Life Through a Child's Eyes
Paper Clips to Change the World
BY LUCRETIA VOIGT CONTRIBUTING WRITER
The Nantucket Atheneum concludes its three-part documentary series this week with a film focusing on a group of middle school children who use the Holocaust to learn about tolerance and cultural diversity, and end up changing their town and beyond

On Monday, Oct. 29, the Nantucket Atheneum will show "Through a Child's Eyes" with the award winning documentary "Paper Clips."

"Paper Clips" focuses on a group of middle school children in Whitwell, Tenn., a coal mining town nestled between two mountain ranges. A small town with a population of 1,600, Whitwell's economy began a downward spiral when a December 1981 explosion led to the closing of the mine in 1997. Whitwell was a close-knit community, but had become nearly homogenous. In an effort to teach their students about cultural diversity and tolerance, the teachers in Whitwell began a curriculum on the Holocaust. That decision led to the Paper Clip Project, and a worldwide awareness that transformed not only the children of Whitwell, but Holocaust survivors from New York and school children from Germany.

Last week The Nantucket Independent introduced you to the cinematographer of the second documentary, "Mad Hot Ballroom." This week, as part three of our three-part series, we introduce you to Joe Fab, the writer, director and producer of "Paper Clips," as well as Principal Linda Hooper, the middle school principal who planted the seed that grew into the Paper Clip Project.
"PAPER CLIPS"
Monday, October 29, 7:00 p.m.,
Nantucket Atheneum Great Hall -
Free
Fab lives and works in McLean, Va. He is the Vice President of The Johnson Group, a company whose mission is to "produce films that entertain, educate, inspire and change lives." While Civil War buffs may count Virginia as part of the South, it is far removed from the hills of Tennessee. When Fab sat down to read The Washington Post on April 7, 2001, he did not even know Whitwell, Tenn. existed. That was about to change.

Dita Smith's April 7 Washington Post article introduced the world to the middle school children of Whitwell, who were studying the Holocaust. Contemplating the enormity of the killing, one student asked, "What does six million look like?" Hooper paused. She said she did not know, but if the students found something they could collect six million of, she would help them. They chose paper clips based on the practice in Holocaust-era Norway of Nazi resisters wearing a paper clip on their lapel. The students set out to collect six million paper clips, one paper clip for every Jew killed in the Holocaust. By the time of Smith's article, the students had received paper clips from Bill Clinton, Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg.

Smith's article caught Fab's eye.

"One of the things that always interests me personally and our company is things that have to do with children and young people. That's the first touch point," he said. "Second is we had been looking for a subject that would really represent the kind of film we preferred to make, and that would be films that have something about them with the potential of having an actual affect on people that lasts beyond the viewing of the movie, and a few weeks after that. This story sounded like that type of story, and that drew us in."

Finding a story, however, was only the beginning. By the time of Smith's article, the Paper Clip Project was two years old. NBC's "Nightly News" picked up the story, and the media had descended on Whitwell. Hooper was not enamored with the attention, to say the least.

"We're a former coal mining town, and the media likes to paint everyone with the same brush. We were portrayed as this redneck trailer trash," she explained. This stereotyping was not the only reason she was skeptical of the media. "The other reason was that I didn't want the purpose of the project lost in the hype and the ego. That's a struggle - to try to keep everybody focused on the purpose. It's not about you, not about me, it's about what kids can do, and it's about making people think."

As a latecomer on the scene, Fab had his work cut out for him.

"The person I was working with at the time was our development director, Ari Pinchot," Fab said. "Part of his job was to get through to Linda Hooper. For most of the five or six weeks between when we saw the article in the Post and when we went to Whitwell, Linda wouldn't take phone calls or return emails.

"One morning, Ari came into my office, and said that Linda Hooper had accidentally answered the phone, and he had her on the line," he laughed. "I talked to her. She was really negative because they'd had a lot of media attention. The best I could get out of her that day was that if we wanted to come down there, she'd meet with us in person and decide whether or not she was going to let us film after she met us."

Fab had a decision to make.

Enter a group of Holocaust survivors from Long Island, N.Y. planning a trip to Whitwell to meet with the students.

Fab knew there was a story here that needed to be told. He traveled to New York and interviewed two of the survivors on a Thursday. On Monday, the day before the survivors were to visit with the students, Fab and his crew worked their way around the mountains to Whitwell. Fab was dedicated to the project and tried to convince Hooper.

"I told Linda that what's been done before has been an article or a couple of minutes on the news. That doesn't give a person a sense of being there," he said. "If you let us make the film we can bring people to see you as you are. We don't have an agenda. You'll be whoever you are. She looked at me after a few minutes, then said in that accent of hers, 'If I let you make your movie, and you make my children look like a bunch of rednecks, I will eat your heart for breakfast.'"

Fab was ready for the challenge and the documentary "Paper Clips" left the drawing table and became a reality.

The film chronicles the beginning of the project, and follows the students as they hear the stories of the Holocaust from the survivors. Acattle car that carried Jews to Auschwitz was donated and traveled from Germany to Whitwell, becoming the Children's Holocaust Memorial and the resting place for 11 million paper clips representing the six million Jews that were killed and the five million gypsies, homosexuals and other victims.

Hooper watched as the project and the documentary bolstered her community.

"I've been pleased with the documentary and my community has been pleased," she said. "At the premier in Whitwell, when they ran the credits, our children stood up and applauded themselves. That was such an awesome time and people in the community came together. We've never had that kind of positive attention, and our children have the opportunity to meet these people and to realize that they may be poor but they are very much blessed. They've been able to travel to Germany, South Africa and all the states of the nation."

The Paper Clip Project is still opening eyes and changing lives. The school has instituted a mandatory 24 hours of community service for each seventh grader. In addition, through a partnership with the South Africa Foundation for Tolerance and Cultural Diversity, each year two students from each community participate as exchange students.

For Hooper, the project has reinforced the lessons she learned as a child in Whitwell.

"This project for me has been an affirmation of what I learned growing up," she said. "You need to be very conscious of how simple acts, simple choices, make such a difference in the world. This project has

really shown me how easy it is for evil to flourish." I