The American Heritage Museum has partnered with Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center to show an extraordinary virtual reality experience they created about Auschwitz-Birkenau survivor Fritzie Fritzshall called A Promise Kept.

In 1944, during the Second World War, thirteen-year-old Fritzie Fritzshall, her mother, and her two younger brothers were arrested at gunpoint and deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau killing center. Separated from her mother and brothers during selection, never to see them again, Fritzie survived for months inside one of the Nazi’s most notorious camps. Working as a slave laborer in a nearby factory, Fritzie was imprisoned with 599 other women.  Each night the women would share with Fritzie a precious crumb of their bread in the hope that the youngest among them might survive to tell the world what had happened to them. In turn, Fritzie promised that if she survived, she would tell their story.

Filmed on location in Poland and Ukraine, A Promise Kept, combines storytelling, immersive cinematography, animation, photogrammetry and 360 sound, as viewers stand with Fritzie as she journeys back to the grounds of her grandparent’s home, to the arrival ramp, crematorium, barracks, and latrines of Auschwitz-Birkenau. From her darkest memories to the sparks of humanity that allowed her and others to survive, it is a story that will captivate, move, and inspire you, ensuring Fritzie’ s promise is kept for generations to come.

A Promise Kept VR experience can be watched by scheduling in advance or on availability during open hours. We can take up to 12 people per fifteen minute showing. To schedule an appointment call (978) 562-9182.