CBS News
Northern California Holocaust survivor turns 100, credits faith and forgiveness for long life
CALISTOGA – Northern California Holocaust survivor Nick Hope turned 100 years old on Sunday.
Hope, surrounded by friends and family, hosted a birthday party in his hometown of Calistoga to celebrate living one century.
“I don’t feel that I’m 100,” Hope said Sunday.
CBS13 first shared Hope’s full story in a three-part series that aired in May 2024, titled “What Hope can do.”
Though his birthday was filled with smiles, there were many days of Hope’s life that were darker. On some, he did not even know if he would make it to the next morning, let alone decades more.
“How did I get through this horrible, terrible hell to 100 years?” said Hope.
Just a child, Hope survived the Holodomor, a forced famine on the Ukrainian people that claimed millions of lives.
Then as a teenager, Hope was imprisoned at Dachau concentration camp in Germany for more than two years.
“No more man. Not a name. Zero. When you step in, you are a dead man,” said Hope.
Hope during every trial kept his grandfather’s words in his heart: “He always said, ‘patient. Patient,'” said Hope.
He survived the Holocaust after American forces liberated Dachau. Then, he truly lived after.
“For him to do what he did, it’s something beyond himself. Very difficult,” said George, Nick Hope’s son. “And for him, he doesn’t hang on. That’s the beautiful thing he wants to keep moving forward. I believe for him to be 100, his famous saying is, ‘Just keep going.'”
George is one of Hope’s three children.
After World War II ended, Hope found a new life in marrying his wife Nadia, also a Holocaust survivor.
They lived for some time in Germany after the war, then eventually settled in Calistoga.
Hope worked to the age of 97 and retired a renowned Napa Valley builder.
If there is anything that defines his life more than hope, it’s faith and forgiveness.
“It helps me to live whole life, to 100 years old. God says, ‘Forgive and be forgiven,'” said Hope.
The family is raising money in an online fundraiser with the goal of sending Hope back to Dachau for the 80th commemoration of the camp’s liberation in April 2025.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
CBS News
Yellowstone hiker burned when she falls into scalding water near Old Faithful, park officials say
Yellowstone National Park, Wyo. — A New Hampshire woman suffered severe burns on her leg after hiking off-trail in Yellowstone National Park and falling into scalding water in a thermal area near the Old Faithful geyser, park officials said.
The 60-year-old woman from Windsor, New Hampshire, along with her husband and their leashed dog were walking off a designated trail near the Mallard Lake Trailhead on Monday afternoon when she broke through a thin crust over the water and suffered second- and third-degree burns to her lower leg, park officials said. Her husband and the dog weren’t injured.
The woman was flown to Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center in Idaho Falls, Idaho for treatment.
National Park Service / Jacob W. Frank
Park visitors are reminded to stay on boardwalks and trails in hydrothermal areas and exercise extreme caution. The ground in those areas is fragile and thin and there’s scalding water just below the surface, park officials said.
Pets are allowed in limited, developed areas of Yellowstone park but are prohibited on boardwalks, hiking trails, in the backcountry and in thermal areas.
The incident is under investigation. The woman’s name wasn’t made public.
This is the first known thermal injury in Yellowstone in 2024, park officials said in a statement. The park had recorded 3.5 million visitors through August this year.
Hot springs have injured and killed more people in Yellowstone National Park than any other natural feature, the National Park Service said. At least 22 people have died from hot spring-related injuries in and around the 3,471-square-mile national park since 1890, park officials have said.