“In the film, he talks about driving around in his truck getting water, and he would just see bodies lying on the side of the road, because no one was coming to bury them,” said Bridget Federspiel, who teaches history at Stivers School for the Arts.
Federspiel is also a youth coordinator for the Junior Council on World Affairs, which is part of the Dayton Council on World Affairs, the nonprofit sponsoring the film showing. Dayton was one of the first U.S. cities to accept Rwandan refugees.
The showing will be held at 5 p.m. Sunday at The Neon. Tickets are $5.
Credit: JIM NOELKER
Credit: JIM NOELKER
Wilkens decided to stay in Rwanda during the 1994 genocide when embassies were pulling their citizens out of the country because two people who worked in his house were Tutsis, Federspiel said.
“They were the ones being targeted by the Hutus,” Federspiel said. “Carl thought if he stayed, he could at least try and protect them.”
Wilkens provided aid to other people near him, bringing supplies to an orphanage that was also hiding Tutsi people inside. He provided people with basic first aid using kits from the Red Cross.
“Wilkens is a superhero,” Federspiel said.
In addition to Wilkens, a small group of United Nations soldiers stayed, along with members of the Red Cross, Federspiel said.
“For the most part, the entire world just left,” Federspiel said.
The Rwandan genocide continued through July 15, 1994, during which between 800,000 and a million people were killed, according to varying accounts. The Journal of Genocide Research estimates there were between 500,000 to 800,000 Tutsi deaths.
Dayton’s connection to Rwanda
In 1995, Dayton began accepting Rwandan refugees. Catholic Social Services and the city were involved in bringing in refugees. The House of the People in Dayton also became a shelter dedicated to refugees and asylees from Rwanda following the genocide.
“We were one of the first in the country to take in (Rwandan) refugees,” Federspiel said.
Kinyarwanda, a language spoken by Rwandans, is one of the languages available for translation in Dayton City Schools. Approximately 30 different languages are spoken in the district, Federspiel said.
“There’s still a pretty significant Rwandan population here,” she said.
Credit: JIM NOELKER
Credit: JIM NOELKER
Rwanda is among the top 10 countries of origin for Dayton’s international community members, according to the 2020 Census.
Dayton has continued to be a welcoming city to refugees and immigrants. Immigrants in Montgomery County paid more than $219 million in taxes and held more than $562 million in spending power in 2019, according to research from New American Economy.
Federspiel’s connections to Wilkens, Rwanda
Federspiel has been teaching the Rwandan genocide since the early 2000s. In 2018, Wilkens visited the region due to a connection with Kettering Health, which is connected with the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
“He came and spoke to my students,” Federspiel said.
She was later able to travel with Wilkens in Rwanda, visiting sites of mass executions and killings during the 1994 genocide.
“The one that bothered me the most was in a school,” Federspiel said. “... For me, schools are supposed to be safe places.”
Federspiel also learned of Rwanda’s current day reconciliation and restorative justice efforts of the country.
“They have these reconciliation villages, which we went to, and this one woman is now, after 30 years, friends with the man who murdered her husband and children,” Federspiel said.
Forgiveness between victims and the perpetrators is one of the ways Rwandans are healing from the genocide, she said.
“If they keep wanting to get revenge, it’s just going to lead to more killing and more killing,” Federspiel said.
Wilkens is expected to visit Dayton again in May and will be hosted by the Dayton Council on World Affairs.
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