There are pros and cons to every profession.

One side of the list is usually longer, but for this journalist, for almost 20 years, the pros have a longer listing. And one of the top pros is because I get to meet and talk to some amazing, interesting, hilarious, sincere, intelligent, wonderful people. The adjectives describing people I talk to really covers every word you could find. We’re all different right?

Recently I had the amazing opportunity to talk to Ben Lesser.

I have never turned off the recorder, ended the Zoom call, and ordered a subject’s book (Living A Life That Matters at https://www.zachorfoundation.org/product/living-life-matters-paperback/) in succession before in my career.

Until I spoke with Lesser.

“A bunch of miracles happened for me to be able to survive. I can’t believe it myself. If you read my book, I write about at least a dozen miracles that happened. There were plenty of life-threatening situations, and I survived them,” Lesser said. “I don’t know how. I went into Auschwitz Concentration Camp when I was 15 ½ years old. I told them I was 18, I was healthy, and I could work. They asked me if I could run 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) and I said yes. They sent me to the left.

“I had no idea I was giving them the right answers that kept me from being sent to the right. The doctor asked me would I rather go by truck or would I run. If I would have said by truck, they would have sent me to the gas chambers, to the right.

“Had they known my age, I would have been sent to the gas chambers. My little brother and my little sister went straight to the gas chambers.”

Lesser, who turned 96 on October 18, was 10 years old when the Nazi holocaust began. After avoiding captivity for 5 ½ years, he was finally caught and sent to the camp we all shudder when we hear spoken, Auschwitz.

“When we arrived at Auschwitz, I had my little brother and sister next to me. I was holding their hands,” said Lesser, who along with one sister (there were five siblings) are the only members of their family to survive the holocaust. “The camp announced, women and children to the left, and men to the right. I decided to go with my uncle, with the men. If this was a labor camp, thought if I went with the men and worked, I would get better food. If I would have went with my sister and brother, I would have been killed.

“I went through hell, hiding and running from one ghetto to another until they finally caught me and took me to camp. I ran away from Poland into Hungary, which was still a free country in 1941. A year later, the Nazis came in and sent us to Auschwitz. I went through two Holocausts, the Polish Holocaust and the Hungarian Holocaust. Very few survivors went through what I went through.”

Through his years telling his story, he still hasn’t met anyone who went through two holocausts.

When World War II ended in May 1945, Lesser was 16 ½-years old and weighed 40 pounds.

“On the second day after liberation, I passed out and went into a coma for 2 ½ months. I woke up in a monastery in Bulgaria,” Lesser said. “I opened my eyes and I saw a bunch on nuns. They started to scream to the other nuns to come in when they saw me open my eyes. It was a celebration.

“No one believed I was alive. I didn’t believe it myself.”

Lesser stayed in Germany for two years before leaving for the United States of America in 1947. He lived in Las Angeles where he delivered packages for UPS for 25 years before going into business for himself as an LA realtor. He owned two offices and employed 78 agents.

Once Jimmy Carter became president and home mortgage interest rates going up to 22 percent caused residents to not purchase homes and forced realtors out of business, Lesser moved to Las Vegas and has been there for 31 years.

He married Jean in 1950 and they had a “wonderful, qualm-free” marriage for 72 years when she passed away in 2022. They have two daughters, four grandchildren, and seven great-grandchildren.

“For many years, I didn’t tell my story to my family, my kids. I didn’t want them to grow up feeling that they were different than the American kids,” Lesser said. “I wanted them to go to public schools and mingle with other nationalities.

“When my grandson’s fifth grade teacher found out I was a holocaust survivor, they asked if I would tell my story to the class. That’s when I decided it was time to talk. I had grandchildren already. When I went into the fifth-grade class, my hands were shaking. I couldn’t open the door. I thought, ‘What am I going to tell fifth graders? Are they going to have nightmares?’ I didn’t know what to do.

“They gave me from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. to speak. I spoke until noon. The school bell rang and none of the students budged. They were glued to their chairs. Finally, the teacher chased them out. Instead of going to lunch, they surrounded me in the hallway to ask questions.”

Through the fifth-grade students he realized the world has to know his story and he couldn’t be quiet anymore.

Lesser first wrote a memoir. He didn’t like the fact he didn’t tell his entire story in the way he wanted, so he followed with Living A Life That Matters, published in 2012.

Every time he tells his story, he says he remembers something he may not have said last time. But there are a few parts he makes sure he tells every time.

“I never wanted to die. I always had the feeling, ‘I will survive this.’ I did everything the way they wanted me to do it. I thought, ‘If I do everything right, I’ll survive.’ That’s what I did through the death train and the death marches,” Lesser said. “One thing I’ve learned is you have to be the best you can be in your profession. You can’t take short cuts. Be the best at whatever you do. And I thanked God. That’s how I’ve lived my life.”