\"The World Knew - Jan Karski\'s Mission for Humanity\". Exhibit to open at the Polish Museum of America in Chicago

“The World Knew” illustrates the dangerous mission that Jan Karski undertook during the Nazi occupation of Poland in World War II to arrest the fates of millions who were being sent to their deaths. At great peril, Karski entered the Warsaw ghetto and one of the so-called Nazi “transit” camps. As an eyewitness to atrocious crimes against humanity, Karski embarked on a mission to “inform the free world” with the hopes of stopping the ongoing genocide. But sadly his efforts were ignored by President Roosevelt and other world leaders.

Karski was haunted by his own famous question: “Why was nothing done, when there was still time to save millions of human beings?”

The multimedia exhibition follows Karski’s life from pre-war school days and beginnings of a promising diplomatic career to the dramatic events of the Second World War and his subsequent life in the United States. “The World Knew – Jan Karski’s Mission for Humanity” was curated by the Polish History Museum, and first appeared at the United Nations thanks to the collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland and the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Poland to the United Nations. It can be seen at the PMA through May 19, 2013.

Copies of Karski’s 1944 book, Story of a Secret State, just republished by Georgetown University Press with a forward by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, will also be available for sale at the Polish Museum during the exhibit.