Miklós Vig

Miklós Vig was a Hungarian cabaret and jazz singer, actor, comedian and theater secretary in the 1920s, 30s and 40s. Born in Budapest on July 11, 1898, he was murdered there on December 19, 1944 by members of the Arrow Cross.

He was born Miklós Voglhut in 1898 to a Hungarian Jewish family in Budapest, Hungary. Although he went to acting school, he had better success as a cabaret singer.

In 1924 as his career was picking up he changed his surname to Vig. He changed his name because Voglhut was a Jewish-sounding name and antisemitism was growing at the time. Vig means cheerful or merry; it is a nice, short, typically Hungarian name that also made a great stage name.

The fact that he was married to a Catholic woman, Kati Szőke, and the fact that he changed his name did not save him from the Holocaust. On December 19, 1944, Miklós was among a group of Jews who were bound, lined up along the banks of the Danube and machine-gunned into the river by Hungarian Nazis, members of the Arrow Cross Party. The Shoes on the Danube Promenade honors the memory of those who were murdered in this fashion.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikl%C3%B3s_Vig