Jews -- Education

Records of the Consistoire Central des Israélites de France, as well as of the local consistories for the departments of Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin (Alsace) and Moselle and Meurthe-et-Moselle (Lorraine), in Strasbourg, Colmar, Metz and Nancy, including minutes, tax-lists, lists of rabbis, cantors, and notables, censuses of Jewish communities, and correspondence.

This record group contains three-dimensional objects and printed materials that relate to the history of Hadassah. A bulk of this record group consists of promotional and commemorative objects and awards created by Hadassah for its Annual and Midwinter National Conventions, and for Young Judaea events. Examples of such items include t-shirts, hats, bags, buttons, stationery and keychains. Artifacts created by local Hadassah chapters and regions, as well as awards received by local and national Hadassah leaders from other organizations, are also included. Of a particular interest is the bronze death mask of Henrietta Szold.

The AVI CHAI Collection contains a breadth of files relating to the administrative and outreach activities of the organization, from its founding in 1984 through 2019.

The AVI CHAI records stored at the AJHS relate to the foundation's activities in North America. The records relating to the AVI CHAI's activities in Israel are stored at the archives of the National Library of Israel.

The records consist of correspondence, reports, minutes, financial documents, digital files, and printed materials that chronicle AVI CHAI’s administrative communication and outreach programming. The collection consists of physical paper records (see detailed breakdown below), born-digital files (including computer files), as well as audiovisual materials such as audiocassettes, microcassettes and DVDs. There are some 35mm slides, but otherwise very few photographic prints or negatives. Of note in the collection are materials that outline the foundation’s research on, and enthusiastic support of, Jewish day schools, camps, teacher training and libraries.

Administration files include by-laws, incorporation documents, and insurance policies, among others.

Board records are comprised of meeting materials, such as minutes and agendas. They document the philosophy, direction and activities of the organization.

Communications files consist primarily the files of Deena K. Fuchs. They include media kits, graphics, working files for annual reports, and other materials.

Files related to AVI CHAI finances include investment portfolio documentation as well as quarterly and annual reports.

The core of the foundation’s history can be found in its Programs files which document the various programs initiated or supported by AVI CHAI. They include detailed files on the foundation’s loans to schools (including building programs) and to summer camps. Also included in this series are files relating to AVI CHAI communications activities, such as media kits, graphics, working files for annual reports, and other materials.

Baron Horace (Naftali Herz) de Gunzburg Collection consists of diverse materials that pertain to the state of Jews in the Russian Empire in the second half of the 19th century and to the philanthropic activities of Horace and Joseph Gunzburgs. Materials comprising the collection shed light on the Gunzburg family's involvement in improving Jewish education, civil rights movement, and their efforts to improve general well being of the Jews in the Russian Empire. Bulk of the collections consists of materials pertaining to the activities of the Hevrah Mefitsei Haskalah (Society for the Promotion of Culture Among the Jews of Russia, Rus. Обшество для Распространения Просвещения Между Евреями в России) and to the Committee for the Improvement of Daily Life of Jews in the North-West Region (Комиссия по Улучшению Повседневной Жизни Евреев в Северо-Западном Регионе)

This collection contains newsletters, pamphlets, brochures, course materials, memorandum and correspondence detailing the Center's views, activities, and research.

This record group contains materials related to the local units of Hadassah—groups, chapters, regions, and co-ops—as well as Junior Hadassah, a youth organization that functioned as a group within the Hadassah Chapter structure. The record group documents over one hundred years of Hadassah’s growth, and illuminates a century of American Jewish communal life, particularly that of Jewish women, across the United States. The record group reflects the formation, administration and activities of the individual groups, chapters, co-ops and regions, and contains information on local events and programs organized around fundraising, Zionism, Jewish heritage, religion and holidays celebration, the study of Hebrew and Yiddish, women's issues, fashion, health, technology and many other topics.

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 the writings and correspondence of Eduard Strauss. Strauss was a chemist and philosopher who taught at the Freies Juedisches Lehrhaus in Frankfurt am Main and later immigrated to New York, where he helped establish a new Lehrhaus.

The Elk-Zernik Family Collection provides documentation on the lives of several family members, especially Rabbi Max (Meir) Elk, dentist Benjamin Elk, Helmut Zernik and Charlotte Elk Zernik. The collection also holds the written compositions of several family members, including the sermons and articles of Max Elk and the autobiographical writing of Charlotte Elk Zernik. Other material includes a photo album and family photographs, a scrapbook, official papers and certificates, letters, some correspondence and clippings.

This record group includes documents created and maintained by the Office of the President, the Office of the Executive Director and the Chair of the Division Coordinators/Directors Committee. Prominent is the Henrietta Szold series, containing correspondence by and to Szold as well as printed materials written by and about her. The files in this record group were created by a national president or executive director, or for their use, or maintained in their office during their years in office. Included are correspondence, minutes, memos, publications, reports and subject files on topics with which these individuals were involved.

This collection documents the life and scholarly interests of Fritz Bamberger, scholar and former vice-president of the Leo Baeck Institute. Much of the collection focuses on his professional and scholarly activities. It includes many newspaper clippings and articles, official documents, correspondence, a scrapbook, family papers, a few photographs and notes.

The collection mainly contains articles, notes, manuscripts and other writings by Fritz Friedlaender on various topics as well as articles from other authors on related topics. There are articles on Gabriel Riesser, Friedrich Meinecke, Moritz Heimann, Heinrich Heine, Stefan Zweig, Richard Beer-Hofmann, Ulrich Sanders and others. The collection also contains letters to Friedlaender from Leo Baeck, Ismar Elbogen, and Max Wiener (1935-1972), and misc. personal documents.

The collection contains handwritten letters by a variety of prominent rabbis and Jewish thinkers, including Jacob Bernays, Philipp Bloch, Zacharias Frankel, Abraham Geiger, Heinrich Graetz, Ludwig Philippson, and Gabriel Riesser, all regarding applications and recommendations for positions at the Jewish teacher training school of the Marks-Haindorf-Stiftung in Münster. Two brief letters by Alexander Haindorf, the founder of the Marks-Haindorf-Stiftung, are administrative in nature. Also included is a passport issued to Hermann Steinthal by King Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia.

Hadassah Functions and Operations Records represent the bulk of aid and services provided to Hadassah's membership, from the 1920s to 2011. Materials found in the record group include correspondence, clippings, press releases, manuals and kits for chapters and members to implement programming and chapter structure, fundraising campaigns, scripts, study guides, programming for local and national meetings, biographical files, and training documentation. Departments documented in the record group include Public Affairs, Education, Women's Health, American Affairs, Zionist and International Affairs, Speakers Bureau, Fundraising, Program, Organization, Outreach and Tourism Departments. Materials related to the general administration of Hadassah are also in the record group; these materials include research and development of projects, archives department correspondence and other materials, Hadassah House administration, and strategic planning. The record group also documents Hadassah's efforts to expand membership outside of the United States, by the development of Hadassah International.

The collection contains various documents pertaining to Gustav Tuch's activity in various Jewish communal organizations.

This record group contains meeting minutes, correspondence and reports of the Hadassah Council in Israel (originally the Hadassah Emergency Services and the Hadassah Council in Palestine), the Hadassah Youth Services (originally the Palestine Council of Hadassah) and the Hadassah Youth Services (HYS) successor organizations, Hadassah Vocational Education Services (HVES) and Hadassah Israel Education Services (HIES). The records represent the activities of Hadassah's representatives in Palestine/Israel, from 1927 to the 1990s. The Hadassah Youth Services focused on providing services to underserved youth in Palestine/Israel, most notably with their school luncheon and Guggenheimer playground programs. After HYS changed its working name to HVES in 1952, it began to focus on vocational education projects in Israel. Legally, however, the name of the organization in Israel remained Hadassah Youth Services. The Hadassah Council in Israel acted as an advisor and liaison between Hadassah's American offices and Hadassah's Israel projects, including the Hadassah Medical Organization, Youth Aliyah, and Hadassah Youth Services.

This collection contains correspondence and a large number of programs and announcements regarding the Jewish community in Hamburg, mostly during the 1930s.

Papers of Hans Epstein (1905-1960), educator and historian. The collection consists of documents relating to Epstein's teaching activities during Nazi rule in Germany, and in New York during and after the Second World War; correspondence from before the emigration with individuals and organizations (including with Martin Buber, and Adolf Leschnitzer of the Reichsvertretung der Deutschen Juden); personal and business correspondence relating to immigration in 1938 and Epstein's work in New York; posters and postcards.

The Harry R. Rosen Community Building Consultants Records consist of photographs, research, and administrative documentation by and for the dozens of Jewish Community Centers (JCCs) in the United States, Canada, and Israel that Harry R. Rosen and his firm helped develop from the 1970s to the early 2000s.

The collection contains the records of the Vilna branch of the Hevrah Mefitsei Haskalah, an educational and publishing organization, established in 1863 to propagate secular knowledge and acculturation into the Russian society among the Jews of the Pale of Settlement. The Vilna Branch was organized in 1909 to assist Jewish education in Vilna and vicinity. During World War I and after Vilna became a part of independent Poland, the organization continued to propagate secular education and maintain schools, libraries and teachers’ courses. The materials include minutes, correspondence, memoranda, programs, leaflets, announcements, and clippings.

Collection sontains the minutes of the Board of Directors (Trustees) meetings, 1972-1975; staff meetings, 1972-1973; background materials and reports pertaining to projects proposed and acted upon; annual reports; financial reports; and miscellaneous publications.

Collection consists of legal documents, certificates, photographs, newspaper clippings, ephemera, and a scrapbook which document the lives of members of a German Jewish family in the midwest during late 19th and early 20th centuries. Also includes materials on Isaac Brown (1840-1901) and his children Hannah (1870-1950), Dora (1871-1938), and Mitchele (1880-1962).

Correspondence of Ismar Elbogen with individuals, including Elias Auerbach, Julius Bab, Leo Baeck, Salo Baron, Markus Brann, Martin Buber, Umberto Cassuto, Ludwig Feuchtwanger, Ludwig Geiger, Robert Raphael Geis, Louis Ginzburg, Ignaz Goldziher, Max Gruenewald, Moritz Güdemann, Julius Guttmann, Bernhard Kahn, Mordechai Kaplan, Adolf Leschnitzer, Lily Montagu, Claude Montefiore, Adolph Oko, Paula Ollendorf, Bertha Pappenheim, Felix Perles, Koppel Pinson, Peter Reinhold, Julius Rosenwald, Cecil Roth, Caesar Seligmann, Selma Stern-Taeubler, Henrietta Szold, Hermann Vogelstein, and Stephen Wise.

Contains material collected by the Jewish Media Service (JMS) on Jewish films, film company catalogs, resources and information from and about various media centers. The majority of the Jewish Media Service records date from when the JMS operated independently from 1975 to 1987. Types of material found in the collection include articles, brochures, catalogs, correspondence, examination study guides, filmographies, film stills, newsletters, pamphlets, photographs, posters, publications, scripts, and slides.

This collection mostly documents the professional career of Rabbi Joseph Perles, one of the first rabbis of the Conservative Judaism movement. As a rabbi, he strengthened and organized the Jewish community of Munich during his posting there from 1871-1894. The collection focuses on his religious writings, as well as his writings on Biblical archaeology, rabbinical philology, and folklore. A number of his sermons are included. There is a large body of correspondence from fellow rabbis and academic peers across Europe. Papers from the Jewish Theological Seminary in Breslau include a statute of the year 1854, a yearly report from 1875, and correspondence concerning nomination of directors for the seminary in 1875 and 1879.

Various materials from and about the Jewish Theological Seminary in Breslau, including manuscripts, publications and photographs.

Collection contains materials generated while Label Katz served in leadership positions with B’nai B’rith from the 1950s through the 1960s; best represented is his tenure as president of B’nai B’rith International between 1959 and 1965, during which Katz concentrated on challenges faced by Soviet Jews, and on the improvement of Jewish education. Materials consist of correspondence, speeches, clippings, photographs, minutes and reports.

This collection contains various materials pertaining to the Jewish boarding school ("Landschulheim Herrlingen").

The collection contains documents relating to Leo Blau's childhood and school days in Cologne including report cards and drivers licenses. There is also his journal from 1933 and a book of poems, also dated 1933. A thesis manuscript by Tatjana Lehmann which includes documents and information about Blau is in folder 3. Folders 4 and 5 contain correspondence from and to Blau regarding his suit to receive social security from Germany and his request to the Cologne mayor's office to be a participant in the official visitors program.

This collection contains documents pertaining to Levi Schwalm's training and professional career as an elementary school teacher in Lower Saxony.