From Rubble to Roots: Six Stories of Survival and Resilience
New York, NY (May 28, 2026)
The Center for Jewish History is proud to announce the opening of From Rubble to Roots: Six Stories of Survival and Resilience, a new exhibition based on the Center’s internationally recognized podcast of the same name. Created with support from Ancestry®, the exhibition opens June 17 and introduces the remarkable stories of six Holocaust survivors, as shared by their children and, in one case, by the survivor himself. Some of these stories had remained unspoken for decades until now.
Through carefully selected images, artifacts, and first-person testimony, the exhibition traces each survivor’s journey from prewar life through persecution and ultimately to rebuilding their lives in the United States.
“From Rubble to Roots brings forward voices that might otherwise have gone unheard, revealing both the devastation of the Holocaust and the remarkable resilience of those who rebuilt their lives afterward,” said Gavriel Rosenfeld, President of the Center for Jewish History. “By sharing these personal histories, we aim to highlight the countless stories of survival and renewal that remain untold, and to remind people how recent this history is, and how profoundly it continues to shape real lives.”
Visitors will encounter Judith Koppel, who survived the Nazi occupation of her hometown of Trembowla with the help of a Polish woman who hid her and her father at great personal risk. They will learn about Isak Borenstein, who escaped death repeatedly, including while defusing bombs in a Nazi labor camp, and went on to build a new life in New Orleans.
“From Rubble to Roots speaks to something too often overlooked: that survivors were ordinary people living ordinary lives before they were imprisoned, victimized, and later carried the impact of what they endured,” said Miriam Malka Frankel, Curator and Host of the podcast. “We focus on the people, with the Holocaust understood as a defining moment within their lives, not the entirety of their identity. In a time when Holocaust denial and revisionism are increasingly present, it is especially important to remember their humanity and recognize how closely their lives reflect our shared human experience.”
The exhibition also shares the story of Erica Gorin, who witnessed her Berlin synagogue burn during Kristallnacht before escaping on the Kindertransport, and Ernie Brod, whose survival began with a moment of chance when his crying as an infant prompted a guard to release him and his mother, setting them on a path to safety in America.
Other stories highlight acts of resistance and endurance, including Samuel Goldstein’s role in the Treblinka uprising and Michal Boruch Knaster’s survival through multiple camps after losing his entire family. Together, these narratives show the horrors of the Holocaust yet, also the determination to rebuild, remember, and carry forward that survivors have and had.
From Rubble to Roots: Six Stories of Survival and Resilience was created with support from Ancestry, the global leader in family history, as part of its ongoing partnership with the Center for Jewish History to preserve the memories of Holocaust victims and survivors. Their collaboration includes providing free DNA kits to Holocaust survivors and their children to help reconnect lost relatives and fill gaps in family histories.
Episodes of the podcast, From Rubble to Roots, are available worldwide on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and at cjh.org/rubble-to-roots. Each episode is also cataloged in the Center’s online collections.
