Curt Lowens  

Curt Lowens (born November 17, 1925 - May 8, 2017) was an actor who appeared on stage and in movies and television shows. He was also a Holocaust survivor and rescuer who saved about 150 Jewish children during the war. Curt Lowens was born as Curt Löwenstein in Allenstein (now Olsztyn, Poland), where his father was a lawyer and his mother was active with local Jewish community organizations. The family moved to Berlin hoping that its large Jewish population could provide more protection. However, after the Nazis took over Germany, they faced persecution, and young Curt continued preparing for his bar mitzvah under Rabbi Manfred Swarsensky of the Fasanenstrasse Synagogue. In 1938, the Nazis closed his school, and he received his bar mitzvah in a school auditorium with other youths. His older brother Heinz successfully emigrated to Britain before World War II started. Curt and his parents planned to emigrate to the United States via the neutral Netherlands in early 1940 but were caught by the Germans when they invaded the country on the intended day of departure. During the first two years of the German occupation, his father worked at a desk job for the Jewish Council in Amsterdam, which saved their family from deportation to Auschwitz. However, Curt and his mother were still rounded up and sent to Westerbork in 1943. They were released through his father's connections and went into hiding separately. While in hiding, Curt became active in a network of Dutch rescuers who saved about 150 Jewish children from the war. He also helped two downed American Army Air Corps flyers and received a commendation for it. After liberation, he joined the British Eighth Corps as an interpreter and later immigrated to the United States with his father and step-mother in 1947. There, he trained to become an actor at the Herbert Berghof Studio in New York and had an active career until his last days, appearing in over 100 films and TV shows since 1960.