{{Short description|Hungarian-American public speaker (1929–2020)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=April 2020}} {{Infobox person | name = Margit Feldman | image = Margit_Feldman.png<!-- filename only, no "File:" or "Image:" prefix, and no enclosing brackets --> | alt = <!-- descriptive text for use by speech synthesis (text-to-speech) software --> | caption = Feldman in 2009 | birth_name = Margit Buchhalter<!-- only use if different from name --> | birth_date = {{Birth date|1929|06|12}} | birth_place = Budapest, Hungary | death_date = {{Death date and age|2020|04|14|1929|06|12}} | death_place = Somerset, New Jersey, U.S. | other_names = | occupation = Public speaker<Br/>Educator<Br/>Activist | years_active = | known_for = Holocaust survivor | notable_works = | spouse = Harvey Feldman (1953–2020) | children = 2 }} '''Margit Buchhalter Feldman''' (June 12, 1929 – April 14, 2020) was a Hungarian-American public speaker, educator, activist, and Holocaust survivor. Feldman and her family were placed in a concentration camp in 1944, where her parents were killed immediately. The 15-year-old survived by saying she was older, old enough to be sent to a work camp. She was freed from Bergen-Belsen concentration camp on April 15, 1945. After moving to the United States, she raised a family and became a public speaker, sharing her experience with students until her death.
==Early life==
Margit Buchhalter was born June 12, 1929, in Budapest, Hungary.<ref name="Bella">{{cite news |last1=Bella |first1=Timothy |title=Holocaust survivor dies of the coronavirus 75 years after she was liberated from concentration camp |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/04/17/holocaust-survivor-coronavirus/ |accessdate=April 18, 2020 |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=April 17, 2020 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="OralHistory1">{{cite web |title=Oral history interview with Margit Feldman – Collections Search – United States Holocaust Memorial Museum |url=https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn504470 |website=Collections |publisher=United States Holocaust Memorial Museum |accessdate=April 18, 2020}}</ref> Her parents were Joseph and Theresa Buchhalter.<ref name="Schiavi">{{cite web|url=https://www.mycentraljersey.com/story/news/local/how-we-live/2016/05/22/holocaust-survivor/84233700/|title=Film chronicles the life of a woman who dared to speak the truth about Holocaust|last1=Schiavi|first1=MaryLynn|date=May 22, 2016|website=My Central Jersey|language=en|accessdate=April 18, 2020}}</ref> The family lived in Tolcsva, Hungary.<ref name="Bella"/>
===Holocaust=== When she was fourteen,<ref name="Schiavi"/> the Nazis invaded Tolcsva.<ref name="Siemaszko">{{cite news |last1=Siemaszko |first1=Corky |title=Coronavirus kills 90-year-old Holocaust survivor |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/holocaust-survivor-who-shared-her-story-students-dies-coronavirus-n1185701 |accessdate=April 18, 2020 |work=NBC News |date=April 16, 2020 |language=en}}</ref> Her family was moved into a Nazi ghetto in another town.<ref name="Bella"/><ref name="OralHistory1"/> In April 1944, her family was transported to Auschwitz and her parents were killed immediately in the gas chambers. Buchhalter lied to the German guards, saying that she was 18 years old, and was sent to Kraków, Poland, where she worked at a quarry.<ref name="OralHistory1"/> The Germans tattooed "A23029" on her left arm as her identification.<ref name="Siemaszko"/> After Kraków, she returned to Auschwitz.<ref name="Obit">{{cite web |title=Margit Feldman Obituary, Somerset, New Jersey |url=http://www.brucecvanarsdalefuneralhome.com/obituary/Margit-Feldman/Somerset-New-Jersey/1871756 |website=Bruce C. Van Arsdale Funeral Home |accessdate=April 18, 2020}}</ref>
Buchhalter was transported to a women's camp in Gruenberg, where she met Gerda Weissmann Klein. Buchhalter was in the death march from Gruenberg to Bergen-Belsen.<ref name="OralHistory1"/> On April 15, 1945, Bergen-Belsen was liberated.<ref name="Siemaszko"/> When liberated Buchhalter suffered from pleurisy and pneumonia, and had suffered injuries from the explosives set off by German soldiers in an attempt to destroy the camp.<ref name="Bella"/> Buchhalter was one of two family members to survive out of the 68 who were transported to concentration camps.<ref name="Schiavi"/> Buchhalter moved to Sweden, where she recovered.<ref name="Bella"/><ref name="OralHistory1"/> She emigrated to the United States in 1947, and moved to New York, where she lived with her aunt Harriet Boehm, and cousins.<ref name="Obit"/>
==Career==
Buchhalter became an X-ray technician.<ref name="Bella"/>
===Educator and activist=== Feldman did not speak publicly about her experience in the Holocaust for many years. In the 1970s, while living in Bound Brook with her own family, a boy from her neighborhood asked Feldman to speak to his elementary school class about her experience. She declined to speak to the group, but allowed the boy to record her talking about it. He played the tape to his class. The class was deeply affected by her story and the boy gave the feedback to Feldman, who realized the importance of sharing her experience.<ref name="GSBS">{{cite web |title=Holocaust Survivor Margit Buchhalter Feldman Addresses Upper School |url=https://www.gsbschool.org/news-detail?pk=927338 |website=Gill St. Bernard's School |accessdate=April 18, 2020 |language=en |date=April 24, 2017 |archive-date=April 18, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200418030830/https://www.gsbschool.org/news-detail?pk=927338 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
Feldman co-founded the Raritan Valley Community College Institute for Holocaust & Genocide Studies in 1981. She also co-founded the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education with then New Jersey state assemblyman Jim McGreevey in 1991. In 1994, she supported a bill mandating Holocaust and genocide curriculum in New Jersey schools.<ref name="Bella"/><ref name="Obit"/>
She served as president of the Jewish Federation of Somerset & Warren Counties and chair of the United Jewish Appeal and Israel Bonds Campaigns. She was also president of the Jewish Home for the Aged, vice president of Congregation Knesseth Israel and a member of Temple Sholom in Bridgewater, New Jersey.<ref name="Obit"/>
In 2003, she co-authored the autobiography ''Margit: A teenager's journey through the Holocaust and beyond''.<ref name="Siemaszko"/>
==Personal life==
In 1953, she married Harvey Feldman, who she met while hospitalized to recover from tuberculosis.<ref name="Obit" /> The couple lived in Bound Brook, New Jersey and had two children.<ref name="Siemaszko" />
Feldman, her family, and the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education created the Margit Feldman Teaching Award in 2014. The award is given to New Jersey teachers who demonstrate "outstanding" in-class education about the Holocaust, bias, prejudice, bullying, and bigotry.<ref>{{cite web |title=New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education – Margit Feldman Teaching Award |url=https://www.nj.gov/education/holocaust/awards/feldman.html |website=State of New Jersey}}</ref> In 2016, Peppy Margolis directed a documentary about Feldman, entitled ''Not A23029''. Michael Berenbaum narrated the short film.
=== Death === Feldman lived in Somerset, New Jersey, until her death on April 14, 2020, from COVID-19-related complications.<ref name="Siemaszko"/><ref name="Schiavi"/><ref name="Obit"/>
==Works== *with Bernard Weinstein. ''Margit: A teenager's journey through the Holocaust and beyond''. Scottsdale: Princeton Editorial Associates (2003).
==References== {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Feldman, Margit}} Category:1929 births Category:2020 deaths Category:20th-century American educators Category:20th-century American women educators Category:21st-century American Jews Category:21st-century American educators Category:21st-century American women educators Category:21st-century Hungarian Jews Category:Activists from New Jersey Category:American autobiographers Category:American people of Hungarian-Jewish descent Category:Auschwitz concentration camp survivors Category:Bergen-Belsen concentration camp survivors Category:Children in the Holocaust Category:Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in New Jersey Category:Hungarian Holocaust survivors Category:Hungarian Jews Category:Hungarian emigrants to the United States Category:Jewish American activists Category:Jewish concentration camp survivors Category:Jewish educators Category:Jewish women activists Category:Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp survivors Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States Category:People from Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén County Category:People from Bound Brook, New Jersey Category:People from Budapest Category:People from Franklin Township, Somerset County, New Jersey Category:Public orators