This LGBTQ+ History Month, queer historians are highlighting stories of resilience long erased from Holocaust history. A new exhibit at the Illinois Holocaust Museum shines a light on queer victims and survivors—many of whom were women and nonbinary people, not just gay men. According to Leah Rauch, the museum’s education director, “I think oftentimes when people talk about this history, they usually focus on cis gay men…But there is a really exciting new, newish field of study, of scholars who are uncovering stories of people who were lesbians, bisexual, transgender and those really untold stories.”
One such story is that of Fritz Kitzing, a nonbinary person who survived the Sachsenhausen concentration camp after repeated arrests for gender expression and same-sex relationships. Founder Jake Newsome notes that history is full of queer and trans resistance. From Berlin’s once-thriving queer nightlife to those who survived against all odds, their stories remind us: LGBTQ+ people have always been their own heroes.
