This week's hero is...
Cornelia ten Boom
Cornelia "Corrie" ten Boom was born on April 25, 1892, in Amsterdam, Netherlands. She was the youngest of four children who grew up in a watchmaker's shop. Like her father, she became a watchmaker (the very first woman to be licensed as one in the country). When she wasn't running her family's watch shop, she was teaching Bible classes at Sunday schools (she was very committed to her faith in the Dutch Reformed Church). Her faith and dedication to her neighbors would become powerful motivations in the coming years.
In May 1940, Nazi Germany launched its Blitzkrieg campaign against Western Europe. In less than a year, the Allied armies were soundly defeated and most of Europe was occupied (Holland included). It wasn't long before, the Nazis began to persecute Holland's Jewish population. Within just weeks of Holland's occupation, thousands of Dutch Jews were arrested and deported out of the country to concentration camps.
Corrie was determined to help her neighbors in any way that she could. She and her family opened up their home to any refugees who needed to hide from the Gestapo. They built a secret hiding place in Corrie's bedroom. This room was eight feet long by two feet wide and could hold up to six people. The family also installed a warning buzzer which would signal any guests to hide whenever the Gestapo were seen in the area.
Four the next four years, Corrie and her family sheltered hundreds of refugees and resistance fighters within their home and helped coordinate attacks from behind enemy lines. Unfortunately a Nazi informant reported the ten Boom's rescue operation to the Gestapo. On February 28, 1944, Corrie, her family, and thirty others were arrested. However, the Gestapo failed to locate the secret hiding place which was sheltering six Jews (they were picked up by the Dutch resistance two days later).
Corrie ten Boom was deported (along with her sister, Betsie) to an infamous concentration camp in northern Germany called, Ravensbruck. For the rest of the year, Corrie struggled to survive in appalling conditions. Her sister died of malnutrition after being incarcerated in the camp for 8 months. Corrie was released 15 days later due to a "clerical error" in the guard's paperwork. She was one of the lucky few prisoners to survive while being over 40 (she later found out that all other prisoners in her age range were gassed). It is believed that more than 90,000 people (mostly women and young girls) were murdered in Ravensbruck.
Corrie spent the rest of the war in hiding. When it was over she immigrated to the United States where she worked as an evangelist (she also became good friends with Rev. Billy Graham). It is believed that she participated in the rescue of more than 800 people during World War II. In 1962, Corrie ten Boom received a knighthood from the Queen of the Netherlands. Six years later she was awarded Righteous among the Nations from Israel.
In 1971, she wrote and published a book called, The Hiding Place. In this book, Corrie chronicled her families efforts to aid people during the Holocaust and their motivation for doing so. The book immediately became a bestseller and sold over 2 million copies in its first year. For the rest of her life, Corrie ten Boom continued to give lectures on the Holocaust and helping to educate the next generation. She passed away on her birthday in April 1983, at the age of 91. Today she is remembered as one of the greatest heroes of World War II, a title that could not be more fitting.
