Danziger: The true meaning of charity, exemplified by a singular woman

[cali]

Editor’s note: Jeff Danziger is a cartoonist and writer who has penned images and stories for Vermonters for more than 30 years. This piece first aired on Vermont Public Radio.


Naomi Bronstein and baby Kim Danziger appear in this photo taken in Vietnam. Photo courtesy of Jeff Danziger.

Naomi Bronstein died three days before Christmas, at the orphanage she founded in Guatemala City. She had devoted her life to orphans, victims of war and poverty, and had lost count of how many she had brought to families in the United States, and to her own country, Canada.

In 1975, as the Vietnam War came to an inglorious end, Naomi brought my daughter out of the war zone. The US had ignored the existence of war orphans until the last minute. President Ford hurriedly provided a C5A cargo plane for a well-publicized evacuation. My daughter was almost on that plane. It took off from Saigon Airport, with about 140 babies and many nurses aboard. Over the South China Sea a cargo door blew off. The pilot desperately tried to get back to the airport but didn’t make it. In the crash, all the babies and many of Naomi’s friends were killed. And to her, fell the task of going out to the crash site to identifying the people—and the babies—as best she could.

A week later, on a commercial plane, my daughter arrived with another group of babies in Montreal, where we waited, with about 30 other Vermont families. Naomi was on that flight, exhausted but happy.

For the next 35 years, Naomi continued to travel to the war zones, and the poverty-stricken areas of the world, to save orphans and bring health services to the citizens. She worked largely alone, not trusting the governments of either the Third World, or indeed the First World, to act in the best interests of the children. After all, the C5A that crashed had been known by the U.S. Air Force to have a faulty design.

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http://vtdigger.org/2011/01/09/danziger-the-true-meaning-of-charity-exemplified-by-a-singular-woman/

[UpInArms]

1. thanks, cali - for the post

I would have missed this story - in every way

[11 Bravo]

2. Remarkable post, cali. Thanks for sharing this.

[OneGrassRoot]

3. K&R n/t