By Amy Harris

Martha Salcudean, a survivor of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, was the first woman to head the department of engineering at UBC (Vancouver Sun). Generously, Salcudean has shared her story both through her memoir, In Search of Light, and a three-hour testimony given to the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre. The documentation of her life starts out with her parents, and their decision to have a baby in the political climate in 1934, and ends with her in the 21st century, reflecting on her past and her survivorship. Throughout her detailed life story, the theme on persistence through adverse events and determination shines through. This paper will identify the moments in Salcudean’s life where she applied her resilience to overcome hardship, whether it be the missing father figure in her childhood, antisemitism and the Holocaust, or her emigration out of Romania. It was these adversities that she faced in her earlier years that taught her both resilience and what it means to take on a leadership position from an early age, which prepared her for her later career, as she became a pioneer in the engineering field for women.

Salcudean took on a strong female leadership role early on in life, as her father was absent for a majority of her childhood. Living in Transylvania during the rise of antisemitism, Salcudean was exposed to marginalization that allowed her to mature and experience resilience.  Her father was forced to go away to do hard labor for long stretches because he was Jewish, which surrounded Salcudean with women taking on leadership positions. She praises her mother for her dedication to both parenting and working, and also speaks highly of her grandmother, who she writes brought up seven children in poverty while at the same time dealing with the loss of her husband (Salcudean 55). On page 54 of her memoir she writes, “my parents were still working as doctors – I say my parents, but it was more my mother because my dad, although he was fortunate to be able to still work in his profession, was away from home a lot, sent to do forced labour for long periods of time.” Her mother took on the brunt of parenting, but because she was still working as a doctor and she was away for most the day, Salcudean was left responsible for her and her sister Eta (Salcudean 54). Even though she was just a child, she took on the role of caring for the family, stepping into the leadership position. Her father died when she was seventeen years old (Salcudean 185), leaving her to mature quickly due to the absence of a father figure in her life. Salcudean’s leadership within her family has translated to her professional life, where she was often the only woman within her group of colleagues. Then later as she became the first woman to head the department of mechanical engineering at UBC, she could apply her past of leadership and resilience to not only successfully lead the department, but also become a trailblazer for women entering STEM related fields.

Greene and Graham discuss this application of resilience in their article, Role of Resilience Among Nazi Holocaust Survivors. They argue that the taking on of routine and learned abilities is a form of survivorship to cope with traumatic events (S76). They write, “during and after such critical events, individuals, families, and communities use both their innate and learned abilities to engage in actions that allow them to respond to the adverse event, deal with feelings of distress, and then begin to heal” (S75-S76). Using this argument, following her mother in her footsteps by pursuing her education became a coping mechanism for Salcudean after the war. As a child she watched her mother become a successful physician while battling sexism and antisemitism and saw this as the leading example. Salcudean’s response to survivalism was to imitate what she was familiar with, which in this case was taking on the determination she praised her mother and grandmother for, persisting through adversity to continue her education and eventually attain a leadership position within the engineering field.

Before deportation, Salcudean was confronted by the increasing Antisemitism of Transylvania. Learning to adapt from this type of discrimination also served as resilience; as Salcudean began to understand the feeling of not belonging, she could work to identify and overcome this post-Holocaust in her career. As she began school in Hungary she writes, “I understood that we were different, that we were considered aliens – more correctly enemy aliens – and that there was a different set of rules for us” (56). Here, Salcudean applies another trait of resilience: refusing to feel shame. She continued to excel at school, and even though her family was made to wear the Yellow Star, instead of the public shame the Nazis had intended, her family was determined to remain proud to be Jewish (Salcudean 59). Additionally, in her testimony she explains that when her father introduced himself to people, he would always include that he was Jewish. He did this up until the end of the war, because he wanted to show people that he was never ashamed of his Jewishness (Hour 1 33:02). Both Salcudean and her family’s refusal to feel ashamed contributed towards her deterministic personality, which would be vital later in her life, both in surviving the Holocaust and her struggle with emigrating out of Romania.  The refusal to be ashamed, her determinism, and dedication to her education all contribute to the theme of resilience in Salcudean’s life, all of which she could apply to her later years, as she pioneered the engineering field for women.

To fully comprehend the extent to which Salcudean persisted through hardship throughout her life, we must examine her survival of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Bergen-Belsen was notorious for its overcrowding, high rates of disease, and the extremely limited amount of food (USHMM). The concentration camp began as a POW camp for French and British soldiers in 1940 but was converted to a concentration camp in 1943 (Jewish Virtual Library). Before 1944, the conditions at Bergen-Belsen were considered good compared to the other camps, because there were no gas chambers and most prisoners were not forced to do labour (Jewish Virtual Library). However, in 1944 Bergen-Belsen received an influx of prisoners, and conditions rapidly decreased (USHMM). As described in the film Belsen: Our Story, “by April 1945, Belsen’s population had soared to over 44,000. Its infrastructure was at its breaking point. SS guards stopped bringing food to the camp, inflicting mass starvation. And when Allied bombs destroyed Belsen’s water pump, the guards made no effort to collect water for inmates from a nearby creek” (40:10). A Hungarian Holocaust survivor, Alice Lok Cahana, describes Bergen-Belsen as “hell on Earth. Nothing ever in literature could compare to anything to what Bergen-Belsen was” (Cahana 00:07). Considering the death rates, extreme starvation, and disease within the camps, one can only imagine the mental strength of the survivors, their trauma, and their will to continue to live even after liberation.

In her memoir, Salcudean’s description of her time in Bergen-Belsen mainly focuses on the lack of food. She writes, “we received very little food…. After a short time, less than a week, we came to realize how incredibly difficult it was to be hungry. After a few days, one stops being able to think of anything else but food” (70). She details the symptoms of starvation, giving the audience somewhat of an understanding of the concept of extreme hunger. However, considering that her general audience has not faced starvation, it is hard for us to fully comprehend the feeling. Salcudean’s description of how the prisoners couldn’t think of anything else besides food aids the reader in grasping the different aspects of torture in the camps, whether it be from physical harm to lack of basic necessities such as food and water. Charlotte Delbo, a survivor of Auschwitz (Lachman), attempts to do this as well in her chapter Thirst, where she describes what it felt like to be on the brink of death from lack of water. Her imagery and detail help the reader gain a better comprehension of what it must be like to be as thirsty as she was; her descriptions break down the definition of thirst for someone who did not experience the camps. Delbo writes, “only the thought of water kept me alert. I was looking for it everywhere. The sight of a puddle, of a slightly liquid mud flow, made me lose my self-control, and my friends held me back since I wanted to throw myself, face down, upon this puddle or this mud” (143). To see how thirst can have such an affect not only physically but also mentally speaks to the extremities of torture prisoners had to endure. Like Salcudean, Delbo successfully coveys the pain and mental degradation of being deprived of such basic necessities. Their accounts help the reader better understand the multiple layers of torture that took place in the camps. With a better knowledge of her pain and hunger, we can understand the sheer determination Salcudean had to survive.

Salcudean’s dedication to her education post war also connects to Greene and Graham’s argument, because going to school established some sense of a return to normalcy for Salcudean. They describe that a trait of responding to an adverse advent is “finding some sense of safety in recognized routines… and reestablishing a sense of control or selfmastery, or the sense that there are choices to be made, no matter how small” (S76). This is exactly what Salcudean sets out to do, as immediately after her liberation, her mother finds a place for her and Eta at a Swiss school (Salcudean 80). The school brought routine back in to Salcudean’s life, and she was able to dedicate herself towards her learning. She writes, “…the message I got from my parents was that everything you achieve in your life is through study and education” (Salcudean 80). She details how there was never any doubt from her parents that she would work hard towards achieving a higher education. In her 1996 testimony she says, “it was very much a given, that I would go to University and study” (Hour 1 17:31). Not only was it a familial value, but education served as a coping mechanism for Salcudean, as she could work towards achieving “selfmastery” in school. After surviving the Holocaust, where she was dehumanized and imprisoned, Salcudean could now finally take control of her life in the form of working hard to educate herself. Going to school served as freedom, a way for her to make choices for herself, something she had been deprived of during Nazi rule.

Once Salcudean and her family were liberated from Bergen-Belsen and were transported to Switzerland, they decided to go back to Romania (Salcudean 88). Her father was unable to work in Switzerland, and he wanted to go back to see who of their family and friends had survived (Salcudean Testimony 38:20). Unfortunately, the impact this move had on their lives was not an improvement from Switzerland, and Salcudean explains that she still faced antisemitism at her new Romanian school because her classmates saw her as an alien. She explains that because of the war, they hadn’t seen a Jewish student in years (Salcudean 92). After surviving the atrocities of the war, to come back and still experience antisemitism in the public sphere speaks to Martha’s mental resilience. Even when she became isolated at school, she continued to receive high grades in school (100), demonstrating the comfort she felt with continuing to learn, and her value in education. Then, in 1951 her father suddenly died from a heart attack (97), and this initiated Salcudean’s path into engineering and later her struggle trying to emigrate out of Romania.

With the Communist regime becoming more politically oppressive, Salcudean writes that she was in “continuous danger of being expelled from the university on the grounds of our social origins” (102). Nonetheless, she continued on with her studies and persisted through the antisemitism and political oppression to first marry her husband George in 1955, and then graduate with a mechanical engineering degree with distinction in 1956 (105). This is yet another demonstration of Salcudean’s sheer determination, as she continued to devote herself to her studies while she still faced antisemitism. She also explains that it was a challenge to be admitted to the University, not because of her intelligence, but because her mother and father were doctors, and the Communist regime favored admission to workers and peasants (101). Her dedication to educating herself paid off, as now she was able to work towards perusing her passion of engineering, and she gained admission into a University that required her to receive over 90 percent on the entrance exam (101).

Shifting forward, Salcudean began to try to emigrate in the 1960s. She now had a son, Tim, and wanted to find a better life for her and her family after witnessing the economic destruction of communism. On page 129 of her memoir she writes, “…my main reason for wanting to leave was related to the lack of freedom and to my realization that economically the whole regime was going to end in a disaster.” This relates back to Greene and Graham’s argument of coping mechanisms, and how taking control of one’s life and reestablishing freedom provides some aspect of safety after surviving an adverse event (S76). Salcudean could identify how communism was slowly taking away the freedoms of the citizens as well as corrupting the economy. As before, where she dominated in her education, she wanted to retain that sense of control she felt, as this was a coping mechanism for the past dehumanization she endured during the Holocaust. She recognized that like the Nazi regime, the Communist regime was slowly taking away her freedoms, which sparked her determinism to flee, and after many setbacks, she and her family were able to leave and seek refuge in the West (Salcudean 140).

Finally, analyzing Salcudean’s life after emigration, we can observe her application of her past resilience and determination to her new life in Canada, as her career in engineering began to take off. She found again a way to find control in her life through her search for work. She writes, “I remember the feeling of security, the feeling of self-worth that is associated with finding jobs” (147). The self-worth she describes is a product of her dedication to her education, a proof of her “self-mastery” in her field. It was also validation of her immigration, as it provided her family with a future in Canada. She was first hired as an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa, writing “I was the first female faculty member hired in the department. Perhaps a few of my colleagues resented my being hired to replace some of their former colleagues who denied tenure. However, most of my colleagues were nice and supportive and made my first year much easier” (150). Her conquest over adversity in her early life became an application towards her career, as she constantly was the only women in her group of colleagues. Through her dedication, her success in engineering was apparent, which allowed for her to trailblaze the field for women. While she says that some might have resented her success, she made it clear in her memoir that she never felt any type of discrimination from her colleagues (155). In 1984 Salcudean accepted the position of department head of mechanical engineering at UBC, and she successfully ran the department as the first women to do so. She writes, “I have nothing but the best to say for the department I was fortunate to lead” (166). Her career culminated to this point, where she was able to become a trailblazer, and not only teach, but inspire women to go into STEM related fields. The hardship she faced in her past taught her the tools of resilience and determination, both of which she applied towards her career, allowing her to become a pioneer.

Salcudean’s devotion to her education and her strength to take control of her life allowed for her success both before and after the war in her work towards becoming an engineer. Salcudean’s story is valuable to preserving the experience of women Holocaust survivors, and their ability to overcome adversities later post war. In discussing the value of gender and memory, Baer and Goldenberg examine the importance of memoirs written by women survivors, writing “they are less representations of reality than they are representations which create reality, a reality that makes life after the Shoah feasible… despite the wounds and losses… (128). Salcudean’s preservation of her life story serves as an inspiration, as she was able to consistently persevere no matter the adversity. She is the prime example of what Baer and Goldenberg argue is the importance of women testimonies: she proves that life after the Holocaust was worth living. Despite the torture and dehumanization she faced, she created a new life for herself; illustrating the possibility to persist through hardship to continue to live. Her patterns of taking control and stepping into leadership roles demonstrates the power of dedicating oneself to their passion, and in Salcudean’s case, this led her to become a pioneer in the engineering field for women.

Works Cited

Baer, Elizabeth, and Myrna Goldenberg. Part III: Gender and Memory: The Uses of Memoirs. “Experience and Expression: Women, the Nazis, and the Holocaust, Elizabeth R. Baer and Myrna Goldenberg, Eds. (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2003), 368 Pp., Holocaust and Genocide Studies, vol. 19, no. 3, 2005, pp. 520–522., doi:10.1093/hgs/dci044. 

“Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp: History & Overview.” History & Overview of Bergen-Belsen, www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/history-and-overview-of-bergen-belsen. 

“Belsen: Our Story.” BBC Two, 2020, www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dtbt. 

Cahana, Alice Lok. “Alice Lok Cahana Describes Arrival at Bergen-Belsen”.United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/oral-history/alice-lok-cahana-describes-arrival-at-bergen-belsen?parent=en%2F4549. 

Delbo, Charlotte. “Thirst.” Auschwitz and After, Yale Univ. Press, 2014, pp. 142–145. 

Greene, Roberta R., and Sandra A. Graham. “Role of Resilience Among Nazi Holocaust Survivors.” Family & Community Health, vol. 32, no. 1, 2009, doi:10.1097/01.fch.0000342842.51348.83. 

Lachman, Translated by Kathryn M., et al. “Charlotte Delbo.” University of Massachusetts Press, 29 July 2020, www.umasspress.com/9781625345783/charlotte-delbo/. 

“Martha Eva Salcudean.” Vancouver Sun, Remembering.ca, 19 July 2019, vancouversunandprovince.remembering.ca/obituary/martha-salcudean-1075803831. 

“Martha S. Holocaust Testimony 1996.” Performance by Martha Salcudean, Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, 2 Apr. 1996.

Salcudean, Martha. In Search of Light. The Azrieli Foundation, 2019.