Spain

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.

The Enrique Lerdau Family Collection focuses on documentation of the lives of Fritz and Barbara (née Elkan) Lerdau and their children, including their early years, marriage, and emigration to Peru. In addition the collection provides material on the Elkan and Rée families and their members, and to a smaller extent on the Lerdau (formerly Levy) family, including some genealogical information. The history of the hops industry and of the company J.F.U. Scheibel is also mentioned among the documents of this collection. The collection includes an assortment of documents, including extensive correspondence; several memoirs; official, legal, educational, financial, and military documents; many photographs; and family writings including poems, notebooks, and eulogies.

This collection contains documents, diaries and personal correspondence of Ernst Scheuer and Rosi Moses Scheuer. They document their life in Paris and their imprisonment in French detention centers in 1939-40 and in Spanish prisons 1940-41. The documents illustrate the struggle for U.S. Visas and the subsequent emigration to the United States, as well as the efforts to establish themselves in New York. The collection also contains numerous manuscripts written by Ernst and Rosi Scheuer, a large number of them being autobiographical.

The bulk of the collection is an assembly of various reports, amounting to a document of 907 pages in ten sections: the reports originate mainly from the "Comité de Coordination pour l'Assistance dans les Camps" (CCAC; also known as "Comité de Nîmes") and other organizations, such as the “American Friends Service Committee” (AFSC) and YMCA pertaining to foreign – particularly Jewish – refugees in unoccupied France during WW II.

Isaac Bitton (1926- ) was born in Lisbon, Portugal. He immigrated to Palestine in the early 1940s where he would go on to serve in the Jewish Brigade of the British Army and later the Israeli Defense Force. He and his family moved to the US in 1959, eventually settling in Woodstock, Illinois. He was a successful executive and philanthropist. This collection contains correspondence and addresses related to the efforts of Isaac Bitton in the restoration of the Jewish cemetery in Faro, Portugal and the recognition of Portuguese diplomat Aristides de Sousa Mendes in the aid given to Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. The collection also contains some material related to his work with the US government, in particular the Small Business Administration.

This collection contains the work of Sephardic scholar and poet David Fintz Altabé. The bulk of this collection consists of lectures and several poems, in addition to a newspaper clipping.

The papers of John/Jean (Hans Ulrich) Stern are composed of a selection of his school papers, several journal entries and primary sources from Tangiers Morocco, and later sources from reunions and societies related to the Jewish communities of Tangiers. There are also several samples of his wife Alia’s poetry in English and French.

This collection documents the events surrounding Sepharad ’92, an event and an international Jewish committee to commemorate the five-hundredth anniversary of the Jewish expulsion from Spain as part of the Spanish Inquisition. The committee, headquartered in New York City, developed programs that sought to educate the public through a variety of approaches about the expulsion and the relocation of Spain’s Jewish population throughout the world. Such programs included educational curriculum, exhibitions, interfaith gatherings, concerts, and conferences.

Sephardic House was established in 1978 as a correction to the often-overlooked contributions of the Sephardic community to American-Jewish culture. The Records of Sephardic House documents the administrative, programming, and publishing activities of Sephardic House since its founding. Such documents include financial records, meeting minutes, correspondence, artist portfolios, press releases, photographs, slides, and much more.

The collection documents the work of Henry Besso and reflects various aspects of his professional life, personal research and writings in the field of Sephardic culture, Spanish language and linguistics, and Sephardic and Spanish history. Collection also documents Besso's involvement with Sephardic organizations and communities. Collection includes audio materials, brochures, booklets, clippings, conference procedures, correspondence, government publications, minutes, notes, photographs, printed matter, reports, speeches, and writings and translations by Henry Besso and others.

The John H. E. Fried Collection contains legal briefs prepared by Fried as a legal consultant to the Nuremberg Tribunal. Manuscripts, legal briefs, clippings, offprints, and memoranda by Fried, Justice Robert Jackson, John J. McCloy and others, cover a range of topics including war crimes, National Socialism, international law, and human rights. The collection contains proceedings of war crimes trials, in particular those of the Nuremberg Tribunal. Also of interest are drafts and research notes by Fried for books on human rights and international justice.

Collection of rare original documents from the 18th century, such as a letter of protection, a passport, and three decrees from Berlin, Coburg, Dessau, Kassel, and Schweinfurt. Also included is a copy of the periodical Juedische Rundschau from Dec. 28, 1937.

This is a compilation of items published by Dr. Toledano from 1973-2006. These items relate to the history of Sephardic Jewry, especially that of Moroccan Jews and Jews within the Muslim world.

This is a compilation of items collected by Morris Tarragano, mainly in photocopy format. These items relate to the history of Sephardic Jewry, mainly the Jews of Turkey and Spain, as well as some genealogical papers.

The collection documents a very wide spectrum of Paul Rieger’s writings and interests. Series I contains personal documents such as his ordination certificate as well as Rieger’s correspondence. The most extensive part of the collection is Series 2: Writings, which contains a variety of manuscripts, articles, notes, index cards, correspondence, excerpts and lectures. Rieger’s articles cover a wide scope of topics, incuding Jewish and non-Jewish issues. His main work however, was Zur Geschichte der Juden in Rom. Series 3 holds a vast amount of off-prints about different subjects, such as on Jewish and non-Jewish topics, on Palestine and Israel as well as on Leo Baeck. Series 4 consists of Jewish, Yiddish, Israeli and German newspapers, and newsletters of Jewish communities in Germany. Series 5: Varia covers miscellaneous documents, such as letters of protection, legal documents, an abundance of marriage contracts, original signatures of Jewish personalities such as of Martin Buber and a record of the first meeting of the Centralverein deutscher Staatsbuerger juedischen Glaubens. There are also various pictures and drawings of different places, synagogues and people. Series 6: Oversized Materials contains Hebrew learning material, newspapers and fliers of Germany as well as Nazi propaganda.

This collection is comprised of materials related to the Brooklyn-born, gay, Jewish bullfighter, Sidney Franklin (1903-1976), who is also known for his close friendship with Ernest Hemingway. The bulk of the collection are photographs of Franklin performing in the bullring, or posing with Spanish and Latin American matadors or famous Americans such as Franklin Roosevelt, Jr., Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., Paulette Goddard, Jack Dempsey and Eddie Cantor. There are also audio recordings of Franklin, a film proposal, clippings and a copy of Franklin’s autobiography.