YIR: Daffodil Project Honors Lubin with Ceremonial Planting

On Monday, Nov. 4, at Dunwoody High School several hundred students gathered in the auditorium for a ceremony held by the Daffodil Project, honoring the memory of Rose Lubin, the Lone Soldier from Dunwoody who was killed in action last year, as part of the season in which their millionth daffodil was planted.

“It far exceeded my expectations,” said Robin Lubin, Rose’ mother. “I was expecting just a few JSU students, Rabbi Neiditch, the principal, some family friends there, and some students. What ended up happening was they filled the auditorium with staff and students, the mayor, and a representative came, and a Holocaust survivor.”

“At first, it was supposed to be in the media room,” said Rose’ father, David Lubin, “but then it got so large they said, ‘we’re moving it to the auditorium’ because about 300 kids showed up, voluntarily, to listen to a Holocaust survivor – Hershel Greenblatt.”

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After watching a half-hour documentary on Greenblatt’s life, students listened to him speak.

“If someone needs help, help them,” said Greenblatt, in a video celebrating the millionth daffodil planted. “That’s what I want them to learn. And that’s what these flowers represent. They represent the hatred of what happened to these children, but they also represent a future, the future of a world that just doesn’t hate each other.”

Am Yisrael Chai’s Daffodil Project, whose long-term goal is to plant 1.5 million daffodils in memory of the 1.5 million children who died in the Holocaust, is marking the season with a special plaque at each planting location commemorating the one-million milestone. But at Dunwoody High School, and at several other locations around Atlanta and beyond, another will be joining it, containing a quote from Rose. The one at Dunwoody High School reads “I am not going to wait for the world to do something great for me, I am going to do something great for the world.”