Irena Sendler, the WWII Hero You May Not Have Heard About

As someone who had a very close friendship with their European History textbook, I have the tendency to get overly-enthusiastic when I find out "new" things about history.  When I'm at history museums, it's a bit dangerous because of how much time I spend wandering around obsessing over artifacts, and my mum and I have been known to go full fan-girl over little details we've learned about the past. Bram Stoker's wife was an ex-girlfriend of Oscar Wilde?  Branwell Bronte (the Bronte Sisters' brother) wanted to die standing up?  Oh, my, so interesting!
Anyway, World War II is one of the subjects closest to my heart, so I was really moved when I found out about Irena Sendler yesterday.  I knew I didn't know nearly all of the WWII heroes/stories yet, but I can't believe I hadn't heard of Irena until just recently.  She passed away in 2008 and was even nominated for the Nobel Prize a while back.  During the war, she was a Polish nurse, and she got a gig working on plumbing and sewage in the Warsaw ghetto--where she used her toolbox to secretly sneak infants and small children out to safety.  She then got them false identity documents, and after the war, she tried to help them reconnect with their families. Sadly, many of their parents had been killed.  Many of the children ended up being raised by foster families, and they owed their lives to Irena's willingness to risk her own.  #powergirl
To learn more about Irena, check out Life in Jar.

 

<3 Frances