WHITEHALL — A special traveling exhibit at the Whitehall Community Library is giving local school children a history lesson on the life and work of Anne Frank and the impact of the Holocaust.
Dozens of children from four area school districts, including Cardwell School fifth grader Lance Howser, have been visiting the library to learn more about Frank, a Jewish child who documented her life while hiding from the Nazis during World War II.
"She ran from the Nazis her whole life —almost—and she couldn't look out the windows, and she had limited space to live in," Howser said.
WATCH: A traveling exhibit at the Whitehall Community Library is teaching local students about the life of Anne Frank and the impact of the Holocaust.
Along with some helpers from the local school, Library Director Jeannie Ferriss guides the children through panels that display a dark time in world history when Adolf Hitler and his Nazis murdered millions, including Jewish people and others who did not conform.
"This is our way of showing the kids that this is the ultimate reaction to bullying one group of people, I mean, just the complete intended annihilation of an entire group of people for no other reason than that they were Jews," Ferriss said.
Ferriss noted the impact history has on the young students.
"A million children died in the Holocaust, and they very well could have been part of them, you know, had they been born in Europe in the 1930s," Ferriss said.
"If you were one of the families that hid, you were considered part of the punishment group," Ferriss said during the tour. Howser grimaces at the thought.
After touring the exhibit, 11-year-old Ava Kravick and others gather to write anonymous notes to Frank, who was murdered in a concentration camp shortly before the end of the war.
"I feel like we shouldn't treat people so differently from the way we treat ourselves or anyone else. We should treat them as our equals and nothing else," Kravick said.
Watching the children take in the experience is a reminder of just how young Frank was when she began to document her life. Kravick is inspired by Frank's persistence to become a great writer.
"I think the message is to keep on trying and believe that there will be something good that will come out of this...there always will be," Kravick said.
The exhibit will close on April 30 with a special guest speaker whose grandfather was in the concentration camp with Frank. The exhibit will move to a Missoula library next.
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