Yes, the Miltons affected history. Odgen supported the Nazis through financial support and Kitty in her denial of refuge to Elsa's son, throwing him in harm's way, i.e., he was eventually imprisoned and died as a victim of the Holocaust. As to the "people at the edge of the photographs" this is all of us who as bystanders don't do or say something to confront racism and discrimination. Silence affects history. There is a book written several years ago entitled Hitler's Willing Executioners which posited that the German people willingly allowed the extermination of Jews by either internally denying it (silence) or knowing about it (because this author contends all Germans knew what was going on) and allowing it to happen. There is an irony to what Evie says as she tries to avoid her family's past while her husband keeps trying to out it front and center in Evie's life.