NEW YORK (Press Release)– No Place on Earth, a story of 38 Ukrainian Jews who hid in caves for two years to avoid detection by the Nazis, will be aired on the History Channel at 6 p.m., Saturday, April 26. This was the longest recorded sustained underground survival. Built upon interviews with the survivors, as well as with Chris Nicola, the caving enthusiast who uncovered the story, the documentary is a true story of strength and survival.
In 1993, Nicola was mapping one of the world’s most extensive horizontal cave systems with a group of elite Ukrainian cavers. He discovered unusual objects: buttons, shoes, a grinding stone, even a rusty, old house key. Over the next nine years, Nicola pieced together a most unbelievable story: with no gear or training, a desperate group of people had lived in this cave for months on end…and survived.
The cave, known as Priest’s Grotto, housed groups of despairing families and created refuge for them in an unbelievably hostile environment during WWII. Led by family matriarch Esther Stermer, whose fierce resolve kept the underground community intact, this group united to survive against all odds.
Throughout their ordeal, heroes emerged – including teenage boys and young men in their 20’s – who put their lives on the line to venture out to chop firewood, collect food and gather essential supplies. What they accomplished is remarkable – in a region where less than 5% of the Jews survived – the 38 who went in to Priest’s Grotto in May, 1943, came out alive in April 1944 as the Russians liberated the area.
Over 65-years later, in 2010, four of those young heroes, now in their 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s, journeyed back to Ukraine with their grandchildren and Nicola to enter the cave for the first time since their courageous parting.
HISTORY is supporting No Place on Earth with educational content for schools nationwide. These resources include educational content created by Tim Bailey, an award-winning educator who is the recipient of the History Teacher of the Year award from the Gilder Lehrman Institute for American History and a classroom viewing guide. These resources will be available at www.history.com/classroom.
HISTORY has also partnered with USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education. Six of those who survived in the caves that are the subject of NO PLACE ON EARTH have given video testimony to the Institute for its Visual History Archive, and students and teachers can watch their testimonies in IWitness, the Institute’s award-winning educational website (iwitness.usc.edu). Their recollections are also the basis for an Information Quest activity within IWitness, which the Institute launched in support of HISTORY Classroom’s digital resource guide for the film.
No Place on Earth is produced by History’s film arm HISTORY FILMS™ in collaboration with Sierra/Tango Productions. The film is directed by Janet Tobias – Emmy award winning director/producer (CBS 60 Minutes, ABC Primetime Live, NBC Dateline, ABC Nightline, PBS Frontline, PBS Life 360).
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