Steven Fenves (Steven Fenyves)

Steven Fenves was born Steven Fenyves on June 6, 1931 in Subotica, Yugoslavia. The town of 100,000 inhabitants had a Jewish population of nearly 6,000. His father, Lajos, managed a publishing house and his mother, Klári (Klara), was a graphic artist. Although they studied Serbian in school, Steven and his elder sister, Estera (Eszti), spoke Hungarian and German at home.

The Axis invasion of Yugoslavia took place on April 6, 1941. Five days later, Subotica fell under Hungarian occupation. On the first day of the occupation, Steven’s father was forced from his office at gunpoint. His business was handed over to a non-Jew, a process referred to as “Aryanization.” Klári knitted shawls and the family had to sell all of their possessions, including Steven’s stamp collection, to earn enough money to survive. The Fenyveses lived in one corner of their apartment. Hungarian officers took over the rest of the family’s home.

In March 1944, Germany occupied Hungary and thus, Hungarian-occupied Yugoslavia. With the help of collaborating Hungarian authorities, the German occupiers began to move Jews into ghettos and deport them to concentration camps. In April, Lajos was arrested and deported to Auschwitz. Steven, his sister, mother and maternal grandmother were forced into the ghetto in Subotica in May. On June 16, 1944 the Subotica Jews were rounded up and sent to the nearby transit ghetto of Bácsalmás. They remained there for 10 days before being deported to Auschwitz.

After days locked in freight cars with no food or water, they arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Steven, Estera, and Klári were selected for work. Steven’s grandmother was sent to the gas chambers; Klári died a few weeks later. The barracks where Steven was housed were supervised by German Kapos, or overseers. Since he spoke fluent German, Steven was chosen to be an interpreter. Eventually Polish political prisoners took over the supervision of the barracks. One of them made Steven his interpreter.  With his knowledge of Serbian, Steven quickly became fluent in Polish. The Polish prisoners were part of the Birkenau resistance and recruited Steven to help. He worked on a roof repair detail that went from compound to compound, smuggling lists of prisoners and trading black market goods. He met his sister and was able to send her a scarf and sweater, bartered on the black market, before she was sent on a transport to another camp.

In October 1944, Steven was smuggled out on a transport to Niederorschel, a satellite camp of Buchenwald. There, he spent nearly six months working on the assembly line in a Junkers aircraft factory. On the night of April 1-2, 1945, the inmates were led out on a death march. They entered Buchenwald late on April 10. After being herded into one of the barracks, Steven went to sleep. When he awoke the following morning, he found the camp had been liberated by American soldiers from the 6th Armored Division.

Steven returned home to Yugoslavia, where he reunited with his father and sister. His father died a few months later. Steven returned to school where he was forced to join a communist youth organization or risk expulsion. He and Estera decided to leave Yugoslavia. In 1947, they escaped to Paris. After three years, they immigrated to the United States, settling in Chicago. Eighteen months later, Steven was drafted into the U.S. Army. After he was discharged he studied on the GI Bill, eventually earning his doctorate.

Steven entered the computing field in the mid-1950s. He devoted his 42-year academic career, at the University of Illinois and later at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA, to the development of computer concepts and tools for civil engineers. Steven retired in 2009. He and his wife, Norma, live in Chevy Chase MD. Steven is a volunteer at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.