Handmade 1944 calendar made by a hidden Dutch Jewish girl for her brother
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Washington, United States
Handmade calendar made by 16 year old Rachel “Chelly” de Groot for her 14 year old brother Louis while they were in hiding in separate places in the Netherlands in 1944. Chelly copied an image of the Alkmaar Cheese Market, depicting two men carrying cheese in front of the Alkmaar Weigh House. Louis received the calendar after Dirk Onderweegs, the resistance member Louis was staying with, visited his family in February 1944. The calendar displays June 1944 because Louis and the Onderweegs had to flee their home in June, after they were turned into the Gestapo for their resistance activity. Germany occupied the Netherlands in May 1940 and implemented anti-Jewish restrictions. In July 1942, the Germans began mass deportations. On November 16, 1942, Chelly, 15, Louis, 13, and their parents Meijer and Sophia left Arnhem and went into hiding. Meijer and Sophia hid in Amsterdam while Chelly and Louis moved around to different locations. In summer/fall 1943, Chelly went to Amsterdam to live with her parents. In December, Louis was sent to Lemmer to live with the Onderweegs family. In February 1944, Dirk Onderweegs visited and offered to take Chelly to a safer hiding place. On April 8, 1944, four days before Dirk was to return, Chelly and her parents were denounced and arrested. They were sent to Westerbork transit camp, then to Auschwitz. Chelly and Sophia were killed upon arrival in Auschwitz on May 22, 1944. Meijer was selected for a work detail and was killed on September 30, 1944. Louis remained in hiding with Onderweegs until liberation in mid-April 1945.
- Title: Handmade 1944 calendar made by a hidden Dutch Jewish girl for her brother
- Provenance: The calendar was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2003 by Louis de Groot, the brother of Rachel de Groot.
- Subject Keywords: Deportees--Netherlands--Amsterdam--Biography. Hidden children (Holocaust)--Netherlands--Biography. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Netherlands--Personal narratives. Holocaust victims--Netherlands--Biography. Jewish children in the Holocaust--Netherlands--Biography. Jews--Persecution--Netherlands--Biography. World War, 1939-1945--Underground movements--Netherlands--Personal narratives, Jewish.
- Type: Information Forms
- Rights: Permanent Collection
- External Link: See the full record at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- Medium: Small, rectangular, brown paper calendar for the year 1944, adhered to the bottom of a rectangular piece of brown cardboard with a curved top, covered with white paper on the front. The calendar has a page for each month from June to December, with perforated top edges. Each page is printed with the month and year, the days of the week, and the days of the month in rows in dark blue ink. The cardboard has a hole at the top center for a knotted loop of thread. At the top is a hand drawn colored pencil image depicting 2 men carrying a load of cheese in front of an ornate building decorated with suns. Several dates in the calendar are circled in faded ink.
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