This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. Spending time outdoors, then let's talk about skin cancer. Non-melanoma skin cancers, or NMSCs, including basal cell carcinoma and cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, are the most common cancers in the U.S. and can become harder to treat if left undetected.
That's why sun protection and timely detection matter. Our sponsor, Regeneron, is raising awareness about advanced NMSCs. Learn more and take the pledge to see a dermatologist annually at let's get real about skincancer.com. Saturday, August 22nd in Tampa. Witness an MMA Legends final fight.
Chris Cyborg, one of the greatest in history. She's an absolute pioneer in the sport. Defends her PFL world title. One last time. Unforgettable and got you marginal.
To an unforgettable career. Saturday, August 22nd, live from Benchmark International Arena. For tickets, visit pfl.info/slash tampa. Indeed Sponsored Jobs gets you quality candidates when you need them most. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes.
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This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Whether it's helped with hormone therapy, weight management, or sexual health. Every woman should have access to affordable prescription medication and personalized care that understands the whole woman. Join me, Dr. Doug Lucas, Clinical Lead of Hormone Optimization and Longevity at LifeMD.
along with other leading experts on the podcast. Here's something good on women's health and longevity. To learn more, go to lifeemd.com slash iHeart. Yeah. This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories.
When World War II broke out in Europe, between 88 and 94% of Americans opposed entering the war. We'd remembered what happened during World War I. and we were an ocean away from the conflict. What threat could Hitler possibly pose? Here to share another story of a member of the 6% who disagreed is Deborah Dwork, author of Saints and Liars.
Today, Deborah shares the story of a woman trapped in Japanese-occupied Singapore. named Laura Margolis. Let's get into it. Take it away, Deborah. Panic-stricken German and Austrian Jews clutched at hope and set sail for the open city of Shanghai, knowing that upon arrival they would face an utterly strange metropolis that promised nothing but the most destitute and temporary refuge from persecution.
There they were joined by some three thousand Polish and Lithuanian Jews, bringing the total refugee community to about twenty thousand. no one expected that they would remain. The sole solution lay in emigration elsewhere, and and the JDC leadership tapped Social worker Laura Margolis to expedite the process. If I'd been a man, I would have joined the Navy and seen the world. But since I am a woman, I joined the JDC, Laura reflected years later.
Her brief was clear. Arriving in Shanghai, however, she was appalled by what she found, and soon chafed against the constraints of her charge. First, the relief program. The Committee for the Assistance of European Jewish Refugees, called the CFA, the local organization responsible for providing aid, was run by a martinette, housed refugees in squalid group shelters, and offered only one meal, totaling 1,400 calories a day. The whole system needed to be overhauled.
With regard to emigration too, the Shanghai community came up short. Refugees pooled in the city, yet for reasons Laura could not fathom, No one had developed a channel to the U.S. Consulate to help them immigrate to the United States. Looking ahead, she saw a plan taking shape. International conditions allowing I feel satisfied that the main purpose for which I came to Shanghai will be attained.
She wrote the New York Office. Laura's hopes were soon dashed. Fearing that the Nazi regime might coerce Jewish refugees into spying. by threatening their families who had remained behind, the State Department instructed consuls to deny visas to applicants who had close relatives living in German-occupied countries. The so-called close relative clause brought Laura Margolis's efforts to naught.
Laura promptly pivoted from emigration to what had been her central concern since she arrived: relief. Neither she nor the J D C executive addressed Why her scope was confined to emigration. Looking at assignments in gender, however, points to a ceiling for her as a woman. Evidently the New York leadership was not prepared to empower a woman to take over the totally male realm of Shanghai relief. But equally clearly, Laura was not prepared.
to accept the limitations they imposed. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor wrought a seismic change. How was she to help the refugees trapped, as was she, in the city under Axis control. they faced the critically important immediate needs of food, housing, medical care that stretched into an uncertain future. The Japanese Perhaps to avoid disorder and unrest, I have Allowed enemy aliens to continue to live and work in Shanghai.
Still, while permitted to raise money using the JDC name, Laura did not have the funds in hand. At her suggestion the local Jewish leadership called upon Captain Kuroshike Inuitsuka. to apprise him of the refugee situation. But his only response was that he would have no dealings with any of these men. Who prior to Pearl Harbor had constantly defied him?
Captain Unsuka virtually threw the men out of his office. Responsibility for securing Inertsuka's interest in the refugee's predicament fell to Lara, but achieving that end Rested on a track record of amicable social encounters. And she drew on the goodwill of her relationship. with the Japanese official to engage his cooperation. My luck.
Was that having met Inutsuka on several occasions socially before the war? I was not guilty of snubbing him. Inatsuka lived in the penthouse of the Cathay Hotel, where Lara also had rooms. He invited her to tea. and she spoke frankly.
You and I now represent two nations fighting each other. But we have a job to do. Inotsuka had to maintain calm. He could not afford hunger riots. Laura undertook to prevent disturbances if he permitted her to borrow money legally on the JDC's guarantee of repayment after the war.
Inatsuka agreed on condition that she take over the entire administration of the refugee program. Laura aimed to reduce costs as well as raise loans. she learned from one Abraham Leewenspiel, a Polish Jew and engineer, that the CFA's kitchen boilers were highly inefficient. Of the sixty Chinese cents each meal cost, fifty cents went to coal consumption and ten cents to food. A new steam kitchen structure, pipes and fittings, with the capacity to feed ten thousand people at one sitting would cost a hundred thousand Chinese dollars.
but the technology depended on a type of boiler impossible to purchase in China. by chance. Victor Sassoon's Cafe Land Company had two such steam boilers, and Laura asked to borrow them. Her request was declined, possibly because Sassoon, a British citizen and thus an enemy national. no longer had the right to dispose of his property without permission from the Japanese authorities, and it was they whom Margolis approached next.
tapping her social network to do so. Leewenspiel was acquainted with one Karl Braun, whose good friend, a Mrs. Nogami, worked in the Gendarme Brie, the Japanese Army's military police. misses Nogami was able to obtain the requisite permit. with the boilers in her possession, Laura constructed a new much more economical kitchen.
contacts. and luck. yielded the facility needed. I sincerely believe that everything that could possibly have been done was done. In order to save as many of the refugee population as possible.
Laura reflected. The handicaps were numerous, and least of all these handicaps were the Japanese. Rather, the problem rested with the Jews. Especially the pre-Nazi era residents. We have in Shanghai a group of Jews who have no social consciousness.
And no feeling of responsibility towards the community. Shanghai itself is not a community. She was a social work professional, while the men charged with refugee relief did not qualify even as amateurs. Laura. despised them.
And a terrific job in the production, editing, and storytelling by our own Monty Montgomery and Reagan Habib. And a special thanks to Deborah Dwork. Her book, Saints and Liars. Go to Amazon, your local bookstore, or wherever you get your books to find out what these Americans did, many of them Christians, to save the lives of Jewish refugees all over the world. This one, remarkably, is about Laura Margallis and what she put on the line, what she did, the lengths she went to to create networks, figure out, and problem solve in ways many of the men couldn't.
These are all many Oscar Schindler stories, and they're American hero stories in the end. Laura Mergalis' story here on Our American Stories. Spending time outdoors, then let's talk about skin cancer. Non-melanoma skin cancers, or NMSCs, including basal cell carcinoma and cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, are the most common cancers in the U.S. and can become harder to treat if left undetected.
That's why sun protection and timely detection matter. Our sponsor, Regeneron, is raising awareness about advanced NMSCs. Learn more and take the pledge to see a dermatologist annually at let's getreal about skincancer.com. Saturday, August 22nd in Tampa, witness an MMA Legends final fight. Chris Cyborg, one of the greatest in history.
She's an absolute pioneer. Defends her PFL world title. One last time. Unforgettable and got you! To an unforgettable career Saturday, August 22nd, live from Benchmark International Arena.
For tickets, visit pfl.info/slash tampa. Upgrade to Elite Checking from America's Christian Credit Union and earn up to 4% APY, plus everyday perks and access to your paycheck up to two days early with early pay. Don't settle. Choose checking that rewards you and aligns with your values. Visit America's ChristianCU.com forward slash iHeart.
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