Fascism on the Rise Archives - KDA Keeping Democracy Alive Podcast & Radio Show · Burt Cohen

Illustrated Lessons of Kids Cleverly Fighting Fascism

·59 min·3 clips

The Secret Buttons is based on the author's mother, who said she crocheted diamonds into buttons during the blackout.

1. Fascism on the Rise Archives on Keeping Democracy Alive focuses on The Secret Buttons, a World War II story about children, diamonds, and hidden resistance. 2. Bert Cohen hosts the conversation, and Ellen M. Shapiro is the book’s author, a graphic designer and writer whose mother’s recollection shaped the novel. 3. The episode asks what a young-adult Holocaust novel is for, and Shapiro answers by tying courage, memory, and immigrant life to present-day politics. 4. Shapiro says her mother told her at age 10, “When I lived in Inglewood during the blackout and the blitz, I crocheted around diamonds.” 5. She explains that the book begins with that family memory and turns it into a story for fifth grade and up. 6. The fictional lead, Annie Blum, is 12, while her sister Rosie is 7, because Shapiro wanted a child protagonist who fit children’s publishing. 7. Annie and Rosie travel from Vienna to Hoek van Holland and then England after the 1938 Anschluss interrupts their education. 8. Shapiro says the girls face forged visas, fear of being noticed as Jews, and the absence of their father, who has already been taken away. 9. She argues that young readers can learn from the girls’ use of intelligence, talents, and persistence when adapting to a new language and culture. 10. The book includes teasing over German-accented English and the accusation that the sisters might be “Nazi spies.” 11. Shapiro says many Holocaust books center righteous Gentiles, but she wanted Jewish characters to solve the problems themselves. 12. She says her students showed her that Holocaust material was not part of their curriculum and that they wanted a story they would actually read. 13. Religion matters in the novel, and Shapiro connects that to her own life as an active synagogue goer and the wife of a rabbi. 14. She describes a Passover chapter in which Annie and Rosie encounter the Haggadah, Shabbat dinners, prayers, and a growing sense of meaning. 15. Shapiro says Vienna was a Nazi “testing grounds” for techniques of identification, deportation, and naming. 16. She cites the compulsory “Israel” and “Sarah” names and the J-stamped identity cards as examples of forced marginalization. 17. The interview is conversational, repetitive at times, and shaped by Bert Cohen’s frequent interruptions and topical pivots. 18. Shapiro answers in a teacherly, explanatory style, often returning to examples like knitting, the Museum of the Resistance in Oslo, and the book’s illustrations. 19. Readers interested in Holocaust history, immigrant identity, and middle-grade fiction would likely value this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a tight literary interview without political detours may skip it.

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