Gary Reiner, co-author of Counting on America, will be our guest Zoom speaker. This event is sponsored by The Women’s Club and The Brotherhood of HSOSC.

Mr. Reiner promised his father Kurt that he would get his father's story published. Gary will do a presentation of his parents' story, including the background of what was happening in Austria and their escape path across Europe to the United States. 

Count­ing on Amer­i­ca is based on Kurt Rein­er’s auto­bi­og­ra­phy, high­light­ing how he and his wife, Hen­nie, man­aged to flee Vien­na, Aus­tria fol­low­ing the March 12, 1938 Anschluss (Ger­man annex­a­tion of Aus­tria). Recur­rent stops at Dachau and a forced-labor farm, fol­lowed by intern­ment in a French prison camp, delay the escape of the fugi­tive two­some. The sto­ry cap­tures the obsta­cles that Jew­ish refugees faced attempt­ing to emi­grate out of Europe dur­ing the Holo­caust. Although Kurt Rein­er died in 1985, his expe­ri­ence is cap­tured and kept alive in Kurt’s first-per­son voice by his co-author son, Gary Rein­er. The account is enhanced by the incor­po­ra­tion of dozens of orig­i­nal source doc­u­ments that cor­rob­o­rate the descrip­tion of events.

Count­ing on Amer­i­ca is a true sto­ry that pro­vides pro­found evi­dence that a com­bi­na­tion of luck, love, per­se­ver­ance, and divine inter­ven­tion was the req­ui­site for­mu­la for sur­vival dur­ing the Holo­caust. The cou­ple’s stead­fast com­mit­ment to reach the shores of the Unit­ed States is a pow­er­ful endorse­ment of Amer­i­ca’s impor­tance to refugees flee­ing despot nations.

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Meeting ID: 868 7190 5523

Passcode: HSOSC