ADRIAN — The Adrian Diversity Event Fund is organizing an educational series titled “Fighting Hate: Lessons Learned from the Holocaust,” which will consist of a number of book studies, learning sessions, and one field trip beginning in late August.

The series is being planned by Bob Behnke, an Adrian city commissioner and retired Adrian Public Schools superintendent. 

Behnke said the free series is intended for people who want to participate actively in the learning opportunity, and he noted that it’s not just a lecture series — participants will be reading books on their own outside of the scheduled times. 

The series can accommodate up to 30 people, and runs from Aug. 27 to Jan. 7. With the exception of a trip to the Holocaust Center in West Bloomfield, sessions will take place on Wednesday evenings at the Adrian District Library.

The first meeting, on Aug. 27, will be a learning session about the events that led to the rise of fascism and the Nazi party.

That will be followed by a two-session book study on the diary of Anne Frank that will also discuss Frank’s life before and after the time she spent in hiding.

Behnke, a former history teacher, has visited many sites associated with the Holocaust. He also developed a particular interest in the life of Anne Frank after being involved in a situation at Northville Public Schools where a parent challenged the inclusion of Frank’s unabridged diary on a middle school reading list. Behnke was Northville’s assistant superintendent for instructional services at the time, overseeing the district’s curriculum, and the parent’s challenge was ultimately rejected.

During a recent trip to the Netherlands, Behnke and his husband traced many of the steps Frank took during her short life, including the neighborhood where she lived before going into hiding and the Westerbork transit camp where she was sent after her family’s hiding place was discovered.

Meetings for the Anne Frank book study will be on Sept. 3 and Sept. 17.

An all-day trip to the Holocaust Center in West Bloomfield wil take place on Sunday, Oct. 26. Participants will attend two presentations — “Spreading Hate: The Impact of Propaganda in the Holocaust” and “Resistance: The Response to the Nazi Movement.” A tour of The Holocaust Center will take place with a debriefing during lunch.  Participants will interact with a variety of Holocaust exhibits, which will also include stories of LGBTQ+ victims and survivors. Transportation will be provided.

On Nov. 19, students will discuss the ghettos, concentration camps, and death camps that the Nazis used to carry out murder on an industrial scale. This meeting will include a virtual tour of the Thereienstadt and Warsaw ghettos, Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, and Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp.

In December, participants will read and discuss “The Men with the Pink Triangle,” which focuses on the gay men who were persecuted during the Nazi regime and imprisoned in concentration camps. The discussion will also touch on the censorship of LGBTQ+ history. These meetings will be on Dec. 3 and Dec. 10.

Finally, in the new year, participants will be invited to take part in what Behnke refers to as “focusing hope” — thinking about ways to prevent hate in the modern age and in our own community. 

Behnke said this will bring the lessons of the 1930s and ’40s home to Lenawee County, and give participants a chance to ask “What do we, as people in the county, want to do to say ‘Hate is not welcome here’?”

 The intent, he said, is to work on opportunities for individuals to design ways to have a meaningful impact on their community.  

The “Fighting Hate” educational series is sponsored by the Maurice & Dorothy Stubnitz Foundation, the Adrian Morning Rotary Club, and Holiday With Heart in Toledo, in addition to the Adrian Diversity Event Fund, which was created a few years ago to help local groups cover some of the costs associated with staging events that reflect and celebrate diversity in Lenawee County.

Thanks to the sponsors, the series will be completely free to all participants, including books and transportation to the Holocaust Center.

Behnke also noted that teachers and administrators who take part will be able to earn credit toward their continuing education hours.

For more information and to register, find the Adrian Diversity Event Fund on Facebook, go to https://forms.gle/meG1wKxUXJWxPfZh8, or email Behnke at behnke168@gmail.com.

Overview

• Aug. 27: A brief history of the events that led to the Holocaust.
• Sept. 3 and Sept. 10: Book study on the diary of Anne Frank.
• Sunday, Sept. 26: All-day trip to the Holocaust Center in West Bloomfield.
• Nov. 19: Ghettos, concentration camps, and death camps.
• Dec. 3 and Dec. 10: Book study on “The Men with the Pink Triangle.”
• Jan. 7, 2026: Planning session — Creating a caring and uplifting community free of hate.