Consists of a letter written by Abelson from Nemaksht, Lithuania, in a beautiful script and unusually elegant language, to his friend Louis Wigdor in Missouri, describing his personal condition and some aspects of Jewish life in Eastern Europe and inquiring about conditions and job opportunities in America. Of interest are references to anti-Semitism in Eastern Europe and the revival of Hebrew as a living language.

Under the employ of the New York Kehillah, detective Abraham Shoenfeld infiltrated and documented Jewish crime rings, prostitution houses and gambling establishments from 1912 to 1917. For the American Jewish Committee from 1938 to 1964, he investigated anti-Semitic organizations and individuals. He also authored a controversial book about the New York crime world, The Joy Peddler, and he was at work on other pieces of fiction and his memoirs. The bulk of his papers consist of investigative reports and research for the American Jewish Committee, his manuscripts, and his collection of anti-Semitic literature.

The collection contains papers Abraham Silverstein, an American Soviet Jewry movement activist who co-founded and co-chaired the Academy of the Air for Jewish Studies, an agency that prepared educational shortwave radio programs for Jews in the Soviet Union. The materials include correspondence, memos, project descriptions and reports, news clippings, transcripts of lectures, research materials and 18 audiocassettes with recordings of the programs.

The bulk of the collection contains documents generated by the Judenrats of the Vilna ghetto during Nazi occupation. The Yiddish poets Abraham Sutzkever and Szmerke Kaczerginski, interned in the Vilna Ghetto before escaping to the forests as partisans, were instrumental in the removal of this collection from Vilna and its subsequent transfer to the YIVO Archives in New York. The collection is therefore named in their honor.

The Adolf Leschnitzer Collection documents the life and professional activities of Adolf Leschnitzer, researcher, historian, and teacher. The collection includes brochures, booklets, clippings, correspondence, financial, vital, and immigration documents, minutes, notes, photographs, printed materials, and writings, by Adolf Leschnitzer as well as other authors. Additionally, there are materials dealing with other members of the Leschnitzer family, namely his wife, Maria Leschnitzer, née Bratz, her mother, Elly Bratz, née Michael, Adolf and Maria Leschnitzers' son, Michael Lesch, also known as Michael Leschnitzer, and Adolf and Albertt Frank.

The collection contains photographs and video recordings taken by Kansas City, Missouri rabbi, Alan L. Cohen, during his trips to visit the Jewish Communities in the Former Soviet Union in 1989 and 1993. Included in Rabbi Cohen’s papers are photographs of a protest demonstration organized by Refuseniks in front of the Moscow Kremlin in 1989.

The collection contains papers of Alan M. Kohn, a former emergency preparedness operations officer at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and a former president of Temple Beth Sholom, the Conservative Synagogue of Brevard County, Florida. It documents Mr. Kohn's participation in the Rally for Soviet Jewry outside of the John F. Kennedy Space Center of NASA on July 15, 1975. The occasion for the rally was the launch of the Apollo spacecraft manned with three astronauts for a rendezvous with the Soviet Soyuz manned spacecraft on the Apollo-Soyuz Space Mission. The purpose of the rally was to raise public awareness of the plight of the Jews in the Soviet Union and to demand their freedom. The collection includes part of an unpublished, novelized memoir written by Alan M. Kohn in 1995, that focused on the rally. The collection also contains a letter of introduction to the memoir.

The American Federation of Jews from Central Europe Collection consists of the Federation’s office files. This includes professional correspondence, by-laws, materials related to meetings and lectures, newspaper clippings, photographs, meeting minutes, reports, speeches, drafts, financial records, legal documents and forms, materials related to immigration and naturalization, newsletters and circulars, membership records, personnel files, restitution materials, oral history transcripts, and items of various related organizations and synagogues. There are also some personal documents sent to the AFJCE by members of the public.

The collection documents American Jewish Committee’s efforts to combat all forms of discrimination against the Jews in the United States. Additionally, there are materials pertaining to AJC’s work regarding other minority groups in the United States. The collection offers researchers a unique chance to see how and what was done prior to the changes in public opinion and civic and legal laws. The American Jewish Committee Records, Subject Files consists of materials created by executive offices, departments, local offices and chapters of the Committee concerning a variety of matters; foremost Jewish civil and religious rights, immigration, and the Holocaust.

The collection contains audio and video interviews with activists of the American Soviet Jewry Movement, former Refuseniks and Prisoners of Conscience.

This is an artificial collection that contains digitized photographs and slides selected from various collections in the Archives of the American Soviet Jewry Movement, and other related collections at the American Jewish Historical Society. The physical part of the collection consists of one manuscript box containing 415 photographs that were separated from their parent collections.

This is an artificial collection that contains digitized posters and ephemera selected from various collections in the Archives of the American Soviet Jewry Movement at the American Jewish Historical Society.

The papers of the president of Arizona Action for Soviet Jewry Ann Polunsky contain audio recordings documenting activism on behalf of Soviet Jews in the Greater Phoenix, AZ.

The records consist of documentation of the Anti-Defamation League efforts to track and counter activities of the John Birch Society from its founding in 1958 through the mid-1970s. The material was organized by the ADL New England regional office and consists of correspondence, including copies of internal JBS material, memoranda, a large volume of newspaper clippings, as well as pamphlets, publications and reports.

The Anti-Semitic Literature Collection documents journalistic source materials (newspapers, newsletters, and illustrations) regarding views of anti-Semitism in the United States during the 20th-century. A few items from the 19th-century are included, particularly illustrations from Puck, Vanity Fair, and The Judge. Items are from various periodicals (i.e., The Dearborn Independent, Common Sense, The Crusader, The White American), organizations (i.e., American Nazi Party, the Christian Educational Association, and the White Party of America), and by many different authors (i.e., Father C.E. Coughlin, Benjamin Freedman, Otto H.F. Vollbehr). Additionally, this collection contains responses by American organizations to American and European anti-Semitism as well as documentation on the reaction of anti-Semitism in Canada.

The papers of the Soviet Jewry movement activist Professor of Computer Science, Emeritus at the State University of New York at Stony Brook Dr. Arthur Bernstein contain a copy of his petition on behalf of fellow computer scientist and Soviet Jewish Prisoner of Conscience Anatoly Sharansky signed by over 230 prominent American computer scientists and mailed to the Soviet and American officials and to the United Nations in 1977. The collection also contains an autobiographical note with a brief history of the Sharansky petition.

Correspondence, clippings, reports, memos and other office papers

This collection contains the papers of Babette Wampold and the Alabama Council to Save Soviet Jews and documents their activities on behalf of the American Soviet Jewry Movement. The collection is comprised of correspondence, case files, clippings, newsletters, photographs, and trip reports.

Personal papers of the Soviet Jewry Movement activist Rabbi Barry Marks, a spiritual leader of Temple Israel of Springfield, IL and a founder of the Greater Springfield Interfaith Association. The collection reflects Rabbi Marks' and the Springfield, IL Jewish community's involvement in the Soviet Jewry movement. The materials include clippings, correspondence, memoranda, newsletters, and speeches.

The papers of Bayard Rustin, a prominent American civil rights leader, LGBT rights activist, and advocate for the Black-Jewish cooperation in the United States, that focus on his involvement in the American Soviet Jewry movement. The collection contains speeches and articles on Soviet Jewry by Bayard Rustin from 1960s-1980s. Also included are publications by the executive secretary of the Conference on the Status of Soviet Jews, Moshe Decter— Redemption! Jewish freedom letters from Russia with foreword by Rustin, and "Silence and Yearning: A Report and Analysis of the Status of Soviet Jewry" based on the findings of the Ad Hoc Commssion on the Rights of Soviet Jews, chaired by Rustin.

The collection contains Bernard G. Richards personal and official correspondence, papers from his involvement with the American Jewish Congress and Jewish Information Bureau, published and unpublished writings, publications collected by Richards, articles about Richards and his activities, correspondence and articles from testimonial dinners in honor of Richards, and photographs. Significant correspondents include Joseph Barondess, Louis D. Brandeis, Vladimir Jabotinsky, J.L. Magnes, Louis Marshall, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jacob H. Schiff, Philip Slomovitz, Arthur Hays Sulzberger, Morris Winchovsky, and Stephen S. Wise.

Bernhard Kahn dedicated 50 years of his life to welfare activities in order to help distressed Jews. Among others he worked for the Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Comittee and the American Joint Reconstruction Foundation .The collection contains personal as well as professional correspondence, articles on Bernhard Kahn’s work and biography, lectures and speeches by him and a number of official documents such as letters of consignment, citizenship papers and educational and professional certificates.

This collection holds the papers of Bernhard Kolb, the business manager of the Jewish Community of Nuremberg. Among the material here are personal papers with some information on the Kolb family as well as a small amount of papers of Hans and Käte Bruck and some material on Jewish communities, especially that of Nuremberg. However, the collection is largely comprised of records from Theresienstadt and the offices of Der Stürmer, the Nazi newspaper. The collection includes official records such as lists, reports and announcements; correspondence; unpublished manuscripts; notes; and some photographs and drawings.

The collection documents the activities on behalf of Soviet Jewry of Bert Silver who served as president of the Jewish Community Council of Greater Washington, worked on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and chaired the commission on international affairs of the American Jewish Congress in Washington, D.C.

The Papers of the American Soviet Jewry movement activist Betty Golomb represent one collection housed within the Archive of the American Soviet Jewry Movement (AASJM). Ms. Golomb was a board member of the Women's Auxiliary of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, served as the chair of the task force on Soviet Jewry for the Union of American Hebrew Congregations and in the executive committee of the National Conference on Soviet Jewry and led Women's Plea for Human Rights for Soviet Jews, sponsored by the Leadership Conference of National Jewish Women's Organizations. The papers of Betty Golomb contain documents of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Leadership Conference of National Jewish Women’s Organizations’ Committee on Soviet Jewry, Women’s Plea for Human Rights for Soviet Jewry, National Federation of Temple Sisterhoods, Congressional Wives for Soviet Jewry, National Conference on Soviet Jewry and National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council. The materials include correspondence, memos, agenda, organizational guidelines, manuals and proposals, publications, photographs.

The collection contains papers of the American Soviet Jewry movement activist Billie Kozolchyk. The documents include a collection of clippings from The Arizona Post that cover the Soviet Jewry movement in the Tucson area during the period of 1977 to 1991. Many of the articles mention Billie Kozolchyk and some are authored by her. The collection also contains excerpts from the diaries of Roz Kaufman, the chairperson of the Tucson-based Chairwoman of Women's Plea for Soviet Jewry. Also included are three t-shirts commemorating the annual Freedom Run for Soviet Jewry that occurred from the late 1970s until the early 1990s in Tucson, AZ.

The collection reflects the role of B’nai B’rith and other organizations in the movement to liberate Soviet Jews. The materials in the B'nai B'rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum Soviet Jewry collection include articles, a flier and posters.

The Records of the Board of Delegates of American Israelites (1859-1878) documents the life cycle of the Board of Delegates, a Jewish civil rights organization located in New York City. The Board served in a two-fold function: acting as a central organization for American Jews and working on behalf of Jews abroad. To the latter end, the Delegates collaborated with the Committee of Deputies of British Jews and the French Alliance Israélite Universelle to provide for the relief and aid, civil, and religious rights of Jews throughout the Americas, Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East, particularly Romania, Ottoman Palestine including Jerusalem, and Morocco.

In the U.S., the Delegates were partially responsible for the appointment of the first Jewish Military Chaplain and surveyed member synagogues concerning the history and size of their congregation, the first organization to systematically record this type of information in the States. The Delegates merged with the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) in 1878 and dissolved in 1925. Correspondents include Adolph Crémieux, Sir Moses Montefiore, Benjamin Franklin Peixotto, Isaacs S. Myer, the Rev. Dr. Arnold Fischel, and Maj. General Benjamin Butler. Documents include correspondence, minutes, committee reports, memorials, announcements, surveys, some printed material including clippings, and a 1932 Rabbinical thesis on the Delegates by Allan Tarshish.

This collection includes historical and genealogical information about the Weil family. Also included is correspondence regarding Bruno Weil's restitution case as well as the organization of Nazi persecution victims. World War I diaries and manuscripts of books written by Weil are also part of the collection.

This collection contains personal papers of the American Soviet Jewry movement activists Carol and Michael Bierman including background materials on Jews in the USSR, documents, and artifacts from demonstrations, rallies and cultural events of the movement, newsletters, pamphlets, and brochures. Also included are photographs and audio and video materials pertaining to Refuseniks, Prisoners of Conscience and Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union.