Leo Ullman was just a toddler when he went to live with strangers in the hopes of evading the Nazis in the Netherlands.


Leo Ullman was just a toddler when he went to live with strangers in the hopes of evading the Nazis in the Netherlands.

When they agreed to take him in, Hendrik and Jannigje Schimmel, a retired policeman and his wife, knew only that Leo was a Jewish boy who needed help. For more than two years, they treated him like a son.

When Leo's parents arrived on the doorstep unannounced one day, the boy, then five, did not recognize them or remember that he had had other parents before the war. 

The Schimmels loved Leo and were committed to making his transition back to life with his parents as easy as possible. The two couples who had never met worked together.

The Schimmels gave Leo their dog, Ruffie, whom he had come to adore. Hendrik Schimmel also walked Leo to school nearly every day just so that he could see Leo.

Leo remained close to the Schimmels, whom he refers to as his "war parents." Watch live at 1:30 p.m. ET on Facebook tomorrow, June 12, Anne Frank's birthday, to hear about Leo's experience as a hidden child in Amsterdam.

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