Bared Maronian: Orphans of the Genocide
Bared Maronian won four regional Emmy awards for his work as an editor and producer at WPBT, Miami’s PBS television outlet. Then after 15 years, his position vanished in a flurry of staff cuts. It’s a sadly common experience in today’s fast-evolving media world.
What happened next was not merely uncommon but life changing.
While planning his next career move, Maronian read a March 2010 article in The Independent newspaper by British journalist Robert Fisk. Under the headline, “Living Proof of the Armenian Genocide,” the article described the systematic conversion of Armenian orphans into Turks during the First World War.
The article cited an American researcher who uncovered evidence that a college in Lebanon was formerly a center for such conversions. Fisk described it as an “orphanage of terror in which Armenian children were systematically deprived of their Armenian identity and given new Turkish names, forced to become Muslims and beaten savagely if they were heard to speak Armenian.”
As an Armenian born in Lebanon, Maronian was gripped by the topic and sensed that Fisk’s revelations shed light on an important but little known aspect of the Armenian Genocide. “This was uncharted territory,” he said.
Thanks to Maronian, that territory is now well charted and ready to be explored by a new generation. His recently completed documentary Orphans of the Genocide examines the fate of thousands of children whose parents were murdered on order of the Ottoman rulers.
It is not a simple story. Many Armenian children were killed along with their parents between 1915 and 1922, but others were taken in by Turkish or Kurdish families. Some of those were raised as adopted children, while the rest became laborers or concubines. Thousands more were rescued by missionaries or international relief workers and sheltered in charitable orphanages in the Middle East and Greece. The less fortunate were rounded up by Ottoman authorities, only to be starved or shipped to nightmarish asylums like the one Fisk profiled.
Orphans of the Genocide intersperses archival footage with photographs and interviews with Fisk and other authorities. Among the film’s most powerful voices is that of Taner Akcam, Turkish-born historian and author. Maronian crossed America from Florida to Boston to California, as well as traveling to the Middle East and finally to Armenia to record stories and document locations where Armenian orphans were housed.
The film makes clear that the tragedy of the Armenian orphans was once well known in America and Europe, as Near East Relief and other charitable organizations solicited funds to shelter them. Major companies such as Nestle lent support, as did child star Jackie Coogan. But the orphans were largely forgotten by the world over the years.
Most historians cite the deaths of up to 1.5 million Armenians as the first genocide of the 20th century, precursor to the horrors perpetrated by Hitler. The present-day government of Turkey, however, insists that all deaths and deportations resulted from the chaos of war. It has firmly resisted calls to acknowledge that genocide occurred. However, Fisk points out that forcibly erasing children’s identity and transferring them to another ethnic group is itself genocide under international law.
The film leaves open the question of just how successful these conversions were. “There are Armenians living in Turkey today who know that they’re Armenian and others who don’t know,” Maronian said. “Some children were lost, but others were found.”
Maronian set out with modest expectations and an equally modest budget. “I told my wife I needed a year and she agreed,” he said. That was nearly three years ago. He produced a condensed 20-minute version of the documentary that was shown to mostly Armenian audiences across the country.
The result was an outpouring of encouragement, along with photographs and testimony from surviving orphans and their families. He also got enough financial support to keep going. “I hit the wall more than once, but every time angels appeared,” he said.
Maronian also benefited from extraordinary dedication of friends and former colleagues who donated or discounted their services. “I never had to compromise quality,” he said. “That’s very important to me.”
The full-length film was recently shown in Detroit and is scheduled for showing in other cities. Maronian is hoping for wider distribution as the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide approaches. “I think people will want to hear this story, and I think they should hear this story,” he said.
Maronian can be reached at Armenoid Productions in Coconut Creek, Florida (armenoid@comcast.net), where he is executive producer.