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Anne Frank
On June 12th, 1929, a baby was born to Otto and Edith Frank. This child, a girl named Anne, would eventually become one of the most well known children of the 20th century. During the 1940s, many Jewish people, and others in Europe were forced to go i
nto hiding because of Hitler. The Franks were just one of these families. They, and another family lived secretly in an office attic for nearly two years. Over these years Anne kept a diary that she called "kitty". In this diary she confessed her deepest
secrets, and wrote to it as she would a close friend. Her diary depicts a story of war, family, and a young girl's painful transition into maturity.
For her 13th birthday, Anne Frank recieved a red, plaid covered diary. This was shortly before the family went into hiding. Two days after, she started writing in it. Anne writes about her birthday, school, friends, and a boy named Hello. But soon, l
ess then a month after getting her diary, the entries take a different turn. She tells the frightning story of how her 15 year old sister, Margot, recieves a call-up notice to report to a concentration camp. The next day her family goes into hiding.
The Secret Annexe from the back.
For a while, everything was as normal as life in hiding could be. But soon the ocupants of the Secret Annexe began to quarrel. Anne describes the petty fights in a September 28, 1942 entry:
Why do grownups quarrel so easily, so much, and over the most idiotic things? Up till now I thought that only children squabbled and that that wore off as you qrew up. Or course, there is sometimes a real reason for a quarrel, but this is just plai
n bickering.
Soon, only a few months after they had gone into hiding, the Franks and the Van Pels decided to invite another person to live with them. Together, they chose Fritz Pfeffer, a family friend. After he moved in, Margot moved into her parents room, and F
ritz Pfeffer shared Anne's.
For the next year or so, the eight people (Anne, her two parents, her sister Margot, the three Van Pels and Fritz Pfeffer) lived in the Secret Annexe. During that time there were burgulars, air raids and many other hardships. The eight had to live on
food for four, the people who bought them food were only able to buy four illegal ration books. Their food was usually moldy or rotten. Anne often complaind about how everyone seems to be taking out their problems on her. But on Augast 4, 1944, everything
changed. They had been betrayed. The German police raided the Secret Annexe, and arrested them all. All eight of the occupants were taken to concintration camps.
Seven of the eight people who had lived in the Secret Annexe died in German camps. Only Otto Frank survived. Anne died only two months before the liberation of Holland. After the war, Otto Frank published Anne's diary. Margot had also kept a diary, bu
t it had been lost. Anne Frank has become an example of what war does to
a person. Her diary has been translated into over 20 different
languagues. The only member of the Frank family to survive life in the
concentration camps, Otto Frank, died in 1980.
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