ROCK ISLAND, Illinois--If you ask Felix Weil how he managed to be the only one in his family to survive the Holocaust, he would tell you it was a mixture of luck and fate.
"I wasn't supposed to make it either. It was a mistake," says Felix.
Felix was one of only 10,000 children in Europe saved by the kindertransport, a train that came from England to bring kids ages 2-16 our of Nazi ridden countries to safety.
"There was a girl by the name of Felicia, very close to my name, Felix. Her last name was Weil too. She was supposed to have been on one of these trains," explains Felix.
But because someone misread the name, it was Felix who got a spot on the train.
"If it hadn't been for that mistake, I wouldn't be here today to tell the story," says Felix.
At only 11 years old, Felix made it to England safely. But his parents and sister were taken to a ghetto in Poland. Later they were taken to a concentration camp where they were killed along with 6,000,000 other Jewish people.
"I have a guilt reeling of not being with my family. Why did they have to lose their lives and not me? Why wasn't I with them?" wonders Felix.
After living in England, Felix made his way to the United States back in 1945. He was then drafted to the US Army where he was sent for post war operations in Frankfurt, Germany, the town he grew up in, the last place he saw his family.
Felix is one of the few Holocaust survivors left in the world, and he says it's his duty to his family and all those who died to keep sharing his story in hopes the tragedy will never be forgotten.
"We must all learn to be able to get along with one another no matter what religion, what color, what race. There's no reason there's not enough room in this world for all of us," says Felix.
Felix now is a father of two and a grandfather of four.
Felix was the guest of honor on Sunday at the Tri-City Jewish Center in Rock Island where people gathered for Yom HaShoah which means "Day of Remembrance of the Holocaust" in Hebrew.