Reports

The Lithuanian Jewish Communities Collection is comprised of documents relating to Jewish cultural, religious, social, political, and economic life in approximately 150 towns in Lithuania. The bulk of the collection pertains to the period between 1919 and 1926, when elements of a system of Jewish national autonomy existed within the Lithuanian state, including a Ministry of Jewish Affairs and governmentally empowered Jewish community councils. Smaller parts of the collection relate to the periods before (1860-1918) and after (1927-1940) the autonomy.

This collection contains writings, minutes, financial records, correspondence, printed materials, newspaper clippings, and photographs relating to Broido's employment, investments, and Jewish and non-Jewish communal activities. It includes material regarding the department store, Gimbel Bros. (1934-1966), where he was associated with Bernard Gimbel, and where he served as Executive Vice President and as Chairman of the Advisory Committee (1953-1961); Temple Emanu-El (1957-1970), where he served as trustee and opposed secession from the Union of American Hebrew Congregations; the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (1944-1976), serving as President from 1965-1975, and where he was involved in the investigation of the Charles Jordan murder in Prague (1967); the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (1953-1972) where he served as trustee and played an active role in financial matters and relations with the Hebrew Union College; the United Jewish Appeal (1941-1972) where he served as President (1951-1952), trustee and member of the Board of Directors; the New York City Community College (1956-1972) where he served as trustee; and the Department of Commerce and Industrial Development of the City of New York (1961-1971) where he served as Commissioner (1961-1966).

Papers of Louis Kraft: social worker, writer, and executive director of the Jewish Welfare Board, 1938-1947. The collection is valuable to researchers studying the Jewish Community Center movement, in particular the activities of the National Jewish Welfare Board during the 1940's, as well as the reestablishment of Jewish community life in Europe after World War II. The collection contains correspondence, minutes, financial and fund raising documents, newspaper clippings, publications, agenda of meetings and conferences, resolutions, annual reports, and handwritten notes. Also included are personal items such as certificates, scrapbooks, diaries, greeting cards, and photographs.

The Marion Rosenthal Biel Collection holds papers of Marion Rosenthal Biel, her husband Frederick (Fritz) Biel, and of some of their family members. Prominent in the collection are documentation of Marion's early life in Germany and of her life during the early 1940s in England, Wales, and New York, as well as Frederick's time as an interpreter in the United States Army during World War II. The collection includes diaries, military documentation, photographs and a photo album, a small amount of correspondence, family members' official documents, and various other papers.

The Martin G. Goldner Collection holds materials amassed by this amateur historian in pursuit of his and his wife’s genealogy, thus interrelating five families: the Goldners, the Ehrenbergs, the Fischels, the Rosenzweigs, and the Baumanns. The most noteworthy materials belong to the Ehrenbergs and their Samsonschule in Wolfenbuettel, as well as to the Fischels and Rosenzweigs. Documents include correspondence, photographs, original manuscripts and other archival materials.

This collection consists mainly of the diaries of Zionist Martin Hauser. Born in Berlin in 1913, Hauser emigrated to Palestine in 1933. He volunteered for the Royal Air Force during World War II and was involved in the liberation of Dachau. In addition to his diaries from 1929-1951, the collection includes speeches, Zionist circulars, and military reports.

This collection primarily consists of correspondence, reports, and other documents concerning the confiscation ("Aryanization") in 1933 of the ceramics firm Steatit Magnesia AG (Stemag). Martin Thurnauer sat on the board of directors and was one of the main business persons in Stemag, and was pushed out of the firm by the local Nazi party. The collection also contains some personal documents.

The collection consists of correspondence between Maurice Jacobs and important Jewish organizations and individuals. The majority of the collection consists of Jacobs' correspondence between organizations such as colleges, universities, and notable local and national Jewish organizations. The collection documents the years 1926 to 1985, with the bulk of the material dating from 1947 to 1985. Besides correspondence, the papers contain clippings, memos, photographs, agendas, reports, and meeting minutes.

On June 30, 1944 the Joint Distribution Committee opened its office in Bari, Italy to assist in the repatriation and relief of Jewish refugees following the Allied victory in Europe. Max Perlman, originally the JDC representative in North Africa, was transferred to head this office. The collection contains reports and lists concerning refugees transported from Naples, Italy to Oswego, NY following the World War II, and JDC efforts for the relief of Jewish refugees in the North Africa.

Articles on Foundation (1960's and 1970's); confidential reports involving allocations of funds (1973-1974); studies of various programs and functions (1960's and 1970's); annual reports; board documents.

The Mendheim Family Collection holds papers of the family of Florence Mendheim. Most of the collection consists of correspondence, including letters of family members. Other materials include unpublished typescripts as well as a few personal papers and books.

Papers of Morey Schapira reflect the work of the prominent activist of the American Soviet Jewry movement in the years 1965-1993. The collection includes details on Mr. Schapira’s leadership role with organizations Action for Soviet Jewry, the Bay Area Council on Soviet Jewry, the New England Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry, the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry, and the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews. The collection contains files on many other groups, individuals and topics.

The papers of Mort Yadin reflect his work on behalf of Soviet Jews as a member of the Washington Committee for Soviet Jewry and the B’Nai Israel Soviet Jewry Committee. Included are transcripts of Yadin's phone conversations with Jews in the USSR, his correspondence with and on behalf of Soviet Jewish Refuseniks and Prisoners of Conscience. The collection also contains news clippings covering Yadin's activism, materials on events and projects, postal receipts, notes, memos, articles, brochures and photographs.

Papers of Murray Levine, a rabbi at Temple Beth Sholom in Framingham, MA, worked extensively to help resettle Jewish immigrants arriving from the former Soviet Union and traveled to the Soviet Union to deliver spiritual and material support to Soviet Jewish Refuseniks. The materials include photographs and slides, trip reports, notes, memos, clippings, Refusenik profiles, a notebook with coded names of Soviet Jews, and correspondence, including a letter of support from Senator Edward M. Kennedy.

This collection is primarily made up of correspondence and other records of the American Association for Ethiopian Jews (AAEJ) that remained in the possession of its president (from 1982-1993), Nate Shapiro, after the organization dissolved in 1993. The AAEJ worked from 1974-1993 to assist Ethiopian Jews immigrate to Israel. The collection also includes Shapiro's personal papers. The Shapiro Papers fall under the broader AAEJ collection.

Contains constitution, resolutions, minutes, reports, correspondence, and other material relating to the activities of the association, established by the professional staff of the B'nai B'rith Hillel Foundations of America.

Contains records on the formation, mission, vision, and activities of the National Center for the Hebrew Language, as reflected in organizational documents (including minutes), event programs and announcements, publications (including the NCHL newsletter, Ivrit Now), photographs, promotional literature (including press releases), media coverage, and the NCHL website.

The National Committee for Labor Israel (NCLI) was an American fundraising organization closely associated with Israel’s federation of labor and trade unions (Histadrut). NCLI provided financial support for the Histadrut’s educational, health, and social programs in Israel through national and regional solicitation campaigns. Major donors included Labor Zionist organizations, American labor unions, and other Jewish community associations. Financial problems eventually led to the dissolution of NCLI, and the bulk of this collection documents its final decades of operation. A large portion of the records pertain to development projects in Israel during the 1960s -1970s.

This collection contains the records of the National Conference on Soviet Jewry, the largest and most influential American Jewish organization created to coordinate efforts on behalf of Soviet Jewry; the NCSJ containes its work today, under the name, the National Coalition Supporting Eurasian Jewry (NCSEJ).

The bulk of the collection covers the NCSJ's activities from the early 1970s, through late 1980s. It includes meetings minutes, memoranda, correspondence, newsletters and publications of the NCSJ and its precursor organizations (primarily the American Jewish Committee on Soviet Jewry, 1964-1971), and the individual files maintained on Refusenik, prisoners of conscience, and Jewish émigrés.

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The collection also includes a considerable number of reports from the visits to the USSR by Soviet Jewry Movement activists and other. A significant part of the collection is represented by the audio recordings that include 13-minute programs on the WEVD Radio dedicated to Soviet Jewry topics and recordings of phone conversations with Refuseniks. There is also a considerable number of photographs, posters and publications, several film strips and VHS tapes.

The collection documents the National Jewish Welfare Board's (JWB) evolution from an organization founded in 1917 to provide support for soldiers in times of war to an agency involved in all aspects of Jewish life both in the United States and abroad. In 1990 JWB recreated itself as the Jewish Community Centers Association of North America.

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 mainly of minutes, surveys, reports, photographs, and correspondence of both JWB personnel and U.S. military chaplains, directed toward or concerned with the Jewish men in the Armed Forces.

The material in this collection covers such topics as: holiday arrangements (primarily the High Holy Days and Passover), food needs, religious services, furloughs, prayerbooks; budgeting and staffing; registration and marking of Jewish graves; anti-Semitism in the military; the general problems of Kashruth; communication between the men and their families; and general recreation and entertainment.

Collection includes approximately 85,000 individual service files and 320,000 surrogate index cards collected by the BWR and the Greater New York War Records Committee on behalf of Jewish soldiers and sailors who served in World War II. The BWR also conducted surveys of Jewish doctors, dentists, farmers and refugees who served in the United States Armed Forces and compiled population studies for cities containing Jewish populations greater than 25,000, among them Trenton, N.J. and New York City. The individual service files typically provide a soldier's name, age, rank, serial number, service branch, home address, civilian occupation, next of kin, awards and casualties. These files contain supporting documentation culled from newspapers, telephone conversations, and correspondence exchanged among BWR staff and volunteers, service personnel and their families, and representatives of the United States Armed Forces.

The alphabetical master cards series serves as an abbreviated, annotated index for the more substantial individual service files of Jewish service personnel who won awards or suffered casualties during the war. The Bureau maintained correspondence files for permanent staff members including Salo Baron, Edward Burnstein, Louis Dublin, Elisha Friedman, Dr. Maurice Hexter, Rabbi Edward Israel, Samuel Kohs, Louis Kraft, Samuel Leff, Harry Lurie, Herbert Marks, Benjamin Rabinowitz, Philip Schiff, Selma Schnaper, Jerome Seidman, David Turtletaub, Frank Weil, Milton Weill, Arthur Weyne, and Joseph Zubin.

The Bureau also preserved correspondence with representatives of local war records committees, religious, and community service organizations including the United Service Organization, Jewish Community Centers, Hebrew Associations, and the National Refugee Service, as well as publishers, alumni associations, and military personnel from the offices of United States Army, Navy, and Quartermaster General's office.

It retained copies of published and printed materials including studies, lists, guides, forms, and cards. Among the vital records are charts depicting the BWR administrative hierarchy; personnel and staff records; lists of volunteers and field representatives employed throughout the United States; minutes of meetings; annual, quarterly, and special reports; budget materials; and policies and procedures implemented during the war records program.

This collection contains correspondence, photographs and negatives of sites and trips taken, material concerning Soviet Jewry activism and Synagogue services, and trip reports of visits to Jews in the Soviet Union.

This collection contains material relating to Norman Salit's activities with various organizations, including the Synagogue Council of America, the Rabbinical Assembly of America, the Wartime Emergency Commission for Conservative Judaism, the Boy Scouts of America, the Jewish Education Committee, the American Child Guidance Foundation, Religion in American Life, the Valley Forge Foundation, the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and the National Community Relations Advisory Council. There are also speeches, writings, sermons, items related to Sharit's legal work and Zionist activities, as well as some letters from Mordecai Kaplan.

This collection contains the personal and professional papers of Abbo Ostrowsky, including correspondence with many important figures from the art world, several of whom had been students of Ostrowsky at the Educational Alliance Art School. There is also information about Ostrowsky’s career as an artist, including some original artwork, exhibition catalogues, and photographs. These materials show Ostrowsky’s significant influence on modern Jewish art and on the success of the Educational Alliance as an institution.

The collection documents the work and correspondence of Joseph A. D. Sutton and reflects various aspects of his life, personal research and writings in the field of Syrian Jewish culture and society, mainly as the Syrian Jews made their way in the United States. The collection also documents the Syrian Jewish experience of the immigrants who came to America and settled, as they are described in his two books: Magic Carpet: Aleppo-in-Flatbush and Aleppo Chronicles. An extensive portion of the collection examines the Syrian community which settled in Brooklyn, including articles by colleagues as well as correspondence.

The collection documents the work and correspondence of Joy Zacharia Appelbaum and reflects various aspects of her life, personal research and writings in the field of Sephardic Jewish culture and society, mainly as they made their way here in the United States. Collection consists in large part of a large array of newspaper and magazine articles describing Sephardic life in various areas of the world, and especially in the United States. An extensive portion of the collection examines the various customs and traditions found among the Sephardim, including customs for the Jewish Holidays (and especially Passover). The collection also includes a significant quantity of information about the American Sephardi Federation, focusing a great deal on its conventions and activities in the late 1980s to early 1990s. There is also a sizable amount of information about the Sephardic communities in the Ottoman regions of Turkey, Greece, and the Balkans, with a considerable amount of material that focuses on the Quincentennial celebrations held to commemorate the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492.

This collection contains papers of Nokhem Shtif, a Yiddish philologist, editor, literary historian, translator, and political activist, and one of the founders of the YIVO Institute in Vilna. The bulk of the materials pertains to Yiddish language, philology, and literature, as well as to the administration and activities of the Kiev-based Institute of Jewish Proletarian Culture, especially the Philological Section, which was directed by Shtif. The materials include manuscripts of Shtif's writings and speeches; correspondence; reports; meeting minutes; departmental planning documents and course programs/syllabi; materials related to Shtif's teaching of Yiddish stylistics courses; newspaper clippings; several manuscripts of articles and research works by other scholars; and notes, transcriptions, and other research materials, including memoirs related to the lexicographer Y. M. Lifshits.

This collection contains the papers of Siegfried Bernfeld, a writer, educator, psychoanalyst, organizer of the Zionist youth movement in Austria during and after World War I, and founder of several Jewish educational institutions in Austria. These materials include correspondence, by-laws, minutes, programs, newspaper clippings, manuscripts, and financial records of Jewish educational institutions, youth organizations, student clubs, sports, tourism associations, and youth publications, mainly in Austria and Germany, which were collected through the various organizations with which Siegfried Bernfeld was associated and maintained in the Archival institutions which he established.