Agi Day

Prepared by the Witnesses of War team

Agi Day was born Zagorka Herzog on 13 May 1940 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, now Serbia. Following the German invasion in 1941, her Jewish family fled to Budapest, Hungary, seeking safety from Nazi persecution. Agi was still an infant when her family became refugees.

The German occupation of Hungary in March 1944 brought renewed danger. Her father went into hiding in the countryside, while her mother sought protection through a Catholic priest. Agi’s mother, older sister and grandmother found refuge in a convent, disguised as nuns. Agi, only four years old, was hidden separately with Catholic families. One childless couple presented her as a cousin visiting from the countryside, concealing her Jewish identity. She spent the final months of the war dependent on the people sheltering her.

Reunited after the war, the family fled Hungary again in 1946, crossing Lake Neusiedl by boat at night into Austria. They subsequently lived in displaced persons camps, including Bad Gastein. Agi later stayed with her father in Vienna while her mother went ahead to Canada to earn money for her passage.

In 1951, aged eleven, Agi joined her mother in Toronto. She became an elementary school and English-language teacher, later raising her children in Montreal. After moving to Seattle, she earned a master’s degree in organizational communication and worked in real estate on Mercer Island. In 2014, she began sharing her experiences through the Holocaust Center for Humanity’s Speakers Bureau, speaking to students and community groups about her childhood in hiding and the people who helped her survive.