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January 29, 2006

Couple's daring rescues started a movement

Today's Providence Journal A-1 centerpiece is a story for cynical times.

Martha and Waitstill Sharp were New England Yankees who risked their own lives to save hundreds, perhaps thousands of artists, intellectuals, liberals, Jews and children from the Nazis in 1939 and 1940. Think Schindler's List with Providence-born Martha distracting customs officials.

In June they will be only the second and third Americans honored by Israel as "Righteous Among the Nations" in the holocaust memorial park at Yad Vashem, Jerusalem.

This is our Flash slideshow about the Sharps, narrated by Journal columnist Mark Patinkin and created by projo.com multimedia designer Kathy DeVault. The html portion -- Mark's full story, a guestbook for the Sharps and links to more info about them -- is here, probably requiring Belo registration. Frank Carnevale and Tom Heslin also helped shaped the final package; Mike Foran, Beth Heaney and Donna McGarry had a hand in it, and Andrea Panciera cleared my path. (Disclosure: I produced this, but the Sharps' story is what's compelling and why I blog it.)

The Sharps' work founded the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, which even today tries to prevent genocide in places like Darfur. Richard C. Campbell of UUSC shared with us historical photos and news clippings from the group's archives.

(Update: UUSC has a blog: Hotwire, "a human rights weblog.")

Every once in a while in life, if you're lucky, you get to be part of something unambiguously good.

Posted by Sheila Lennon at 3:31 PM | Permalink

Comments

Dear Rhode Islanders:

Many thanks to the Providence Sunday Journal and its writers for an outstanding article about the Reverend Waitstill and Martha Sharp. Not only did you capture the recorded history of their bravery and humility but you've also provided a public service by informing your readers how ordinary people, in terribly times, can accomplish extraordinary deeds.

In addition to rescuing an estimated 2,000 people and founding the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, the Sharps have left a great legacy that includes their beloved children, Hastings and Martha, their grandchildren Artemis III, Jane and Michael Joukowsky and numerous great-grand children.

As a former Rhode Islander, I take great pride in Martha Sharp's connection to RI. After leaving Rhode Island in 1986 to work with Vietnam Veterans in Washington, DC, I have finally returned to New England to work with the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. As an international human rights organization, we continue to build on the important legacy left by the Sharps.

After reading this splendid article and watching genocide unfold in Darfur, I believe, if Martha and Waitstill Sharp were alive they would ask the question, who among us are the "Righteous Among Nations" today?

I truly hope one or more of them read yesterday's Providence Sunday Journal.

Again, thank you.

Wayne F. Smith
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee
130 Prospect Street
Cambridge, MA 02139

(617) 868-6600

Posted by: Wayne F. Smith on January 30, 2006 12:23 PM