PORTSMOUTH, Va. — On a beautiful Sunday, people at the Portsmouth Jewish Museum and Cultural Center remembered the millions of children who died in the Holocaust.
Thousands of daffodils were planted at the museum in their honor last year and the flower was highlighted in the commemoration. Now, they're blooming.
"So, in October, we started our planting," Barbara Rossen with the Jewish Museum and Cultural Center told 13News Now.
"We have partnered with the Daffodil Project out of Georgia and Am Yisrael Chai in Israel, with the goal of planting 1.5 million daffodils worldwide in honor of the 1.5 million children that perished in the Holocaust and as a memorial to these children every year, she continued.
About the flowers, she said: "They come back. We can celebrate and we can remember those children that we have lost" every year.
According to the Daffodil Project: "The shape and color of the daffodils represent the yellow stars that Jews were forced to wear during the Holocaust. Daffodils represent our poignant hope for the future. They are resilient and return with a burst of color each spring, signifying hope, renewal and beauty. The daffodils also honor those who survived the Holocaust and went on to build new lives after this dark and difficult period."
"It's amazing," Elka Mednick with the Holocaust Commission said. "It's beautiful and the daffodils are yellow, which are the color of remembrance, which is just very fitting for why we are here today," she continued.
"For me. It's hope and it's remembrance and it's just continuing to honor victims of the Holocaust and also with this project to try to remember victims of other genocides," Mednick told us.
"We need to remember so that this does not happen again," said Barbara Rossen. "There is all kinds of hate in this world today and hopefully this will help brighten people's day and celebrate the blooming and the blossoming of these daffodils."