Memorandums

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.

Papers of Margery Sanford cover the period from the early 1970s to the late 1980s and document her activities as the Documentation Committee chairperson of South Florida Conference on Soviet Jewry, as well as her individual efforts in the American Soviet Jewry Movement. The documents include correspondence, notes, memos, minutes, publications, news clippings, photographs, stickers and a flag.

Personal papers of the American Soviet Jewry movement activist Marilyn Labendz, who participated in the MetroWest Conference on Soviet Jewry, chaired the MetroWest mobilization to Summit II, and Women's Interfaith Plea for Soviet Jewry. The collection contains speeches, memos, correspondence, pamphlets, news clippings and digital photographs.

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.

Personal collection of Soviet Jewry Movement activist Meta Joy Jacoby who chaired the Soviet Jewry Committee of the Main Line Reform Temple, Beth Elohim in Wynnewood, PA. The Committee provided moral support to Soviet Jewish families through the mailing of letters and telegrams, placing phone calls, and sending Jewish cultural materials to the Soviet Union. Meta Joy Jacoby repeatedly traveled to the Soviet Union to meet with and deliver aid to the Refuseniks. The collection includes memos, correspondence, newsletters, brochures, and clippings.

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.

The collection contains papers of one of the pioneers of the American Soviet Jewry Movement. Starting in the early 1960s Moshe Decter instigated broad publicity campaigns to raise global awareness about the persecution of Soviet Jews and authored hundreds of articles on the subject in a variety of publications. Mr. Decter established and directed the Jewish Minorities Research bureau, served as the executive secretary of the Conference on the Status of Soviet Jews and as a director of research at the American Jewish Congress. Moshe Decter Papers consist of materials dating from the late 1950s to the early 2000s, with the bulk of the collection dating in 1960s-1970s. The documents include articles, correspondence, transcripts, notes, memoranda, publications, news clippings, broadsides and photographs.

The papers of Myrtle Sitowitz reflect her work on behalf of Jews in the U.S.S.R. Based in Los Angeles, CA, Mrs. Sitowitz was active in The 35's—The Women’s Campaign for Soviet Jewry, an international organization with members throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and New Zealand. Myrtle Sitowitz’s collection contains correspondence, newspaper articles, a children’s guide to Soviet Jewry, profiles and case histories of the Refuseniks and Prisoners of Conscience, community planning information. The materials include notes, memos, correspondence, publications, news clippings and a bumper sticker.

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.

This collection documents the activities, administration, planning, proceedings, and correspondence of the National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council, 1944-1994. The collection includes correspondence, programs, minutes, proposals, reports, clippings, press releases, and publications.

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.

Pamela B. Cohen Papers document activities of the prominent activist of the American Soviet Jewry Movement. Pamela B. Cohen began her activity through the independent grass roots council, Chicago Action for Soviet Jewry (CASJ) and in 1978, served with Marillyn Tallman as co-chair until 1986, when she became the national president of the Washington-based Union of Councils for Soviet Jews (UCSJ). She served in that capacity for 10 years. The Pamela B. Cohen papers include materials from the late 1960s through 2009, and the bulk of the collection is dated 1970s-1980s. The documents include correspondence, notes, memoranda, publications, news clippings, photographs, ephemera, audio and video recordings and 3-D objects.

This collection contains documents relating to Isaac A. Hourwich’s role as an economist, publicist, statistician, lawyer, author, and authority on immigration, as well as his involvement with the labor movement and the formation of the American Jewish Congress. There are reports, minutes of meetings, memoranda, clippings and correspondence, and manuscripts and articles about Jewish labor, Socialism, Russia, Marxism, immigration, and other subjects. These materials demonstrate Hourwich’s important role in American labor, immigration theory, and political and economic theory.

This collection, which is a sub-group of RG 294 Displaced Persons Camps, consists of the records of Leo W. Schwarz, the Director of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (AJDC/JDC) for the U.S. Occupation Zone in Germany during the years 1946-1947. The papers pertain to his work with the JDC in Germany and to the history of the Jewish displaced persons in Germany after World War II.

This collection contains documents of journalist and left-wing political activist Paul Novick, consisting mainly of correspondence, subject files, manuscripts, photographs, and newspaper clippings. These materials relate to Novick’s career as long-time editor of the Morning Freiheit (Morning Freedom), his important role in the worldwide Communist movement, the history of the Freiheit itself, and Jewish and general politics. These materials demonstrate Novick’s important, and changing, role in the history of Communism, as well as his career as a Yiddish journalist and author.

Papers of Rabbi Pinchas Mordechai Teitz (1908-1995) cover the period from the late 1960s to the early 1980s and document his activities related to Soviet Jews. The collection contains correspondence, related to Soviet Jews, documentation of Rabbi Teitz’ trips to the USSR, his articles on Soviet Jews, the Russian-Hebrew religious books published for Russian-speaking Jews by the enterprise MOHIR ( established by Teitz) records of shipments of books and religious items to the Soviet Union, a sound recording reflecting the visit of the Chief Rabbi of Moscow to the USA in 1968, and photographs related to Rabbi Teitz Soviet Jewry activities in the USA and the USSR. The documents include articles, correspondence, notes, prayer books, publications, news clippings, a trip report, photographs and a vinyl record.

The collection contains the records of the ASJ, an organization active in the Boston area, which survives today as Action for Post-Soviet Jewry, as well as those of two other organizations closely related to ASJ: the New England Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and the Soviet Jewry Legal Advocacy Center. The bulk of the collection is from the decade starting in the late 1970s through the late 1980s. The collection includes large databases on Refuseniks, prisoners of conscience and Jewish émigrés. Along with the database spreadsheet forms there are a large number of individual files. Among these files are materials related to Soviet Jewish refugees in Italy from the time of the Ladispoli crisis of the late 1980s. The collection also includes a substantial number of reports from visits to the USSR by ASJ activists and other travelers cooperating with the Soviet Jewry Movement as well as a considerable number of photographs, posters and publications.

This collection, which is a sub-group of RG 245 HIAS, includes the records of the main HICEM office in Europe prior to and during World War II. There are also some records from the post-war period relating to the dissolution of HICEM, HIAS’s taking over of HICEM’s operations and HIAS’s work with displaced persons.

This collection consists of general reference files from the New York City headquarters of the American Jewish Committee (AJC). Materials originated in various AJC departments and were maintained by a Central Records office until 1962, when records retention policy was decentralized. Document types include correspondence, memoranda, reports, clippings, and published materials concerning individuals, businesses, government agencies, and other organizations related to the work of the AJC.

The collection represents the papers of Morris David Waldman (1879-1963), a rabbi, social worker and communal leader, who was appointed executive secretary of one of the main Jewish defense organizations, the American Jewish Committee (AJC), in 1928. The executive secretary had top executive function at the organization and was in charge of working out and implementing the organization’s projects and policies regarding monitoring the civil and human rights of the Jews, and intervening on behalf of the Jews both in the U.S. and abroad. In 1942, Waldman was promoted to executive vice-president, a position he held until his retirement in 1945. The Morris Waldman Files relate to all of Waldman's activities as acting executive secretary and vice-president of the AJC.

The collection contains the records of the Paris Office of the American Jewish Committee, established in 1947 to study conditions of Jewish refugees and Jewish communities in Europe and North Africa. The Paris Office was involved in major programs and projects of the AJC to study the needs of and aid to the Jews of Europe and the Middle East. The materials include correspondence, memoranda, reports, clippings, photographs and published materials.

This collection contains the records of the American Jewish Public Relations Society (AJPRS), the professional association of publicists in the Jewish communal field. It contains correspondence, meeting minutes, memoranda, society publications, memoirs about the society’s founding, photographs, publicity materials, and newspaper clippings.

The collection documents the activities of a human rights non-government organization on behalf of Soviet Jewry and Jews in the Former Soviet Union. Organized by Harold Light in San Francisco in 1967, the group worked to bring the Soviet Jewry issue to national and international attention. The collection contains correspondence, minutes, case files, publications, newspaper clippings, card files of Refuseniks, subject files, audio/visual materials, and information on other Soviet Jewry and interreligious organizations. Also included are materials relating to Soviet Jewish emigration, Cold War relations, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and human rights conditions in Russia and the former Soviet republics.

The Records of the Forward Association collection consists of the administrative records of the Office of the General Manager of the Forward Association, publisher of the Jewish Daily Forward. The collection contains correspondence, financial materials, minutes, reports, and information related to various anniversary celebrations. These materials serve to illustrate the professional activities of the Forward Association and its General Manager and show the Forward’s importance.

This collection contains the administrative records of Jewish Education Committee as well as materials from the National Council for Jewish Education and the American Association for Jewish Education. The Jewish Education Committee was a Jewish educational organization in New York concerned with coordination of educational activities as well as development of educational resources for the Jewish secular school systems in the U.S. and was organized in June 1939. Materials include correspondence, memoranda, minutes, reports, conference materials, surveys, and publications.

The National Jewish Welfare Board Military Chaplaincy Records document the evolution and activities of NJWB’s military chaplaincy agency, which was known as the Commission on Army and Navy Religious Activities (CANRA) from 1942 to 1947, as the Division of Religious Activities (DRA) from 1947 to 1953, and then as the Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy (CJC) after 1953, during the Executive Directorship of Aryeh Lev (1946-1975) and Philip Bernstein (1942-1946). The collection also consists of Aryeh Lev’s records during his service as assistant to the Office of the Chief of Chaplains of the Army (1940-1945), as well as Lev’s personal papers. Most broadly, the collection chronicles the role of Jewish chaplaincy and Jewish participation in the U.S. military effort from WWII to the Vietnam War. Subjects addressed include the establishment of Judaism as one of the major faiths in the U.S. military, patterns of observance among service members, and post-WWII relief work by Jewish chaplains on behalf of displaced persons. Materials include minutes, reports, correspondence, speeches, sermons, autobiographical writings, photographs, questionnaires and printed materials.

This collection contains several types of materials relating to the various activities of the Society for the Advancement of Judaism, including published bulletins, yearbooks, correspondence, newspaper clippings, audio recordings, and photographs. This collection also contains disbound scrapbooks, some of which are extremely fragile.