On March 31, Robert “Bob” Behr, a survivor of Auschwitz, one of the worst of the concentration camps set up in Nazi Germany, will hold a free public lecture on campus in remembrance of the 70th anniversary of the Holocaust.
Behr’s presentation will begin at 6 p.m. in Lee Hall’s Bettersworth Auditorium. Free tickets will be available at the Center for Student Activities in suite 314 of the Union. Before his presentation, the university will host a series of events to promote awareness of the Holocaust anniversary.
Behr was born on March 1, 1922 in Berlin, Germany. During Kristallnacht on November 9-10, 1938, Behr’s father was arrested and sent to Buchenwald concentration camp. When he was released, Behr’s father moved to Cuba before immigrating to the United States. Behr hoped to join his father in the U.S. but could not get an affidavit. On Nov. 29, 1938, Robert and his parents got evicted from their apartment. Luckily, the Jewish Community Service helped his family find two rooms in an elderly Jewish woman’s apartment for their family to live in. In 1942, Behr’s parents were arrested by the Gestapo, the official secret police of Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe, for helping a friend escape to Switzerland. Behr was arrested two days later, and the family was deported to Theresienstadt concentration camp. 
The camp rapidly became overcrowded, and the Gestapo deported the prisoners to Auschwitz. In order to protect his family from deportation, Behr went to work on the new headquarters at Wulkow, a satellite camp of Theresienstadt. Supply problems stalled their work due to the conditions of the coldest winters of the century. In efforts to keep the prisoners busy, they were told to wash the trees. In January 1945, the prisoners returned to Theresienstadt, and Behr was reunited with his parents.
There, he worked in the camp kitchen until the camp was liberated on May 5, 1945.
Behr was finally able to immigrate to the United States in 1945. When he arrived, Behr enlisted in the United States Army, through which he hoped he would be assigned to Berlin so that he could care of his mother. Being a fluent German speaker helped Behr transfer to Berlin. While there, Behr interrogated former Nazi personnel. In 1952, Behr left the Army and joined the United States Air Force civil service in Dayton, Ohio, where he worked as an intelligence officer. After 39 years of government service, Behr retired in 1988. Behr earned a Bachelor’s as well as a Master’s degree in Modern European History. He also became a professor at Sinclair College. Today, Behr volunteers at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.