1942 The teachers were starved

It was 1942. Norway was in the second year of Nazi occupation with a puppet prime minister in place.

New orders arrived - all teachers were to pledge loyalty to the Nazis, join the Nazi national teachers union, and indoctrinate their students accordingly. 

Parents protested by the thousands, but teachers did something quite remarkable. They refused. Simply refused. 

The government responded by closing schools and withholding the salaries of 10,000 teachers. Many teachers responded courageously by teaching in their homes. 

The Nazi retaliation was brutal. Teachers were arrested and sent in freezing cattle cars to concentration camps. Ignoring the danger, Norwegians gathered along the tracks as they passed, singing and offering gifts of food.

The teachers were starved, forced to crawl through snow and endured nighttime marches where they were viciously beaten. Incredibly, months of such treatment did not break their spirits, and they were finally returned to their homes and their newly reopened schools. 

What incredible bravery in the face of ultimate evil!

Thank you teachers for your incredible example!

I salute you.

We posted about the heroism of the Norwegian teachers who took a courageous stand against the Nazis.

 If you wondered what their students were doing…

Students instituted their own silent means of resistance. They used paper clips to make themselves bracelets and necklaces; they wore paper clips in their lapels; they turned their paper clips into a symbol of unity between themselves and their beleaguered teachers. 

Just imagine, thousands of students speaking eloquently without saying a word! They went even further, turning their backs when Nazi soldiers passed by and singing patriotic Norwegian songs when the Nazis visited their schools. 

Students in Oslo high schools refused the compulsory order to join the Nazi Youth Movement and were punished by beatings, threats, and arrests. They faced truly grave danger head on. Despite the Nazi brutality, the teenagers simply refused to comply, and eventually the Nazi demands were abandoned. 

Historians describe the Norwegian resistance as “an unconditional ideological defeat upon Nazism.” And just imagine, it started with a bunch of brave kids and their paper clips.

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