world war 1939-1945

An easy to read book of stories and documents on the Nazi regime.

Tells Irena Sendler's story of saving 2,500 children during the Holocaust.

It's 1939 in Germany and for young Georg life is full of cream cakes, school, and loving parents. But all of that is about to change. Although Georg has been told he has the "perfect Aryan-shaped head", perhaps inherited from his German mother, his father, An English academic professor living in Germany, has Jewish ancestors. When a university graduation ceremony turns into a pro-Nazi demonstration and Jewish students, Georg's father,and others are killed, Georg is smuggled out of Germany to London in a suitcase, and then to Australia. He must forget that he is German, with Jewish ancestors, in order to survive.

Recalls the ill-fated voyage of the St. Louis and it's Jewish passengers as they were attempting to flee Nazi Germany and the author's own journey of remembrance and hope to honor his grandfather seventy years later.

In 1943, a group of brave Danish and Norwegian hunters carried out one of the more dramatic operations of World War II. Their mission was to patrol a section of the Greenland coast and to guard against any of the enemy coming ashore. It seemed an unlikely scenario, given the cruel climate. But one day a footprint was spotted on desolate Sabine Island, along with other enemy signs. Not expecting the find this trouble, Sledge Patrol members fled to the nearest hunting hut, only to be pursued by the Germans. In the dead of the Arctic night, the men escaped capture at the last instant and without their coats or sled dogs, walked fifty-six miles to get back to their base.

An account of one of the defining moments of twentieth-century history : the siege of Leningrad. It began in September of 1941 when Nazi German forces severed the last outside connection to the city. The siege lasted 872 days, during which the dying population suffered horrors beyond the power of description. The author interviewed dozens of survivors to create a deeply personal and universal story of survival in extreme circumstances.

Hanna Reitsch became the first female Luftwaffe test pilot. She was an ardent Nazi and prepared to die for the cause. She became Hitler's personal heroine. After her capture she complained bitterly about not being able to die with Hitler, but went on to have a celebrated flying career post-war. She died at the age of 67, creating a new mystery---did she kill herself using the cyanide pill Hilter had given her thirty years earlier?.

After her son's death in Israel, Regina Segal takes her granddaughter, Mica, to Warsaw, Poland, hoping to reclaim family property that was lost during World War II. But Regina has not told Mica everything and is hiding a secret about her past. Slowly Mica begins to wonder if everything her grandmother told her about the lost property is true or if the real reason they came has to do with something else. And in the meantime Mica's life is complicated by Tomasz, the tour guide who is showing her around Warsaw. A poignant tale of Jewish survival in World War II, presented with elegant simple line drawings that convey not only the story but emotion as well.

The Tuskegee Airmen are African American pilots who fought segregation and discrimination in order to serve their country during World War II.

Join Tom Brokaw as he journeys into the heart of America in search of ordinary citizens, military heroes, famous achievers and community leaders. Theirs are stories of families who fought their way to economic stability; women whose roles changed forever; citizens who learned to reconcile a national purpose with their individual needs.