Former president of the Rotary Club of Maidenhead, Sir Nicholas Winton, is to become the first inductee into the Rotarian Peace Hall of Fame at the Illinois Holocaust Museum in the USA. Sir Nicholas is best known for saving hundreds of Jewish children from the holocaust on the eve of the Second World War by transporting them to Britain by train.
Sir Nicholas is unable to attend the ceremony himself, but two of the 669 children whom he saved will be representing him at the ceremony on September 26. There will also be a screening of the acclaimed documentary, Nicky’s Family, followed by the unveiling of a plaque.
Sir Nicholas, who is often compared to Oskar Schindler and Raoul Wallenberg, has rarely spoken about the work he did to organise the trains for the children and his good deeds went undiscovered for half a century until his wife, Greta, found some papers and photographs in 1988.
In 2009, on the 70th anniversary of the rescue trains, a statue of Sir Nicholas was unveiled at Prague’s main railway station and in 2010 a statue was unveiled at Maidenhead railway station to commemorate his remarkable achievements.
Sir Nicholas, who is now 104, was president of the Rotary Club of Maidenhead from 1973/74. On his 100th birthday, he was taken on a flight in a micro light plane by the daughter of one of the children he saved, who is now a world champion hang glider and micro light pilot.
Photo courtesy of the Evanston Patch
