Social service -- United States

Correspondence, financial records, minutes, reports and printed material relating to the organization and activities of the AJCRW. Materials relating to the creation of the AJCRW, annual meetings, conferences. Materials on membership, constitution, Executive Committee. Budget and financial reports. President's reports. Correspondence and reports from Boston and Philadelphia offices. Publicity materials and materials relating to publications of AJCRW.

This collection contains the records of the National Refugee Service (NRS), a refugee aid organization founded in New York City in 1939 to assist refugees fleeing Nazi persecution. A successor agency to the National Coordinating Committee for Aid to Refugees and Emigrants Coming from Germany, which had operated as an umbrella organization of refugee aid agencies since 1934, the NRS remained in existence until 1946, when it was merged into the new organization United Service for New Americans. The NRS program encompassed a migration service that assisted with affidavits, visas and other legal aspects of the immigration process; temporary relief and casework services; job placement, retraining, and small business loans; help in resettling to localities throughout the country; and social and cultural adjustment to American life. The records include minutes, correspondence, memoranda, and reports related to the board of directors; the executive director; lay advisory committees; the various departments within the NRS; special committees assisting professional groups, including physicians, musicians, rabbis, social workers, and scholars; and cooperating refugee-assistance committees and organizations across the United States.

The collection consists of printed and mimeographed material on American Jewry including population studies, Jewish welfare and religious organizations. Correspondence wtih literary and cultural figures and Jewish institutions.

The Solender Family Papers document the professional achievements and to a lesser extent, the personal lives, of the members of the Solender family. The Solender family has been influential in the field of Jewish Communal Services since the 1930s. Family members that are most prominently represented in the collection include Samuel Solender (1890-1961), his son Sanford Solender (1914-2003), and his grandson Stephen Solender (1938- ).

The collection consists for the most part of records of the national administrative offices of the Workmen's Circle but also includes some internal records of local branches. Workmen's Circle constitutions and early documents, 1893-1911. Minutes of the National Executive Committee, NEC circulars, publicity materials. Minutes of the National Organization Committee and the National Administration Committee. Files of Executive Secretaries Joseph Baskin and Nathan Chanin and of Benjamin Gebiner, Assistant Executive Secretary. Correspondence and other materials of the Cemetery Department, Education Department, Workmen's Circle School Committee, Sanatorium Department, Benefit Committee, Grievance Committee. Membership records. Materials relating to Workmen's Circle annual conventions. Financial records. Records of Workmen's Circle Schools in New York, New Jersey, California, Illinois, Ohio, Massachusetts, Michigan, Washington D.C., Texas, Pennsylvania. Minutes, school programs, some class records, lists of students. Correspondence of the Folksbiene Theater. Materials on Workmen's Circle Home for the Eastern Zone. Some fragmentary materials on camps. Samples of Workmen's Circle publications. Internal records of local W.C. branches throughout the U.S., including minutes, financial records, correspondence.