Vietnam War, 1961-1975

The collection documents the National Jewish Welfare Board's (JWB) evolution from an organization founded in 1917 to provide support for soldiers in times of war to an agency involved in all aspects of Jewish life both in the United States and abroad. In 1990 JWB recreated itself as the Jewish Community Centers Association of North America.

The National Jewish Welfare Board Military Chaplaincy Records document the evolution and activities of NJWB’s military chaplaincy agency, which was known as the Commission on Army and Navy Religious Activities (CANRA) from 1942 to 1947, as the Division of Religious Activities (DRA) from 1947 to 1953, and then as the Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy (CJC) after 1953, during the Executive Directorship of Aryeh Lev (1946-1975) and Philip Bernstein (1942-1946). The collection also consists of Aryeh Lev’s records during his service as assistant to the Office of the Chief of Chaplains of the Army (1940-1945), as well as Lev’s personal papers. Most broadly, the collection chronicles the role of Jewish chaplaincy and Jewish participation in the U.S. military effort from WWII to the Vietnam War. Subjects addressed include the establishment of Judaism as one of the major faiths in the U.S. military, patterns of observance among service members, and post-WWII relief work by Jewish chaplains on behalf of displaced persons. Materials include minutes, reports, correspondence, speeches, sermons, autobiographical writings, photographs, questionnaires and printed materials.

Collection is composed of addresses, speeches, testimony, correspondence, press releases, and Congressional Record excerpts.

The papers of Seymour Halpern reflect a wide range of issues including problems posed by Palestininan refugees, defeating Arab boycotts, cutting off foreign aid to the United Arab Republic and President Abdel Nasser of Egypt, denouncing U.S. arm shipments to Arab states, protesting Egyptian intervention in Yemen, responding to France's withdraw from NATO, celebrating Israel's anniversaries, supporting Hadassah, eulogizing J.F. Kennedy, assisting Jews in the Soviet Union, ratifying the Genocide Convention, working towards domestic immigration reform, urging the dispatch of an international peace-keeping force in South Vietnam, and establishing a U.S. Committee on Human Rights. Of particular interest is 1963 correspondence between Halpern and Richard M. Nixon regarding Nixon's visit to the United Arab Republic.

This collection is comprised of photographs, one bank book, pamphlets, clippings and personal correspondence regarding the organization, Trees for Vietnam (later named Trees and Life for Vietnam). Trees and Life for Vietnam’s goals came out of the Jewish Campaign for the People’s Peace Treaty, which sought to establish a treaty of peace between the United States and North Vietnam from the late 1960s to the early 1970s.

Rabbi William F. Rosenblum was head rabbi of the reform congregation at Temple Israel in New York City, 1930-1963. He was also an active leader in a number of Jewish social welfare and religious organizations. In addition to broadly documenting his rabbinical career and organizational activities, the William F. Rosenblum Papers reflect Rosenblum's interests in military chaplaincy, relations between Catholicism and Judaism, the media, race relations, post-WWII Europe, and the Vietnam War. Materials include correspondence, scrapbooks, sermons, speeches, notes, radio transcripts, clippings, photographs, audiotapes, and film.