Holocaust Survivor Celebrates 100th Birthday With Drive-By Parade in Texas

A Holocaust survivor living in North Texas was able to celebrate his 100th birthday with a procession of visitors who drove through his neighborhood to help brighten his day.

Heinz Wallach reached a milestone on Sunday when he became a centenarian, but with social distancing restrictions in place throughout the country to slow the spread of coronavirus, his family couldn't throw a typical party to mark the big occasion, according to KTVT.

That's why Wallach's daughter, Tamar Leventhal, improvised by planning a drive-by parade for her father to help him celebrate, and show him how much he is appreciated by his community.

"I'm speechless," Wallach told the news station as cars drove by his home. "This is unbelievable, and I have to take this in my mind."

Leventhal said the parade took two weeks to plan, and she also received help from the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum.

"I've been emotional the last two weeks putting it all together and realizing how many people love my father," she told KTVT.

"He believes that you can persist, you just have to follow the rules, do what you need to stay as safe as possible, but not panic," Leventhal added of her father. "That's how he survived, escaping a concentration camp and so forth because he did not panic in spite of the dangers around."

According to the station, Wallach was born in Kassel, Germany in 1920, and saw his home destroyed in November 1938 during "Kristallnacht," in which the Nazis attacked Jewish communities and businesses, killing nearly 100 people.

Wallach and his father were captured and taken to Buchenwald, one of the largest Nazi concentration camps in Germany, for two months.

The camp was surrounded by electrified fencing and guards with automatic machine guns, a page from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum details, and SS soldiers routinely subjected prisoners to "extraordinarily cruel treatment."

Wallach's father, mother and sister all died during this time.

"My mind is that the Almighty took care of me and he led me through," Wallach told KTVT of his survival.

In conjunction with the parade, the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum launched a dedicated page where people can leave video messages for Wallach to wish him a happy birthday.

According to a New York Times database, Texas has seen 56,644 cases and 1,538 deaths attributed to coronavirus as of Tuesday afternoon. The United States as a whole has had over 1.6 million cases and 98,606 deaths.

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