When a new south Spokane middle school was named in honor of Dutch resistance fighter and Spokane resident Carla Olman Peperzak in 2023, the school’s educators committed to continuing Carla’s work as a Holocaust educator. All three grades receive Holocaust education history each year — a unique opportunity for middle school students in Washington — with support from the Holocaust Center for Humanity (HCH) in Seattle.
Carla has been an educator with the HCH’s Speakers Bureau for more than 20 years. Last week, the school welcomed another HCH speaker, Ingrid Kanis Steppic, whose family was also active in protecting Jewish people in the Netherlands during World War II.
Ingrid began telling her family’s story in 2014 when her granddaughter asked her to visit her school.
“I grew up aware of it, but we didn’t talk about it much,” she said, noting that there wasn’t support or understanding for the trauma that survivors like her parents experienced like there is today. She later realized how important it was to share when she saw that newer generations didn’t know the history.
“Children need to realize that this can happen, that people can be manipulated to do this, that it can happen again,” Ingrid shared. “You’ve got to stop it before it starts. You have to stand up. The earlier you stand up, the better the chance to stop it.”
Ingrid, who lives in Seattle, became an HCH speaker about 10 years ago.
She was born in 1943; at that time, Germany had occupied the Netherlands since invading in May 1940. The Kanis family was not Jewish, but they were opposed to oppression of their Jewish neighbors.
Her father Jan worked for the post office and would see notices for families to report to the train station. He also started to see death notices for people who had been sent away.
“They all said they died of pneumonia on the same day,” Ingrid said, which her father knew was a lie. When he realized that Jewish people were being killed, he started telling people who received notices not to go. He and his wife Nel would hide Jewish families at their home before helping them find places to hide to the country. In total, they helped 40 Jewish hiders.
They also participated in other Dutch underground activities, like stealing food and ration stamps, creating fake documents, printing secret newspapers, and gathering information for Allied forces.
Her teenage sister Ali also got involved, riding her bike as a courier to carry messages for the Dutch underground because girls were less likely to be stopped than men.
Her father was arrested and sent to Dachau, a German concentration camp, in 1944, and her sister Ali was also arrested and sent to a women’s prison that same year. Even after her husband was sent away and during the “Hongerwinter” of 1944–45, where 22,000 Dutch people died of starvation, Nel continued to assist short-term hiders and managed to find food for four children.
Both Ali and Jan survived and saw Holland liberated on May 5, 1945, although Jan was severely ill with typhus when American soldiers liberated Dachau and didn’t return home until June.
Ingrid later married an American. On a visit to the states in 1969, she helped her father connect with the military unit that liberated Dachau. Her parents were honored as "Righteous Among the Nations,” a recognition from Israel for non-Jews who risked their own lives to save Jewish people during the Holocaust, in 1971.
“My father’s birthday was December 25, which is Christmas, and our hiders would always come visit us and we would celebrate Christmas the next day,” Ingrid said.
Student leaders at Peperzak were integral in preparing for the school-wide convocation with Ingrid. Members of Peperzak ASB and Spokane’s HCH Student Leadership Board (SLB) helped plan and organize the event with Peperzak ASB advisor Karen Krantz and SLB advisor and English Language Arts teacher Justin Farley.
Eighth graders Benny and Harper joined SLB for its inaugural year after hearing Carla speak and wanting to deepen their understanding.
“The injustices that peopled faced still have an impact on our country today,” Benny said.
Harper was grateful that Ingrid was able to visit to share her story with students. “I hope they’re empowered to make a difference and be more knowledgeable about history.”
Carla also attended Ingrid’s presentation and received brand new copies of a graphic novel based on her story written and illustrated by Kim Vandervert’s art students.
LEARN MORE