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| Dr. Lotta Hitschmanova, founder and Executive Director of the Unitarian Service Committee of Canada. |
The
refugee crisis—actually make that multiple crises—that is engulfing the Middle East, Levant, and
Europe and feeding xenophobic panic
in disappointing numbers of Americans is a good time to look back
at a better response and to the dedicated work of a true hero.
If
you live this side of the border to
the Land of the Great White Grandmother,
chances are that you never heard of Lotta Hitschmanova. But
you should learn about her. She was awesome.
Canadians
of a certain age will remember her for her once ubiquitous
annual fund raising appeals on radio and television and in
smartly produced short films for the Unitarian Service Committee of
Canada (USCC)which she served as Executive Director for many years.
Her story begins in Prague when the Czech city
was still a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on November 28,
1909. Her birth name was Lotte Hitschmann. Her father was a
prosperous malt merchant and the secularized Jewish family lived in modest
wealth and comfort.
She
was a gifted student who excelled at
the progressive and co-educational Stephans Gymnasium. She studied philosophy and mastered several European languages at the University
of Prague and then went on to study political
science and journalism at the Sorbonne in hopes of entering a career in international diplomacy.
In
1935 Lotte returned to Prague where she completed her Ph.D. studies and launched a successful career as a free lance journalist often
contributing material to Czechoslovakian,
Rumanian and Yugoslavian newspapers. As
the menace of Hitler and Nazism rose she became noted for her outspoken anti-fascist beliefs and articles. By 1938 she changed her name to the Slavic Lotta Hitschmanova as a protest to German hegemonic ambitions.
When Germany annexed the Sudetenland
Hitschmanova learned that she was on a list of hostile journalists
to be detained. She was forced to
flee her homeland leaving her parents and a younger sister behind.
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| After being taken to an Unitarian Service Committee clinic in Marseilles, Hitschmanova went to work for the agency as a translator. The USC was a rare beacon of hope for desperate refugees from all over Europe. Here the agency distributes relief bundles. |
She first fled to back to Paris and from there she
went to Brussels, Belgium, where she resumed her journalistic
career. But the war kept catching up
with her and for the next few years she alternated between a variety of
journalism and humanitarian jobs while often finding herself a stateless
refugee. By late 1941 she was in Marseilles
in
Vichy France where she worked as a secretary at charity for refugees. It paid
next to nothing and the tiny woman fainted
on the streets of starvation
after which she was taken to a clinic run
by Unitarian Service Committee.
It
was a fortuitous match. Soon she was volunteering her services with
the USC as a translator and then as a liaison
officer with the Czech relief agency, Centre
d'Aide Tsechoslovaque. Her work was
valued by the USC, but officials recognized that she was still in danger. In 1942 they arranged her escape from Europe via Lisbon on a converted freighter crammed with other refugees and headed to New York.
Like
many Jewish refugees even with the help of the USC, Hitschmanova could not gain permanent refuge in the U.S. After stopping in Boston to deliver
highly sensitive documents detailing the dangerous work of the USC in
Europe, she went to Canada, which offered her asylum.
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| Hitschmanova with Korean orphans on one of her annual world-girdling inspection tours of USCC humanitarian aid projects. The organization expanded beyond Europe to include projects like this in Korea and others in India, Africa, and serving Palestinian refugees. |
She
later recalled “exhausted, with a feeling of absolute solitude in an entirely
strange country...I came with $60 in my pocket. I had an unpronounceable name.
I weighed less than 100 lbs, and I was completely lost.” Yet relentlessly
resourceful, within two days she found employment as a secretary and three months later was in Ottawa where she worked as a Department
of War Services postal censor. She read the letters of German Prisoners of War and scoured them for
useful military intelligence.
Still
deeply impressed by the selfless work of the USC, Hitschmanova joined the Unitarian Church of Ottawa. She also continued her work for refugees
with the Czechoslovakian National
Alliance and by raising money for Czech
War Services in London. She regularly contributed articles to the
Canadian press and made speeches on behalf of her causes. Toward the end of the war she went to work
for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.
All during the war she never gave up a desperate
search for her parents and sister Lilly. She learned that for a while her parents were
held at Terezin, a model concentration camp used as a showplace
for the Red Cross and international
diplomats. Then she got the devastating
news that they had been taken from that relative comfort and safety and had
died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.
Eventually she located her sister living in Palestine with her husband.
Both eventually joined her in Canada.
With
no family to return to, Hitschmanova
decided to remain in Canada. She turned
down several excellent job offers.
Instead, she determined to serve the uprooted refugees still in
Europe. In July 1945, she helped
to organize the Canadian branch of the Unitarian Service Committee, which was
affiliated with both American Unitarian
Association and the Unitarian Church
in Canada. Senator Cairine Wilson, a
liberal icon in Canada, was named
the Honorary Chairwoman, but as Executive Director, Hitschmanova ran the show with systematic energy
and efficiency.
At first registered under the War Charities Act the Canadian committee was
restricted to fund raising only through Unitarian congregations and to
individual Unitarians. When the law
changed in February 1946 Hitschmanova
energetically began her public appeals citing the great need. At first funds were directed to
Czechoslovakia and France.
That spring she made her first annual tour to
inspect the work in the field. She
adopted a military style uniform modeled after that worn by American WACs. She found the outfits useful in
gaining admission to even restricted areas. Besides they were comfortable and made
packing for her extended trips easy.
She wore the uniforms at home and abroad for the rest of her life. They became her trademark as she rose
as a public figure in Canada.
Despite her affection for the Boston based
USC, it didn’t take long for her to come into conflict with its leadership. They insisted that all field operations
be headed by an American. She felt that those
on the ground and familiar with the situation knew best. She preferred to empower local partner
organizations and their leadership by providing them with
needed funds and perhaps technical support. Her secondary goal was to make those
partner organizations self-sustaining and independent as quickly
as possible. “There are three
basic principles in the field of the art of giving aid. To come as an
open-minded friend and good listener, when offering help; to say goodbye to a
project when it can continue on its own; to serve with a personal touch,
because a relationship of confidence must lift your aid beyond the realm of a
simple business proposition and prove that you really care.”
To
accommodate that philosophy in 1948 she re-organized
the Canadian Committee completely independent of not only the Boston based USC,
but of the Canadian churches as well.
Despite its independent status, the USC Canada continued to draw support
and volunteers from Unitarian congregations and most proudly considered it “ours.”
In
the first full year of operations in 1946, Hitschmanova set a pattern which she would repeat yearly—three
months of intense fund-raising in Canada, four months overseas to supervise
programs and investigate possible new partners, and months at home reporting on
her findings and producing an annual film about the Committee’s
achievements. That first year she raised
$40,000 and collected 30,000 kg of clothing for distribution in the
refugee camps.
She
particularly homed in on the needs of
children, making a project to supply prosthetic
limbs to maimed victims a high priority and establishing one of
the first adopt-a-child sponsorship programs that became a model for many others.
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| Hitschmanova is so highly esteemed in Canada that she adorned the $100 bill. She is the only Unitarian enshrined on a nation's currency and one of a relative handful of women who were not heads of state or government given such an honor. |
She found herself showered with honors. According to a biographical sketch in the Dictionary
of Unitarian and Universalist Biography by Joyce Thierry:
Dr. Hitschmanova
received numerous awards, including the 1975 Woman of the Year for India by Prime
Minister Indira Gandhi. By this time, grateful governments around the world
had acknowledged her work in their countries in a variety of ways: the Chevalier of Public Health from the Government of France and the Gold Medal from the Red Cross of France, 1950; the Medal of St. Paul from Greece, 1952; Public Service Medal from the Government
of South Korea, 1962; Athena
Mesolora Gold Medal from the Government
of Greece, 1967; Officer of the
Order of Canada, 1972; the Royal
Bank of Canada Award, 1979; and Companion
of the Order of Canada, 1980. In 1983, she received Officer of Meritorious Order of Mohlomi, Lesotho, and was only the third person to be given the Rotary Award for World Understanding.
She refused to accept honorary
doctorates from universities,
saying she had worked hard enough in Paris and Prague to earn her own
doctorate.
In
1982 after 37 years at the helm, ill
health finally forced Hitschmanova to retire. Sadly in her remaining years she suffered
increasingly from Alzheimer’s
Disorder. She died of cancer on August 1, 1990 at the age of
79. She was widely mourned across Canada and by the hundreds of thousands whose
lives she touched around the world. Her memorial service was held at her
beloved Ottawa Unitarian Church.
In
perhaps an even more profound tribute
to her vision the modern Unitarian
Universalist Service Committee, heir to the old Boston based organization,
now follows Hitschmanova’s model of partnering and nurturing organizations on
the ground.
