of them accordingly. Mengele arranged to have special living quarters built for them, so they could be monitored. To keep them healthy for his human experimentation, he arranged for them to have more hygienic living conditions, better food and their own bedclothes. Mengele allowed them to keep their own clothes, and forced the taller members of the group to carry the dwarfs to the experimentation sites. The family were told that they were to put on a show for the SS guards at their huge canteen. When they arrived Mengele had them strip whilst he spoke about his own ideas about genetics. The Ovitzes—like many other camp inmates—were subjected to various tests. Mengele's physicians extracted bone marrow and pulled out teeth and hair to find signs of hereditary disease. They poured hot and cold water in their ears and blinded them with chemical drops. Gynecologists inspected the married women. Eighteen-month-old Shimshon Ovitz was put through the worst ordeals because he had taller parents and was prematurely born; Mengele drew blood from the veins behind his ears and from his fingers on a daily basis often causing weakness. The Ovitzes also witnessed two newcomer dwarfs being killed and boiled so their bones could be exhibited in a museum. Mengele also filmed them; this film was not found after the war, and it is possible that he kept it when he fled. They expected to be killed after Mengele had finished his experiments, but they lived to see the liberation of Auschwitz on 27 January 1945. The Red Army took them to the Soviet Union where they lived in a refugee camp for some time before they were released. Aftermath The Ovitzes traveled on foot for seven months to their home village. They found their home looted and moved, first to the town of Sighet and later to Belgium. In May 1949 they immigrated to Israel, settled in Haifa, and began their tours again, being quite successful and packing large concert halls. In 1955 they retired and bought a cinema hall. Descendants of the dwarf men of the family were born taller; the women did not become pregnant due to their small pelvises. The firstborn of the dwarfs, Rozika Ovitz, died in 1984 at the age of 98. The last adult dwarf survivor of the family, Perla Ovitz, died in 2001. Media In March 2013, Warwick Davis presented an episode of the