Coming up next on this special edition of Arizona Horizon, a local author shares the remarkable story of a World War Two concentration camp survivor.

Also tonight, a new book chronicles 111 places in Phoenix that are not to be missed.

And local author Christina Estes talks about her new Phoenix based murder mystery, the stories, and more next on this special edition of Arizona Horizon.

There is ona.

Horizon is made possible by contributions from the Friends of Arizona PBS, members of your public television station.

Good evening, and welcome to this special authors edition of Arizona Horizon.

I'm Ted Simons, a local author is sharing a story involving a survivor of World War Two German concentration camps.

The book is titled Henry, and it's an account of love, loss and loyalty as it takes on some of the lesser known evils of the Holocaust.

We welcome the book's author, Katrina Schaefer, to Arizona Horizon.

Good to have you here.

Glad to be here.

Yeah.

Thank you for being here.

We should mention that this book has been out a while now, but it's got legs on it.

It has legs.

It it's there's a certain part of history that is timeless.

Yes, but also timely.

Yes.

And so it stays current and it's out there.

It's done.

Well.

And the subtitle is A Polish Swimmer's True Story of Friendship from Auschwitz to America.

Henry is Henry is the Gouda.

Who is Henry's a Gouda.

Henry Cejudo was a gentleman I met just randomly on a phone tip.

Someone's like Katrina, you need to meet this gentleman.

And I was writing in the Arizona Republic, and I liked finding interesting people.

So we met.

He was 85, had no children and no siblings, and I just had this gut instinct.

He had a story and there was no one getting it.

And he had a story.

He was a champion swimmer in Poland, correct?

Right before swimming was a really big deal.

Yes.

He, his mom was a single mom because so many dads died during the, war there.

These are skinny guys.

Here he is.

Just check a guy on the left, okay?

Yeah, and he was 16.

And there he is, in front of Saint Mary's.

Yes.

Downtown Krakow.

And in front of Saint Mary's.

This is important because when we hear about Holocaust survivors and German concentration camp survivors, we think of of Jewish people.

This man was not Jewish.

Correct.

The Holocaust is a horrible genocide that happened.

But it's a subset, especially of what happened in Poland.

6 million poles lost their lives.

3 million were Jewish, 3 million were not.

Because Poland was also devastated by both Hitler and Stalin.

Yes.

And for various historical reasons, Germany and Russia hated Poland, were determined to ruin Poland.

And one of the first things you do is you arrest and kill the leaders, and then you arrest anyone else that could fight against you.

Including a champion swimmer named Henry Gouda, who sounds like he winds up in Auschwitz and Buchenwald.

Correct.

But Auschwitz was only about 40km from Krakow's and Auschwitz to open in June 1940, long before there was a final solution.

It was a repurposed Polish army camp, and it was used because there were overflowing prisons.

They were arresting so many poles.

Yeah, and until 1942, most people don't realize the majority of prisoners there were Polish.

And he was arrested because he was he was just he was he was a political prisoner for being Polish.

Correct?

Yes.

Okay.

How did he survive these concentration camps?

He always said, Catrina, I'm nobody special.

I was lucky and I knew someone.

And there's a story in there where he had almost died within six weeks.

And a friend of his, who had been the goalie on the water polo team from the YMCA, rescued him, got him a job in the kitchen at Auschwitz.

And if you think about that, that's only 50 men out of 22,000.

Yes.

Time.

And so being in the kitchen, he was with elites and he had a view into a lot of history others didn't see.

Yeah I'll bet.

Did it help him survive by being Catholic?

No.

What helped him survive is one.

He had six years of German language.

Oh.

Okay.

You had a longer life span if you spoke German.

Interesting.

And he went in strong.

You know, a lot of people, if you were older and arrested and professors, you were not in good shape.

He went in as an athlete.

Yeah.

And that helped so much.

But then his connections.

Yeah.

You know, there's a lot of luck with every survival story.

How did he get to America after release?

Interesting.

He actually went back to Poland after the war.

He was liberated in Dachau.

And at that time, he wanted to see his mother.

He could have gone to the States.

He could have gone to Canada.

But he couldn't leave his mother.

Yeah.

And he always said that was one of the worst things he did, because he didn't understand the communists would be ruling Poland.

So he ended up after hiding out for a year, got a job through a friend in the camps.

As for swim and water polo coach for the Polish National Army team, and he stayed with them until 1956, he would work with Communist, but he never joined the Communist Party.

Wow.

And when they were ready to send him for reeducation through connections he had made, he defected to the US.

Yeah, in the 1950s.

And how did he make it to Arizona?

Interesting question.

He he actually ended up in New York City.

Sure.

And had a lot of connections there.

You have to read the book, but he eventually retired here in 1985.

His wife had a sister here, so he came here in 85 and retired.

Okay.

He comes here in 85 and he retires.

And he meets what?

A reporter from the Arizona Republic.

How did this reporter find Henry Agoda?

This reporter in 2002 got a phone call from a gentleman who doesn't even remember giving me that phone.

Wow.

Katrina, I have a gentleman you need to write.

He's Polish.

He survived Auschwitz and.

Oh, and this was special.

He went to high school with Pope John Paul.

Oh, my goodness gracious.

Which I explain and justify as best I can.

We think he did.

Yeah okay okay, okay.

But that's a hook.

Would you like to meet this man?

What reporter wouldn't.

Sure.

Yeah.

And go ahead.

Well.

If you had the chance to interview someone who is there, like someplace in your social study texts and you could ask them questions that you couldn't ask anyone else, would you go for it?

Of course you would.

But the question is, would he go for did he want his story told?

I met him when he was 85 and I had younger kids, and I was working, and I was like, what am I doing?

And a good friend said, Katrina, if you wait till you have time, he'll be gone.

Yeah.

So I made the time and we interviewed for six months.

And he was cooperative.

He he wanted it done.

He wanted this story out there.

His wife was from the Bronx.

He met her over here and she visited termine that he get his story out there.

Was it difficult to write?

Parts of it were, because you can only listen to so much concentration camp.

Force.

But he made me promise not to just write about the war.

And this intrigued me about this gentleman.

He's like Katrina.

I lived through hell for three years, but I had an amazing life.

So don't just write the bad parts.

And there is humor and optimism in there, isn't there?

I mean, the book includes some of that.

Yeah.

I mean, he was kind of like a Polish Forrest Gump.

I would talk to him and he would recognize names and places and, we clicked.

Yeah.

You wouldn't spend that much time with someone you didn't like in the first place.

Yeah.

Last question.

And this is so interesting.

You have books here.

These are these are foreign, like these are books in Poland.

Correct?

Poland and Czech Republic policy.

Okay.

Last question for these readers, for these readers, for all readers, what do you want to take from the what's the message of this book.

That there were a wide range of people who were persecuted and Poland suffered more than any other country, and they deserve credit.

All right.

What they went.

Through.

Well, congratulations on this book.

It's really fantastic.

And as we said, it may have been released a few years ago, but it's still going strong.

Katrina, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Good to have you here.

Yeah.

Just hi.

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There's a new book out that's a kind of travel guide with locals in mind.

The book is titled 111 Places in Phoenix That You Must Not Miss, and it dives into the heart of Phoenix to find its best kept secrets, natural wonders, and inspiring people.

We found out more from the author of the local travel log, Travis Swan.

Good to have you here.

Thank you.

Ted.

Yeah, having me on.

Congratulations on the book.

Why did you write this?

What?

This is an interesting idea.

Where do you come from?

It comes from the publisher.

It's a family owned publishing company.

And Cologne, Germany, they have, thousands of books.

They have hundreds of books in the series.

Cities all over the world.

Cologne to lucky numbers.

11.

That would make for a very short books.

Added one to it.

That's how they came up with 111.

Wow.

I was going to ask why 100?

I mean 101 one one.

I get that right from the from the publishing company.

Yes, it is.

All right.

How did you decide?

I mean, 100 lemons a lot.

So you probably didn't have to do too much winnow, but eventually someone's got to go.

How did you decide what went in and what didn't?

So the, contents are very diverse, so geographically and topic.

So you have a few restaurants, a few parks, a few of this and that.

The that plays into the selection.

The other is I've been to every single place in the book.

Yeah.

So, you know, it's filtering through, you know what?

I think other people would like what I like.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay, let's let's take a look at some of these things, and I want to start with a silver service.

This is a battleship silver service from the USS Arizona and is what are we looking at here?

So this is, special to me.

I served in the US Navy.

So when I found this, this was, like, fantastic.

It's the formal silver service from the USS Arizona, and it was taken off the ship in January of 41 before the Arizona was sunk, and, Pearl Harbor.

So they knew that war was impending.

So they took the service off.

So it was first put on the ship in 1919.

Wow.

So it was there for a very long time.

And that's what the Capital Museum is, it not?

It is.

Yeah.

And it's like 60 something pieces and it's all on display.

Isn't that something?

All right, let's keep it moving here.

We got Bernie the robot.

I think Bernie the robot's like, just a few blocks from here, right?

Yeah, it's.

He is.

I've met people who worked downtown for decades, and I've never seen it, so, I also love that the address is 111 Monroe.

So another.

Oh, my God, I mean.

All right, well, you had to get that there.

The there's an idea behind this, isn't there?

There is, there is.

So the, sculptor, Doug Boyd is, he found himself hiking the Sierra Nevada mountains, and he noticed all of a sudden that he was tied to his phone using GPS, taking photos instead of enjoying the beauty of the nature that he was in.

So he thought you.

Yeah.

Take it further.

And you know what?

If robots.

Or what if humans became robots, and then the robots discovered things that humans had abandoned.

So this is kind of his, message to people to put down the devices once in a while, connect with other humans in nature.

If a robot can read a book, you can read a book.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Okay.

We got licks uptown, ice cream and ice cream show.

What's this about?

Yeah, yeah.

So that's my friend Janine.

So the, owner and flavor creator, Rich Dolan is brilliant.

Flavors that, tie in to childhood memories.

Strawberry Quik or, Nutter Butter.

But then also flavors like fig and, goat cheese.

Personal.

Favorite.

My good.

But.

They're all lactose free.

Yeah.

And this is again, this is Uptown ice cream.

It, looks.

Like some town.

Where's it located?

Seventh and, seventh.

Avenue.

Melrose is it the Melrose there?

Yeah, yeah.

So.

Okay.

All right, all right.

Penske Racing Museum, we got Indy cars next.

After ice cream, we go to IndyCar.

It's the same again.

It's very diverse.

Yes.

Yeah.

So this is one of those places that, you're not just going to happen upon.

You have to know either someone tells you about it or yeah, you're going to buy a car from, Penske.

Some of these cars won the Indy 500, and they range from manufacturers at Ford to Pausch.

And it's a very small museum.

Stories.

Yeah.

Number of race cars, engines, trophies.

We're located.

Great.

A lot of fun.

Scottsdale in Scottsdale.

Okay.

All right.

And I know where this is.

Our next is a Sauro, and it's that crested at that is that is iconic.

That is, it really is.

That's a Britannica.

Barton Gardens, right?

This is the Desert Botanical Garden.

Yes, they have one.

So this is a very rare, world.

There's only one in about every 200,000 that are crested.

Yes.

I've only seen three since I've been here.

And the garden has one.

Yeah.

If you go ask about it, it's.

Yeah, yeah.

An iconic figure there.

All right.

The last one is really interesting.

It's Steven Spielberg's directorial debut.

And that looks like this was with the Phoenix Theater.

What's going on here?

Thanks.

Theater company.

So, they've been around for a very, very, very long time.

So Spielberg, when he was 17, debuted his very first film at what was then a little Phoenix Theater.

And if you get to when you get to theater at the box office, this hallway, to the right, there's a big picture of Steven as we know him today, and it tells the story about how his first film was debuted there.

And this hallway leading to the theaters.

They light up red, on performance night.

So it's kind of a red carpet experience.

Yeah, yeah.

And as far as Spielberg just got, like, 3.5 minutes of a science fiction film from 1964.

He was a kid.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.

And really, that meant, those few minutes that still exist.

You see them online, but they, you can see later on he put out, Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Yeah.

And if you see the, the, footage from his original movie, you see some hints or nods that that inspired.

Some interesting close encounters.

Got about like 20s left or what do you want people to take from this book?

Go and explore your own backyard.

Yeah.

What the book is for.

It's like places that even locals might not know about.

And yeah, good stuff.

Congratulations on the.

Book.

Thank you, Travis Swan again, 111 places in Phoenix that you must not miss.

Thanks for joining us.

Thank you.

For.

Award winning local journalist and author Christina Estes is back with the second murder mystery hunter Jolene Garcia.

Series.

The book is titled The Story That Wouldn't Die, and it deals with murder, potential corruption at City Hall and efforts to have the story and maybe even Jolene Garcia killed.

We spoke to Christina Estes about her new book.

Christina Estes joins us now.

Congratulations on what a set.

Up, Ted.

Thank you.

Well, this is a this is book number two.

Does it feel any different than book number one?

So the process right now feels, when I was here last time, I was nervous and geeky.

And this time I feel excited and geeky.

Oh, good.

As long as we keep the geeky, that's all we care about.

But you're.

It's each kind of gone through the process now.

You also went through the process of writing a book.

First time, I would imagine again, a little anxious.

Was it any better this time?

It was better because I knew that my writing was better and I also felt the story was better.

And I also knew I didn't really have to worry about whether I was just going to sit in a drawer for the rest of my life, that I had a deadline and so you needed to you needed to finish it.

That makes a difference to me.

Yeah.

When you know people, when you know it's going to get published as to I hope is going to give.

Okay.

Who is Jolene Garcia?

Jolene is a Phoenix TV reporter.

She's 29 years old from the Midwest who feels like a complete fish out of water in Phoenix.

She is fictional, but I draw that part for me.

I remember being a fish out of water when I moved here from the Midwest when I was in my late 20s, and so I'm able to recall those feelings in writing her.

Her relationship with her bosses and words her coworkers describe as best you can.

Overview of that.

Interesting.

How about that?

Yeah.

Jolene has a favorite photographer, which many reporters do, just like many photographers have favorite reporters.

And her favorite photographer is named Nate, and he sometimes calls her out because she goes too far, sometimes because she is very ambitious and persistent as a reporter.

But she's also not just seeking recognition to break a story and to be first, but also seeking some recognition that she did not get in her childhood.

So sometimes all of that combines and she does some questionable things.

Yeah, we get we learn a little bit about that, but not too much.

You don't give away too much about that.

It's kind of interesting.

Well, I will leave it alone with that.

There's a lot of city hall intrigue here.

There's lots of, like, bureaucratic intrigue.

My question, because I was, as I was reading, I was thinking, boy, how is she keeping all these things square?

How do you keep it together?

How do you know which person is which person and which are going?

You know what my brilliant editor, Maddie Howe, told me?

You need to remind the reader of why the person is in the story.

So, it was an edit that I know you wrote an early copy, so you didn't read the finished one, which is which?

Which addressed that.

But but because there are so many characters and because we will read books that sometimes will take us weeks, sometimes months, you don't sit down and you're like, Ted Simons, who was he?

You just need to remind.

And I did notice that I think it almost felt like at the end of two chapters is what I notice at the most is like, oh yeah, she's doing a nice job of making sure we remember who this person is and why this person is doing this sort of thing that was a technique that was poignant for us.

And you know what?

I see that now as a reader and I'm like.

Yes, brilliant.

Yes.

And when you don't see there's a reader, you go, hey, wait a minute.

Yes, any of these characters, because again, lots of characters and it's a it's not I wouldn't call it complicated, but it's not like an easy kind of a breezy sort of a read.

There's a lot going on here.

How did you make sure that they went in the right direction and they didn't do these characters, and it's all falling all over themselves wherever they want to go?

Well, I covered City Hall for nine years, so certainly my experiences and the people I encountered inspired the characters.

This is fictional.

However, Ted, I want to test your knowledge.

Do you remember 8 or 9 years ago?

This is total insider stuff.

Greg Stanton was mayor.

Yes.

He got stuck in the elevator at City Hall.

Yes, I do remember that.

That's how the book opens, with Jolene responding to the mayor.

And this I will say this was a very different mayor than mayor.

Yes, yes.

These are.

Interesting family as well.

The response from local politicians, obviously this book is coming out tomorrow, so we haven't had too much response on this.

But in general from reporters in town, besides the fact that there are no characters that are Arizona PBS hosts charming, loquacious, you know, next book.

Okay.

All right.

But besides that fault, what are you hearing as far as responses do people say, I know you, you're writing about me?

Well, you know, what's funny is there's a lot of speculation about who JJ is, which is Jolene's nemesis.

Oh, boy.

And yes.

So there's a lot of speculation about that, but but local people who are who are in the media really appreciate the, some of the sarcasm and some of the poking fun at management and social media and things that they really can't say because they're still in those positions.

Right?

Well, and anyone who's worked in television news understands and realize and sees that although now is social media, it is so much different than it used to be, but sees that dynamic.

Yeah, it is totally change the way the local news, commercial news is produced, for sure.

So with that book in your hand, is it the way did it finish?

Did this story end the the climax and everything?

Did it happen the way you envisioned it when you started writing?

Mostly I sort of left a bit of a cliffhanger.

And yes, you did.

Yes you did.

But that's but that's a little almost separate and apart from some of the other aspects of the story.

Something really big happens to Jolene, and, I didn't know where.

I didn't know how it was going to continue.

And so I was like.

I think I need to leave.

It there.

Okay.

Let the reader decide how they want it to end.

Yeah, yeah.

But between that and the first page, pretty much how you planned it.

Well, you know what, I didn't plan.

I didn't plan a career change where I'm now working at City Hall.

So that's a little weird, right?

Yeah, I was going to say some eyebrows raised.

Theirs doesn't necessarily put City Hall the best, but we won't go any further with that.

So.

Okay, so I'm guessing there's another Jolene Garcia novel coming down.

The bandit.

I totally want to know what people think and what they would like to see happen, based on the way that this sort of ends.

My heart is telling me something, and we'll see what Jolene tells me.

Research.

Do you do research on these books?

Well, this is very, kind of easily researched because it was based on my nine years of covering City Hall, and so I knew how the city operated.

I just I mean, I attended countless city council meetings and community meetings where I saw how policies and passions really affected us in our daily lives.

There is a serious story thread in the book about development and displacement, and that was completely drawn from my experiences.

Reporting is Hollywood or Netflix?

Are they calling it?

Are they get on themselves?

Okay.

All right.

If I do, you know, that's the only way to get my name on the book.

I that is a great deal.

Yeah.

There we go.

We're working the deal there.

But I mean, this is it sounds like this is like, this is this would work, don't you think?

Yeah.

I mean, I would be flattered if somebody wanted to make it into a streaming series, which is kind of what I think it would work better than than a movie.

Yeah.

It's so interesting to me when I hear, because for some authors, that's like the end all be like, they really want that.

And this was like, this is my baby.

I love my baby.

It's perfect the way it is not perfect, but I'm happy with it the way it is.

You should be happy with it.

Congratulations.

You number two.

Christina.

Is this a story that wouldn't die?

And, you just keep writing them and we'll keep reading them.

Thank you.

That's a great deal.

Good to have you here.

And that is it for now.

I'm Ted Simons.

Thank you so much for joining us on this special edition of Arizona Horizon.

You have a great evening.

You.