http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wamc/local-wamc-556420.mp3
Albany, NY – When Daniel Mendelsohn would walk into a room, his older Jewish relatives would invariably pinch his cheeks and exclaim in think Yiddish accents, "He looks so much like Shmiel." Smiel was his grandfather's brother who was murdered, along with his wife and four daughters in Poland during World War II. But that was all the family he knew.
As he got older, Mendelsohn, who is a Professor at Bard College, decided he needed to know this missing family, who were only alive to him in old, faded photographs, and through the stories told by his grandfather.
The search for these six Jews took him around the world, and can be followed in a stunning new book called, "The Lost:" The Search for Six of Six Million." In the first of her 2 part interview, Susan asks Daniel Mendelsohn how his quest got started.