Personal Narrative: My Trip To The Holocaust Museum

The last time I was at the Holocaust Museum, I was on a family road trip out to DC the summer before the fifth grade. I had just recently been taught about the atrocities of WWII and what the word Holocaust meant. I had read the diary of Anne Frank, as many fourth grade students are either required or choose to do. I had sat on my grandfather’s knee and listened to the vast stories of his childhood growing up during the war and scoured his bookshelves; flipping mindlessly through his numerous historical fiction novel and military autobiographies, thinking little of what the names and numbers on the pages meant. Once I visited the museum, the actuality and reality of the numbers hit fourth grade me like a tidal wave. I made it to the room filled

They were running through the museum, taking pictures, loudly laughing and talking through the various exhibits; blindly ignoring the key message strung across every inch of wall space not covered by information or pictures. That message, “Never Again,” was ironically typed on all the brochures the students had thrown on the ground outside as they exited. I saw banners, t-shirts, donation envelopes, and other merchandise with this logo in almost every square inch of the lobby as I entered. I think when I was younger, I had been so excited to learn more about Anne Frank and been briefed by my parents about what this museum was for, so I had kept my head down until we were in the steel elevators. This time, I looked defiantly around and began to critique and analyze every inch of the museum. This time the overwhelming sadness didn’t hit me until after my visit. This time, I really did begin to wonder, “Why is this museum here?” During my visit, with this question in mind, several exhibits stuck out to me specifically to address the guilt and responsibility felt by the American government for this crime against

I, however, feel there is an undercurrent of American exceptionalism throughout the museum, justifying and glorifying our participation within the war and liberation of the Holocaust. Though I believe the idea to be noble in its purest form, I believe the style and execution of information presented was hyper patriotic and didn’t focus enough on how to overcome and learn from the mistakes. The entire campaign of “Never Again” lacked depth and seemed purely monetarily focused. The discussion of why that is an issue could be an entire other essay, so I will leave my thoughts on throwing money at an issue as less than an ideal solution. The museum certainly has the room for creating discourse around the issue and the roots of the problems for visitors to begin to think of, but I believe it needs to create better means for facilitation and education on how to move on from this point. I’d be curious to see what Arendt would say about the museum, given the fact it is trying to address the “collective guilt” people feel in general over the Holocaust, even though that feel technically doesn’t exist. This trip certainly gave me things to mull over as well as a chance to revisit the experience I had from long ago and see how my perspectives on not only the museum, but ideas of guilt