes postal relics sent to and from concentration camps and ghettos during the Holocaust.
The exhibit has taken on added meaning in the wake of the dramatic rise in antisemitism in the United States.
A recent report by the Anti-Defamation League said Massachusetts’ 41 percent rise in antisemitic incidents in 2022 over 2021 was higher than increases in New England and the country, putting the state among the top six states in the nation. Both those incidents and the 204 incidents reported in New England in 2022 were record highs since the ADL began tracking the information in 1979, according to the report.
The spike in antisemitism recently prompted New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft to launch a $25 million “Stand Up to Jewish Hate” campaign through his Foundation to Combat Antisemitism. The campaign’s main thrust is to make the country aware that even though American Jews make up only 2.4 percent of America’s population, they’re now the victims of 55 percent of all hate crimes, Kraft said.
The Holocaust Stamps Project exhibit is also vital, stressed American Philatelical Society executive director Scott English, because “a 2020 survey showed nearly two-thirds of millennials and Generation Z lacked basic knowledge of the Holocaust. This exhibit brings to life the tragedy of the Holocaust using the voices and artifacts of the victims,” he said in a news release.
“We have a duty to connect the past to the future so that it never happens again.”
Susanna Mills, the exhibit’s coordinator, said the exhibit’s value lies in its hands-on access to history.
“A postcard mailed from a Poland ghetto might be the only surviving, tangible evidence of the life and death of a Jewish victim of the Nazi regime. To touch history like that makes it real,” she said. “The American Philatelic Society is proud to safeguard and share those stories told by stamps and postal relics.”
Larry Kessler, a retired Sun Chronicle local news editor, can be reached at larrythek65@gmail.com.

IF YOU GO ….
WHAT: Opening of the new exhibit, “A Philatelic Memorial of the Holocaust,” based on the Holocaust Stamps Project created by the students at the Foxboro Regional Charter School. Stamps were collected from 2009 to 2017.
WHERE: The American Philatelic Society’s American Philatelical Center at 100 Match Factory Place in Bellefonte, Pa.
WHEN: An open house will be held from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday, June 11, featuring discussions of the Holocaust-era postal history. After that, the center will be open to the public for tours from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays to Fridays.
IF YOU GO: Information on driving directions as well as nearby lodging can be found by going to the center’s website, https://stamps.org/contact/visits-tours.
DEDICATION: An invitation-only ceremony was held May 31.
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LINKS TO THE TWO STORIES:
This is the link to the May 30th Holocaust Stamps Project story in The Sun Chronicle: https://www.thesunchronicle.com/news/local_news/foxboro-charter-schools-holocaust-stamps-project-to-open-at-pennsylvania-museum/article_9e4b4fff-4bbe-5b88-b18b-053b2df0fa42.html

Here's the link to the Jewish Rhode Island Holocaust Stamps Project story:
https://www.jewishrhody.com/stories/holocaust-stamps-project-exhibit-opens-june-11-in-its-new-home,36331