Tribute to Hélène Waysbord-Loing, who died on October 29, 2023.

Born in Argenteuil in 1936 to Polish Jewish parents, Hélène Waysbord was hidden at the age of 6 in Evron in Mayenne in the autumn of 1942 after the arrest of her father Jacques and mother Fajga, deported and murdered in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.

Agrégée de lettres classiques, teacher, then in the 80s, responsible for major works at the presidency of the Republic, she became scientific delegate of the National Library of France. Inspector General of National Education, she led in 2008 at the request of the Minister of National Education a working group on Shoah teaching in primary schools. She presided over the House of Izieu from 2004 to 2016, then honorary president.

Writer, Hélène Waysbord-Loing looks at her family history and pays tribute to Alexandre Halaunbrenner, a figure of the association of Sons and Daughters of Jewish deportees from France.

Hélène Waysborg deposited at the Shoah Memorial in 2013 the letters written by her parents from the camps of Beaune-la-Rolande and Drancy.

In Emmanuel Macron’s speech awarding him the medal of Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor at the Elysée on November 29, 2019, the President of the Republic emphasizes how much "You have pedagogically and sensitively carried the memory of the Shoah, you are committed to these essential projects. You have written with talent to transmit and build and you have constantly celebrated literature, art, memory giving meaning, a flame to this life that should have stopped so many times (...).

The Shoah Memorial presents to her husband Bernard Loing and all his family, its most sincere condolences.

Photo: Hélène Wajsbord, 2015. © Jean-Marc Lebaz/ Shoah Memorial