Keeping the memory of Anne Frank and the inhabitants of the secret annex alive.

Anne Frank received a blank diary on her 13th birthday, just weeks before she and her family went into hiding in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. Her marvelously detailed, engagingly personal entries chronicle 25 trying months of claustrophobic, quarrelsome intimacy with her parents, sister, a second family, and a middle-aged dentist who has little tolerance for Anne's vivacity. The diary's universal appeal stems from its riveting blend of the grubby particulars of life during wartime and candid discussion of emotions familiar to every adolescent.
The family's feelings of security collapsed, however, when in 1940, Adolf Hitler and his troops conquered Holland and the freedom of the Jews began to be severely restricted. Dictates on where Jews could shop, swim or go to school became a part of everyday life.
Aware of where those restrictions might ultimately lead, Otto Frank spent the year preparing and stocking an annex behind his business office at Prinsengracht 263 into a hiding place.
Eight people eventually came to live in the secret annex. There were the four members of the Frank family, Otto Frank, Edith Frank, Margot and Anne, three from the Van Pels family, Herman and Auguste Van Pels and their son Peter, and an elderly dentist named Pfeffer.
Life in the annex settled down to a monotonous routine. They woke at 06:45a.m. and by 08:30 they all had to be quiet as work began in the warehouse beneath them. Breakfast at 09:00 and after breakfast all movement was kept to an absolute minimum until 12:30 when the warehouse closed for lunch.
At this time, the inhabitants of the annex had lunch and listened to the BBC. At 14:00 the warehouse reponed and there was silence once again. Between 14:00pm and 17:30 time was spent resting or reading. When the warehouse closed at 17:30 everyone could move around again. At 21:00 preperations were made to go to bed. At weekends the routine varied, with no welcomed visitors from downstairs and even more need to keep quiet to avoid attracting the slightest attention to what supposed to be an empty building.
Inevitably, emotions in the closed quarters began running high. The van Pels family tried unsuccessfully to discipline Anne, and, according to Miep Gies, Mrs. Frank became very depressed. Shortly before they were arrested by the Gestapo, Anne experienced the first flush of love with Peter Van Pels, a shy boy also reaching out for love and understanding.
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___________♥Anne Margot Peter Otto Edith Hermann Auguste Fritz Pfeffer

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"Some of us read Anne Frank's diary on Robben Island and derived much encouragement of it."
-Nelson Mandela-

This apparently inconsequential diary by a child, this "de profundis" stammered out in a child's voice, embodies all the hideousness of fascism, more so than all the evidence of Nuremberg put together.
-Jan Romein-

One of the wisest and most moving commentaries on war and its impact on human beings that I have ever read."
—Eleanor Roosevelt in her introduction to The Diary of a Young Girl

In addition, four people acted as helpers for the people in the annex, and brought them food, supplies and news of the world outside the darkened windows. These protectors had placed themselves at great personal risk because they could have been arrested and jailed for helping Jews. All of these people worked at the business that had belonged to Otto Frank.
Anne's famous diary captured two years of hiding in the attic above the store, but it ended on August 4, 1944, when their hiding place was betrayed. It was an anonymous phone call which led the Nazis to the secret annex. For almost 60 years, the identity of that informant, whose call had such tragic consequences, has remained a mystery to historians.
As the Gestapo men searched the annex for valuables such as money, the briefcase in which Anne kept her writings was opened and the papers were scattered on the floor. Little did these men realize the eventual value of these materials. However, the two women, Miep Gies and Bep Voskuijl , had known of Anne's intense feelings about these papers and gathered them up for safe keeping.
Anne's precious diary was among the many personal effects left behind by the family. Anne, and the seven others who shared the cramped Secret Annex with her, were all deported to Westerbork camp.
A few weeks later, as the Allies began retaking Holland, the inhabitants of the camp were moved to Auschwitz and later to other camps. At the gates of Auschwitz, Otto Frank was separated from his family for the last time. In January, 1945, the German guards left the camp to the advancing Russian army. Most of the prisoners, including Peter Van Pels, were herded along with the troops, but Otto Frank was in the camp infirmary and was left behind. Otto Frank tried to convince Peter to hide in the infirmary, but he was afraid. Peter was never heard from again.
Otto Frank was the only one of the original 8 residents of the secret annex to survive.Mrs Frank died starvation, Van Pels died in the Auschwitz gas chambers, Mrs Van Pels is unknown and Pfeffer died at the Neuengamme camp in Germany.
Anne ultimately ended up in the Bergen-Belsen camp in Germany, after being evacuated from Auschwitz in October, 1944. As starvation. cold and disease swept through the camp's population, Margot, Anne's sister, developed typhus and died. A few days later, Anne herself, in March, 1945, succumbed to the disease a few weeks before the camp was liberated by the British. She was 15 years old.
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Women should be respected as well! Generally speaking, men are held in great esteem in all parts of the world, so why shouldn't women have their share? Soldiers and war heroes are honored and commemorated, explorers are granted immortal fame, martyrs are revered, but how many people look upon women too as soldiers?...Women, who struggle and suffer pain to ensure the continuation of the human race, make much tougher and more courageous soldiers than all those big-mouthed freedom-fighting heroes put together!
-Anne M. Frank-

Earning happiness means doing good and working, not speculating and being lazy. Laziness may look inviting, but only work gives you true satisfaction.
-Anne M. Frank-

Everyone has inside of him a piece of good news. The good news is that you don't know how great you can be! How much you can love! What you can accomplish! And what your potential is!
-Anne M. Frank-

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.
-Anne M. Frank-

ps: Thank you for remember Anne Frank!
Anne Frank is hope is life is love!