Hanni Vogelweid

Hanni [Sondheimer] Vogelweid (Oct. 5, 1923 - Jan. 27, 2006) was born in Berlin. Her family fled Germany when she was eleven, moving to Kaunas (Kovno), Lithuania. When the Soviet Union occupied Lithuania in 1940, Hanni's father decided they had to leave. Hanni, at 16 years old, stood in line outside Japanese Vice-Consul Chiune Sugihara's consulate for several days, finally obtaining transit visas from him, allowing her family to escape. The family traveled on the Trans-Siberian railway to Vladivostok, where they then boarded a ship for Japan. They remained stranded in Japan for many weeks until Japanese authorities forced them to relocate to Shanghai in Japanese-occupied China, in late 1941. Hanni and her family remained in Shanghai for the rest of the war. After the war, Hanni found a job working on the American Army base in Shanghai. She met and married an American officer stationed there. She returned with him to the United States in 1946. Director Chris Tashima and co-writer Tom Donaldson first met Hanni in August 1996, when she invited the filmmakers to her home in Huntington Beach, CA, to show them old photos, and to share her thoughts: "Very few people know about Sugihara... it was hidden, and he suffered... so you're doing a great thing," she told the producers. She proved to be invaluable to the production, by providing personal photos and documents, and by sharing many memories of her journey, and how Sugihara saved her life. On November 13, 1996, Hanni arrived on the set of the filming of Visas and Virtue (1997) in Los Angeles. She was there to offer her support and to make a special appearance in the film. The moment she arrived, everyone sensed that someone special was close by. "Her presence grounded the whole project in reality," says Tashima. "She served as a vivid reminder of why we wanted to share this story." She became a friend of the filmmakers, and a fan of the film. Over the next nine years, she often attended screenings and community presentations, as a special guest. Hanni passed away in January, 2006. She brought to the film and to all involved a great sense of warmth and humanity, and the producers were honored to have had her be a part of their journey.