The Unknown Child Foundation, a new fund to be welcomed to the Community Foundation of Northwest Mississippi, has set its sights on DeSoto County to house a statue and remembrance park for the lost children of the Holocaust.
The foundation was established in 2009 through the Pennies Project, an effort put forth by three women who had a passion for raising student awareness of the Holocaust. This project consisted of local students collecting one and a half million pennies to represent the one and a half million children who were perished in the Holocaust. Students wrote letters to athletes, actors and politicians asking for donations and some even went door-to-door within their community. In three short years, the students obtained their goal and built relationships with the Jewish community.
The Unknown Child Foundation has commissioned Rick Wienecke from Israel to create the sculpture of the Unknown Child. Rick has other Holocaust sculptures in Auschwitz, Israel and soon in Poland. The one and a half million pennies collected by Pennies Project will surround the placement of the sculpture to represent the one and a half million children murder by the Nazis.
Tax-deductible donations to the Unknown Child Fund can be made at the Community Foundation of Northwest Mississippi.
Photo by Stan Carroll of the Commercial Appeal