Jewish refugees

This collection contains the personal and professional papers of Abraham Klausner, including articles written by and about him, research materials for his articles and his memoir, correspondence, and Klausner’s personal and military records. These materials reflect his active involvement with Displaced Persons and the DP Camps in Postwar Germany as well as his sometimes complicated relationships with the Joint Distribution Committee and the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA). The collection also contains issues of Fun Letstn Hurbn (From the Last Extermination).

This collection contains documents pertaining to a project, spearheaded by the Conference on Jewish Relations in the United States, to establish a large colony of Jewish refugees in Alaska. Included are: German and American newspaper clippings (1938-1939) with announcements of new restrictive laws regarding the assets of Jews; followed by reports, meeting minutes and correspondence regarding the possibility of Alaska as a potential site for large scale resettlement of refugees.

This collection contains a number of Alfred Büchler's school papers from educational institutions in Vienna and Shanghai, as well as his German passport and a travel calendar from his emigration out of Austria.

The collection holds primarily e-copies of Alice Muehsam’s correspondence with AAUW, 1941-1943. Also included are her CV and a description of her research, together with German letters of recommendation in reference to her dissertation, 1937-1938 (folders 1 and 2); as well as American letters of recommendation (folder 3).

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 includes translated family correspondence to Arthur Josefsberg in the United States from his parents Klara and Berl Josefsberg and his sister Rosie (from Vienna), and his brother Joszi and his wife Valy (from France).

This collection documents the life and work of the economist Arthur Prinz. It is comprised of correspondence, documents, diaries, clippings, research notes, index cards, and books and offprints. Information on various topics, especially immigration and emigration during the 1930s, Jews and the German economy, and Marxist economics will also be found here.

This collection contains the archival papers of Arthur Rath. Most of it consists of correspondence with friends and family members. Primary topics of the collection are Arthur's life in Switzerland towards the end of World War II and the decades immediately after, correspondence with friends who were also Jewish refugees from Germany after the war, and Arthur Rath's life decisions following the displacement of his family during the war.

This collection holds the letters, postcards and holiday greetings of Irene Adler and Maria Hagenmeyer. Prominent topics are Irene Adler's everyday life and matters of the Adler and Hagenmeyer families.

This collection consists primarily of economist Carl Landauer's correspondence (incoming and outgoing) concerning assistance for refugee scholars during the 1930s and 1940s. It also includes correspondence with Jewish communal organizations in San Francisco and Oakland, and some offprints of Landauer's articles.

This collection holds letters exchanged between the Austrian émigré Cecilia Ruberl in Rome and Stefan Taussig in upstate New York, to whom she loaned funds in order to establish a farm. Although most of the correspondence concerns their financial association, letters sent during and after World War II document his aid of her and her family members. In addition to correspondence, the collection holds a few receipts for stock transactions and documentation of a restitution claims decision on behalf of Cecilia Ruberl's family.

The collection contains a compilation of letters sent to Charles Leigh (formerly Karlheinz Liebenau) and his sister Helga in England, where they had immigrated via Kindertransport, from their parents Max Liebenau and Dora Liebenau née Simke in Berlin. The letters are dated from May 1939, the time of their arrival in England, to November 1941, when their parents were deported to Riga. Photocopies of the original correspondence are accompanied by English translations.

This collection holds records pertaining to the Comité national de Secours aux refugies allemands victimes de l'anti-semitisme and documents the work of the organization. Included in this collection is correspondence, statistical reports, lists, announcements, and material on the founding of the organization.

This collection contains records of the German-Jewish Orthodox Congregation Ohav Sholaum of Washington Heights, New York, such as by-laws, correspondence of its long-time rabbi, Ralph Neuhaus, and documents relating to its charitable organization Gemiluth Chessed of Washington Heights. It also includes sheet music used by the congregation's choir.

These are the translated letters between the Heimann siblings in Germany, Palestine and Uruguay; mainly in 1939.

The collection documents the life and professional activities of the German-born attorney Curt Silberman, in the period of his life following his emigration to the United States, from the 1940s to the 1990s. The materials include correspondence; manuscripts of speeches; ephemera; clippings; publications such as organizational newsletters and anniversary booklets; and photographs. The majority of the materials relate, on the one hand, to Silberman's service in and engagement with social welfare, cultural and educational organizations and institutions, including the American Federation of Jews from Central Europe and allied organizations; and, on the other, to his activities as a lecturer and speaker, both in the United States and (from the 1960s on) in Germany, especially his hometown of Würzburg, on topics including the commemoration of Kristallnacht, German Jewish history, and aspects of international law.

Vital records, education certificates, correspondence, as well as genealogical and other archival materials pertaining to the extended Dannhauser family. Also available are materials pertaining to Fred (Manfred) Roesler.

This collection contains the papers of the Deutsch-Edel family, originally from Vienna, and in particular the family of Georg and Sabina Deutsch and their children. The bulk of the collection – dating 1940 to 1990 -- is correspondence, but there are also large sections of educational and immigration records, as well as memoirs documenting the history of the family authored by George Deutsch. The collection documents the lives of family members in Vienna, including their educational and professional lives, up to the time of the Nazi annexation of Austria and the flight of different members of the family to England and the United States. Post-World War II materials (the largest portion) consist mostly of correspondence between Thomas Deutsch and his parents, and material pertaining to Thomas’s academic career and travel.

This collection documents select periods throughout the life and career of Dezider Scheer. Containing material related to his personal and professional life, the collection is made up of correspondence and clippings, as well as original and photocopied photographs, historical documentation and ephemera.

The collection is comprised of photographs of various provenances related to the lives of Jewish displaced persons (DPs) in the period immediately following the Second World War, from 1945 to 1952. The photographs pertain to DP camps and communities in the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Austria, and Italy, primarily those established by the American and British military, and administered by the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, and, later, the International Refugee Organization. Diverse aspects of daily life among the DPs are depicted, such as school, work, recreation, and vocational training, including many activities sponsored by Jewish voluntary organizations, especially World ORT and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. Also depicted are cultural activities such as theater, children’s performances, Jewish holiday celebrations and parades, and commemorative events honoring those who died in the Holocaust. The photographs capture leaders of the Jewish DP zonal and camp committees, DP police, and Zionist living collectives (kibbutzim), as well as notable military, political, and cultural personalities of the period, such as Lucius D. Clay, Fiorello LaGuardia, David Ben-Gurion, Yitzhak Gruenbaum, and H. Leivick. The photographs also reflect political and historical developments, including the major congresses of the DP leaderships in Germany, Austria, and Italy; protest demonstrations concerning British policies regulating immigration to Palestine; and events held upon the founding of the state of Israel in 1948.

This collection of posters includes approximately 1,000 rare or unique items pertaining to over 100 displaced persons (DP) camps and centers in Germany, Austria, and Italy, dating primarily from 1946 to 1952. Comprised of approximately 60% handpainted and 40% printed items, it includes posters produced by diverse Jewish groups within individual camps, such as administrative and cultural committees, sports clubs, Zionist and religious groups, and landsmanshaftn; as well as organizations active throughout the camps, including the Jewish central committees in the respective countries, the World ORT Union, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the Jewish National Fund, and the Jewish Agency. A small number of items also document activities of the revived Jewish communities in the city centers of Munich and Vienna. Many of the posters use not only language but also color, graphic design, and pictorial and figurative elements to engage their audience with calls to entertainment, lectures, protests, and commemorations.

The bulk of the materials in this collection are drafts of articles by psychologist Dorit Whiteman on the experience of Holocaust survivors, including a full draft of the longer work The Uprooted. Additional materials include some photocopies of personal papers belonging to her mother, Lillian Stern Bader.

Annual report of the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service for the year 1943, accompanied by a report on alien registration and Harrison's speech on immigration and refugee relief efforts.

The Eleanor G. Feitler Family Collection consists of the correspondence and papers of members of the Emil and Auguste Glauber and Heinrich and Erna Mayer families, especially the descendants of the three Herrmann sisters (Clara, Paula, and Erna) along with the families into which they married.

This collection describes the private and professional lives of Elisabeth Gay and her husband, the businessman Joseph Gay, who came to the United States from Austria in 1939. Topics present in the documents found here include Austria of the 1930s, America during World War II, the economies of several South American countries, and restitution for the Gays' Austrian property. Documents include extensive correspondence, publications, notes and manuscripts, reports, scrapbooks, and photocopies.

The bulk of the collection consists of correspondence to the siblings Elisabeth and Margaret Jonas in Kent, England from their parents Julie and Julius Jonas and others in Hamburg, 1938-1939. Also included is the guestbook of the Melamid family in Antwerp and in New York, 1933-1949, containing signatures, drawings and photographs.

Various manuscripts by Erich Drucker from the Erich Drucker Collection and the LBI Memoirs Collection

The collection contains writings, along with a small amount of personal and business correspondence, of Erich Drucker, a German businessman and active member of the Socialist Workers' Party of Germany, who immigrated to the United States from Nazi Germany in 1941 and subsequently became a book dealer in New York City. A prolific writer throughout his life, Drucker regularly kept diaries, and wrote poems, essays, sketches, reflections, and aphorisms. The materials include notebooks dating from Drucker's youth in Germany; typescripts of poems, prose and diaries that he produced in the United States; business correspondence from the year 1933 of the firm Drucker headed in Berlin before his emigration – Drucker & Gotthelf, a representative of clothing manufacturers; and Drucker's edited copies of letters written to him by his friend Elise Tilse, of Berlin, in the years 1946 to 1947.

This collection contains original documents of Erika Bander and Harry Bander dating to their time as refugees in Shanghai, China, 1939-1947, as well as some photocopied photographs and a 1-page genealogical manuscript on Erika's family.

The collection contains documentation of the Erna Weingold Kleinermann family, including vital records, identity cards and passports, school certificates, and correspondence.