TRANSITION

SIMON WIESENTHAL, 96

A survivor of 12 concentration camps, Wiesenthal pursued Nazi war criminals around the globe for almost 60 years. The relentless investigator played a role in the capture of more than 1,100 fugitives, including "chief executioner" Adolf Eichmann, Treblinka commandant Franz Stangl and the Gestapo officer who had arrested diarist Anne Frank. Though critics took issue with some of his claims--the title of his 1961 book "I Hunted Eichmann" was called an overstatement--Wiesenthal devoted his life to ensuring that the perpetrators of Adolf Hitler's "final solution" could never rest in peace, no matter how far they ran. Bringing as many to justice as possible, even decades later, was his way of making sure the world never forgot the millions who died. "For your benefit, learn from our tragedy," Wiesenthal once said in an interview. "It is not a written law that the next victims must be Jews. It can also be other people."

© 2005