Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)

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.

The Erich Jacobs collection contains documents and correspondence, as well as genealogical tables of both the Jacobs and Neumann families. There are several documents regarding emigration attempts, as well as receipts, passport and naturalization forms, registrations to various organizations, and certificates. Much of the collection includes facsimiles of the original records with translations attached.

This collection holds personal and official documents, correspondence, genealogical information, biographical manuscripts and photographs related to the Feith, Lyon and Katz families. Most of the documents pertain to Erna Bonette, Fred Gustav and their son Henry Arthur Katz. The collection focuses on their lives in Germany and the United States as well as their emigration via Luxemburg and Portugal. It also holds materials pertaining to members of the extended Katz and Lyon families and their ancestors, including the Feith family. Also included is material about a Mikveh from the 15th century in Siegburg, Germany.

The Erna Katzenell collection consists of documents about Katzenell's life in hiding during the Second World War and her ultimate rescue. Amongst others, it includes documents about her rescuers, clippings, correspondence, photographs, and transcripts of interviews.

This collection represents a lifetime of genealogical research by Ernst R. Stiefel about his family history. Files about individuals and families contain documents that are almost entirely photocopies from various German archives. Various family trees and photocopies of articles about Jews in Germany are also in this collection.

This collection contains the papers of Ernest W. Michel, Holocaust Survivor Journalist and public speaker,including clippings of newspaper articles written by and about Michel, correspondence between Michel and many important Jewish and political figures and autograph files, which Michel collected. Many of these files concern Michel’s Holocaust experiences, speaking engagements, the World Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors, and Michel’s work with the United Jewish Appeal.

Photographs (photocopies) and clippings pertaining to the author Ernest W. Michel.

This collection documents Ernst Lissner and Ruth Lissner née Stern (1924-1998), in particular Ruth's time in England after leaving Germany via Kindertransport. It includes correspondence and documents.

The Esther Milich Family Collection holds documents about the immigration of Esther Milich and her brother Nathan Berkowicz in 1939 and about other members of the Berkowicz and Milich families, including the fate of Berkowicz family members left behind in Europe. The collection also contains documentation on the restitution claims filed by Esther and her brother. This collection includes official, legal, and personal family correspondence; official and legal documents; personal family papers; and a few photographs and newspaper clippings.

This collection documents the family of Eugen Rosenberg and Frida Giglio Saenger Rosenberg née Magnus, in particular two of their sons, actor Hans-Karl Rosenberg (stage name Hans-Karl Magnus) and electrician Herbert Rosenberg. It includes a large amount of correspondence between Frida, Hans-Karl, and Herbert Rosenberg during World War Two.

The Eugen Neter Collection documents the professional and personal life of the Mannheim pediatrician Eugen Neter and centers on his professional work and postwar life in Israel. Notable in the collection are the examples of his writing, the biographical articles about him and the material on the Gurs concentration camp. The collection additionally includes some of his correspondence, papers and correspondence of other family members such as Mia Neter, and newspaper clippings on other individuals.

This collection contains the correspondence, official documents, and the German passports of Eugene and Cecilia Leoni. The passport documents the addition of their Jewish names, and their efforts to leave Austria after the Nazi occupation. Collection also includes their son Leon's school report cards, textbooks, exercise books from Vienna, and a school certificate from Havana, Cuba. One of the report cards indicates that Leon was transferred to another school for Jewish children in 1938, and the exercise books also reflect Hitler's occupation.

This collection pertains to the life of Eva Kahn (née Krafft) and members of her extended family. It encompasses documents of her life as a child and teenager in Eger (today Cheb, Czech Republic) and later in Chicago, Illinois. Included in her personal papers are school materials and a friendship book. The collection furthermore documents the lives of family members of Eva Kahn and her husband Stephen Martin Kahn with correspondence, photographs, a baby journal and an autograph album. Two letters written by Eva Kahn's cousin Martin Wels who was killed in the Holocaust are part of the collection.

Personal documents of Martin Reich and his mother, Emma, describing their lives in Mannheim, Germany and Strasbourg, France prior to their immigration to the United States.

This collection portrays the personal and professional life of the violinist Felix Freilich. It also provides information on his wife and the genealogy of their families. The collection contains correspondence, family trees, photographs, clippings, publications and music scores. Subjects found in this collection include the genealogy of the Freilich and Greenberg families, the professional life of Felix Freilich, and the city of Altenburg, Germany.

This collection holds the papers of publisher and rare book dealer Felix I. Kauffmann, and contains documents relating to the family publishing house, his military service in World War I, and membership in Jewish organizations. The collection includes some correspondence with Leo Baeck as well as other correspondence, official documents such as military, vital and legal papers, curricula vitae, newspaper clippings and articles, and other papers.

The collection is of mixed provenance and consists mostly of 16 mm films and some 8 mm and 35 mm films. There is also a group of VHS and 3/4 in. tapes. Many of the films are registered as part of other record groups in the YIVO Archives and were physically separated from these record groups, placed in the Collection of Films, and cataloged, for preservation purposes and for improved access to researchers. The collection includes the following series: Amateur Films. ca. 75 items, 1920s-1930s. Amateur home movies made by American Jews on trips to Eastern Europe, mainly Poland. One segment of this series consists of films produced by Gustave Eisner, who owned the Gustave Eisner Travel Agency in the inter-war period and arranged trips back to Poland and to Palestine. The Eisner films include some of Palestine and of American Jewish life. Amateur films made by Abraham Twersky of the Sholem Aleichem Houses in the Bronx which include images of a number of notable cultural figures in the Yiddish secular world. Films of Towns and Cities Commissioned by Landsmanshaftn. 2 items. 1920s-1930s. A Pictorial Review of Kolbuszowa, 1929. A film about Sedziszow, Poland, 1935. Post-war films made by social welfare organizations. 1940s-1960s. About 40 items. Films produced by social welfare organizations such as the HIAS and the AJDC describing the situation of Jewish refugees and displaced persons and organizational work carried out on their behalf. Included are films about HIAS's involvement with Hungarian refugees in 1956. Miscellaneous films. A film about Jewish refugees in Shanghai in the late 1940s. 8 mm footage of the Warsaw Ghetto and the Cracow Ghetto during World War II. Yiddish language newsreel made of a memorial ceremony held in Skierniewice, Poland, in 1947 for Holocaust victims. A Scientific Expedition to Birobizhan (1929), a silent film by the faculty of Brigham Young University, Utah.

The Flora Morstadt Collection documents the life of Flora Morstadt and her family mainly through the years 1938-1944. The bulk of the collection is comprised of letters from Flora Morstadt to her family during World War II. Other materials include documents relating to emigration, post-war identification cards, and Flora Morstadt’s recipe book.

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.

The Frances and Gustave Kauders Family Collection holds the papers of this couple, as well as of members of the Kauders family, and correspondence from the Schostal family. Topics found in the collection include the immigration of Frances and Gustave Kauders, some details of their early lives as expressed in family correspondence, and the failed emigration and subsequent deportation of members of the Schostal family. The collection includes family correspondence, official and educational documents, and correspondence with official agencies regarding immigration and restitution with related documentation.

This collection documents the life and significant experiences of Frank M. Sherman. Prominent themes in this collection are his work for the United States military during World War II, his and his family's experiences in Nazi Germany, and his membership in the Deutscher Vortrupp. The collection consists of a large amount of correspondence as well as clippings, audiocassettes, publications, scrapbooks, official papers, notes, and a few photographs of friends or family members.

The Fred Cahnmann Family Collection documents portions of the lives of Fred Cahnmann and other Cahnmann family members. In addition it provides genealogical research on the Cahnmann and related families. The collection includes many family trees, correspondence, photographs, official documents, articles and newspaper clippings and research notes.

The Fred Emil Katz Collection holds material on the Katz family of Oberlauringen, Germany. Most notable in this collection are the articles and exhibitions that document what happened to the Jewish families of Oberlauringen during the Holocaust. In addition, the collection includes personal correspondence, photograph albums, and a book.

This collection contains correspondence, documents and photographs pertaining to the life of Fred Herz, his family and his wife's family, the Weinrebs. In particular there are several albums of family photographs ranging over the span of nearly a century.

The collection includes materials related to the professional and personal life of the German-born businessman Fred W. Lessing, in the period following his immigration to the United States in 1942. Approximately half of the collection by extent comprises correspondence and documents pertaining to Lessing's restitution claims, including documentation related to the brickworks and brewery businesses of his father, Willy Lessing, and correspondence in the early postwar years with his father's former bookkeeper, Franz Bütterich, of Bamberg, who had served as a trustee for the firm under the Nazi regime from 1938 to 1943. Other materials relate to Fred Lessing's activities as a member of the board of the Leo Baeck Institute, New York, and as a member of the executive committee of the Wiener Library, London. Also included are materials concerning the history of the Jews of Bamberg, and postwar commemorative activities there; documents and notes pertaining to Lessing's family history; and a relatively small amount of personal correspondence and ephemera, including some pertaining to Lessing's receiving an honorary doctorate at Tel Aviv University.

The collection contains personal papers and correspondence as well as photographs and photo albums relating to the families of Jenny and Aron Friedlich and Salomon and Clara Urman. Also included are restitution papers relating to Salomon, Clara and Jenny Urman.

The Fritz Seckel Collection contains the correspondence between Fritz Seckel (Seckelsohn) and his family during World War I and the correspondence to his daughter Irene during World War II.

The collection contains a published brochure about the memorial for German resistance against the Nazi regime and related materials. Also included are clippings from the German press about German resistance during World War II.

The General Jewish Council was an umbrella organization founded by the American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, B’nai B’rith, and Jewish Labor Committee in order to coordinate their rights defense activities.

The bulk of the records in this collection date between from 1938-1944, the active years of the Council. Materials consist primarily of correspondence, minutes, memoranda, and reports.

This collection depicts the life and work of the author Georg Hermann. The main focus of this collection is his literary estate, and the collection contains extensive manuscripts of both his fiction and non-fiction writings, including novels, shorter fiction, essays, and articles. In addition, it also holds correspondence, clippings, photos, official documents and papers, writings by others about Georg Hermann and his work, and a few photos.