67th National Reunion

Wednesday-Sunday July 31 - Aug 4, 2013

St. Louis, Missouri

Reunion Chairperson:  Mary Anne Delker 636-928-5391 mdelker@att.net

 

Museum Happenings

On March 1, 2013, the 12th Armored Division Memorial Museum sponsored a Holocaust Remembrance Ceremony at the Abilene Civic Center Auditorium.  The program started with the presentation of the colors by the combined Cooper High School and Abilene High School Air Force ROTC Color Guard.  The candle lighting ceremony was next followed by our speakers.  Max Glauben spoke about his experiences in surviving the Warsaw Ghetto and four German slave labor camps.  John Critzas, A/714 TBn told about his experiences as a gunner in a Sherman tank and the liberation of a concentration camp.  Kimhun Dam, a high school teacher in Abilene spoke about his experiences when his father led his family and the 200 people in their village from Cambodia through the jungle to Thailand to escape the genocide in Cambodia in 1975.  Venantie Uwishyaka then told us how she escaped with her daughters from the genocide in Rwanda.  The event was attended by about 500 people.

 

The museum staff and volunteers have been busy updating exhibits in the museum.  Those who visited the museum during the 66th Annual Reunion inAugust, 2012, saw the Herrlisheim Dioramas that bring that battle into a three dimensional plane.  Since the reunion, a "Dog House" like thos occupied by the Advance Party personnell at Auffay, France has been added to the lobby area of the museum.  Dan Joplin built a Bailey Bridge dioprama that is exhibited in the 119th Engineer exhibit.  We moved the POW exhibit to the basement next to the Herrlishiem dioramas.  Most of the 12th men who became POW's were captured at Herrlisheim so we thought the POW exhibit should be located there.  It has been expanded in scope and we have a "Hanover Brick Cleaner" exhibit there and the Red Cross Box donated by Merle Loomis is on display.  This gave us more room in the Concentration Camp exhibit to add a diorama depicting the living quarters of the prisoners at Hurlach IV concentration camp and gives us more room to conduct shool tours about the holocaust.

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12 Armored Division Association Web Site