No. 191 Winter 2000-2001 NE W S Exhibit Opens “YIVO at 75: Milestones and Treasures” IVO's first exhibition at its Archives,” Board Chairman period in the United States. The Ynew home —“YIVO at 75: Bruce Slovin commented. “In story of Eastern European Milestones and Treasures”— this show there are many Yiddish language, literature and YIVO Institute opened in October at the Center amazing items — original culture is told as an integral part fo r for Jewish History. The exhi- manuscripts by the Yiddish of YIVO’s story. Je w i s h bition celebrates the breadth of writers Isaac Bashevis Singer “Visitors will see original items Re s e a rc h YIVO’s history. It also chronicles and Sholem Aleichem; a letter that should not be missed!” the role YIVO played in Jewish from Leo Frank to Abraham Mohrer noted. “Included are an scholarship and communal life Cahan of the Forward, written 1848 copy of the Tsena U’rena in Europe and the United States. in 1914 from a jail cell in Georgia (Yiddish Biblical commentary “This is our inaugural exhi- before he was lynched by a and stories, primarily used by bition and I want everyone to mob; and an illustrated ketubah women), Lemberg, Latvia; a come and see these treasures (marriage contract) from handmade Hanukkah menorah from the YIVO Library and Singapore, from 1889.” from Poland, 1872; and a 1929 Curated by letter from Albert Einstein to YIVO archivist historian Simon Dubnow, Fruma Mohrer indicating his support for the and designed fledgling YIVO Institute.” by Paul Hunter The exhibition catalog, edited of Artel Exhibi- by Fruma Mohrer and Roberta tions, the show Newman (English), and Dr. traces YIVO’s Hershl Glasser and David history from its Rogow (Yiddish), is available founding in from the bookstore of the Center Vilna, Lithua- for Jewish History. “YIVO at 75: nia in 1925, Milestones and Treasures” runs Visitors to YIVO’s through the until April 27, 2001, Monday inaugural exhibit. Holocaust and through Thursday, 9 a.m. to the post-1940 5 p.m. Claims Conference Awards $250,000 for YIVO Encyclopedia he Conference on Jewish Material Claims in Eastern Europe. Conceptualized by Dr. Gershon TAgainst Germany has approved an allocation Hundert, Montreal Community Professor of of $250,000 toward the cost of research for The Jewish Studies at McGill University, this two- YIVO Encyclopedia ofII the VHistoryV andOO Culture of Jews volume work is to be the definitive documentation of the history and culture of East European Jewry CONTENTS: before, during and after the Holocaust. Hold the Chairman’s Message . . . .2 Summer Program ...... 12 "I want to thank the Claims Conference for this Da t e YIVO’s Stolen Art ...... 3 Lecture Series ...... 14 grant," Executive Director Dr. Carl Rheins, noted. Yivo’s Annual Retirement Planning . . . .4 YIVO Events Schedule . .16 "Their support of The YIVO Encyclopedia is a Benefit Dinner Academic Advisory Library ...... 18 tremendous step forward for the project. We are Tuesday Council ...... 5 Preservation Efforts . . . .20 proud to have them as partners in the hard work ahead. The time is right to collect the fruits of this April 17, 2001 Autobiographies Project .6 Music Archive ...... 21 Leadership Forum ...... 7 New Accessions ...... 22 new era into a comprehensive information source Pierre Hotel Zamler Project ...... 10 YIVO Donors ...... 26 to be used by both academics and the lay public." New York City Project Judaica ...... 10 Letters ...... 30 [continued on page 5] For YIVO’ s SpringYY Public Programs Schedule, See Pages 16-17 Message from the Chairman of the Board A Busy Year at YIVO his has been a busy year at YIVO. We are firm, and a Yiddish enthusiast who also has joined Tproud to welcome Charles J. Rose to the YIVO the YIVO Leadership Forum committee. We are Board. He is a General Partner of Bentley Capital proud to have his experience and enthusiasm. Management, Inc., an investment management Congratulations are in order for Dr. Arnold Richards, our devoted YIVO Board member and former Chair, on his receiving the Mary S. Bruce Slovin Sigourney Award in December in recognition of his distinguished contributions to the field of YIVO News psychoanalysis. Mazel tov also to YIVO Board Founded in 1925 in Vilna, Poland as the Yiddish member Dorothy Payson and her husband Scientific Institute and headquartered in New Martin on their 40th wedding anniversary. Each York since 1940, YIVO is devoted to the history, is a good friend to YIVO and to the Jewish com- society and culture of Ashkenazic Jewry and to munity, and we are grateful to have them with us. the influence of that culture as it developed in the Americas. Today, YIVO stands as the preeminent “At 75 years old YIVO is vigorous center for East European Jewish Studies; Yiddish language, literature and folklore; and the study of and looking forward.” the American Jewish immigrant experience. Let me also say that I am pleased to have Dr. A founding partner of the Center for Jewish History, Adina Cimet on board to begin work on the YIVO holds the following constituent memberships: Educational Program on Yiddish Culture (EPYC), • American Historical Association • Association a pre-college curriculum that the Leadership for Jewish Studies • Association of Jewish Libraries Forum committee has initiated and championed. • Council of Archives and Research Libraries in Thanks to the committee members for their hard Jewish Studies • Research Library Group (RLG) work and enthusiastic farsightedness. The Leader- • Society of American Archivists and • World ship Forum is holding its first event, “Find Your Congress of Jewish Studies. Heritage at YIVO” on January 18, 2001 (see p. 5). Outreach has been the focus of this important Chairman of the Board: Bruce Slovin year — with the new Cultural Events Series and Executive Director: Carl J. Rheins renowned lecturers such as Deborah Lipstadt and Director of Development Yehuda Bauer, the film premieres, the musical and External Affairs: Ella Levine programs, and our inaugural “YIVO at 75: Director of Finance and Administration: Milestones and Treasures” exhibition in the Center Andrew J. Demers for Jewish History. As an organization, at 75 years Chief Archivist: Marek Web old YIVO is vigorous and looking forward. Head Librarian: Aviva Astrinsky YIVO is a living and vital entity. Please join us. Our Jewish tradition of involvement begins Head of Preservation: Stanley Bergman with you. Editor: Elise Fischer Yiddish Editor: Hershl Glasser Production Editor: Jerry Cheslow

Contributors Erica Blankstein, Nikolai Borodulin, Krysia Fis h e r , Shaindel Fogelman, Marilyn Goldfried, Leo Gree n b a u m , Yeshaya Metal, Esther Mishkin, Chana Mlotek, Fruma Mohrer, Roberta Newman, Cori Robinson, David Rogow, Yankl Salant, Daniel Soyer, Yermiyahu Ahron Taub, Steven Wander

15 West 16th Street New York, NY 10011-6301 Phone: (212) 246-6080, Fax: (212) 292-1892 www.yivoinstitute.org e-mail to Yedies: [email protected] YIVO Board member Dr. Arnold Richards speaking after receiving the Mary S. Sigourney Award in recognition of his distinguished contributions to the field of psychoanalysis.

2 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Message from the Executive Direc t o r Recovering YIVO’s Stolen Art Collection

n the recent Swiss Banking Settlement, Special Settlement Fund, after payments are made to IMaster Judah Gribetz’s plan to distribute surviving Nazi victims, to some of the educa- $1.25 billion in payments from Swiss banks and tional projects that have been submitted to the corporations is a significant step for thousands of Special Master. individual Holocaust survivors who have fought YIVO's interest in seeking restitution also led Dr. Carl J. Rheins for decades to recover their pre-war savings. The me and Professor David Fishman to accept an Gribetz distribution plan accepted by Federal invitation from Walter Schwimmer, Secretary Judge Edward Korman on General of the Council November 22, 2000, also of Europe, and Andrius has significance for YIVO. “Reclamation of an important Kubilius, Prime Minister Between 1935 and 1938, part of our Yiddish cultural of the Republic of the Institute developed an heritage seems closer now Lithuania, to go as an impressive art collection official delegation to the in Vilna under the direc- that this new legal groundwork International Forum on tion of Dr. Otto Schneid. has been established.” Holocaust-Era Looted It contained more than Assets held October 100 original artworks by 3-5, 2000, in Vilna. The such artists as Marc Chagall, Mane Katz, I. Forum was attended by 37 countries and by 17 Ryback, Mark Antokolski, Yankl Adler, Maurycy non-governmental organizations. Gottleib, B. Kratko, and Chaim Nisn Tyber. This The meeting was convened 1) To provide a art collection and the works in it together reflected forum to discuss the possibility of compiling an the Jewish community’s support for YIVO’s inventory of looted cultural assets, including those museum. Each work in the collection was either restored to their rightful owners; and 2) To donated by the artist (Chagall, Katz, Cuckierman), establish international legislative guidelines for by a distinguished citizen (Dr. T. Symchowicz, the implementation of such a process. Sofia and Joseph Weitzman, Mieczyslaw Zagajski), During the Forum, YIVO met with U.S. Deputy or a community group active in supporting YIVO Secretary of Treasury Stuart Eizenstat, head of the (YIVO Friends from Lodz, Ida Kaminska 20th American delegation, and with Monica Dugot, Anniversary Committee). Deputy Director of the Holocaust Claims The collection itself was a valuable assemblage Processing Office (Art Claims) of the New York of work by contemporary artists, but it also State Banking Department, to present YIVO’s incorporated religious art and Jewish ritual cultural properties restitution claims. objects. Taken altogether, the YIVO art museum Although no solid evidence on the whereabouts collection was a snapshot of the nature and vitality of YIVO’s stolen art collection has appeared, two of the living YIVO community, one interested in resolutions adopted at the Vilna Forum provide preserving and studying all aspects of Jewish life some hope for the future restitution of the and culture — political movements, personal collection. First, the 37 signatories to the Vilna histories, rabbinical activities, community Declaration have asked all “governments, institutions, creative writings and artistic output. museums, the art trade and other relevant As in the case of important Jewish art collections agencies to provide all information necessary” for confiscated by the Nazis in Paris and Amsterdam, the restitution of cultural assets looted during the YIVO’s collection was seized by the Einsatzstab des Holocaust. These entities are asked to post such Reichsleiter Alfred Rosenberg and appears to have information on accessible web sites, and to been shipped to Germany. Similarly the proce e d s cooperate in the creation of a centralized web site fr om the sale of these works are likely to have in Strasbourg, France, in association with the passed through Swiss banks. Certainly none of Council of Europe. these artworks was returned to YIVO after the war. Second, they also agreed to recognize the Coupled with the looting of thousands of rare principle of “previous Jewish ownership of such books from YIVO’s pre-war library, these losses cultural assets,” and pledged to achieve a just form the basis of YIVO’s claim in the Swiss solution for the restitution of properties. Banking Case. Gribetz recognized the merits of Reclamation of an important part of our Yiddish such institutional claims. In his plan, Gribetz cultural heritage seems closer and more possible recommended to the Federal Court that it may be now that this new legal groundwork has been possible to allocate a portion of the remaining established.

3 Development and External Affa i r s Passing the Torch by Ella Levine, Director of Development and External Affairs s I was looking through Our future is based on both the past and the Amy family photo albums, present. To know your heritage is to be in contact I found a picture, taken in with both your family’s and your community’s Jerusalem: I was passing the history. A community’s history grounds each of its shamash to my four-year-old members, by forming a common base of daughter, who was lighting the understanding. sixth Hanukkah candle. It made Whether we come from Poland, Lithuania, me think of the passing of the Russia, Hungary, Romania or elsewhere, our tra- torch, how its light shines on our ditions define us and also link us with people people and our children, and across the world. how strong the need is to continue this process. Sharing this knowledge, linking with those who Exploring, preserving, teaching and spreading might not have had the opportunity to learn about awareness of Jewish life in pre-war Eastern their heritage, will not only change them, but will Europe — this is so vitally important not only for also broaden our community. In effect, it will our children, but for all the generations that fol- preserve our future. At YIVO we strive to help you low. Consequently, it is with great hope that we and the Jewish community to honor the wisdom begin YIVO’s new EPYC program on Yiddish of traditions and to share them with others. culture in Eastern Europe. We will create a link, I look at the photo of my child lighting the sixth bringing the rich Jewish culture and history candle and I know this work is a key to our of Eastern Europe — in the full complexity of that permanence, toward our future — one full of life, life and times — to today’s generations and to remembrance, and continuity. those in the future. Planned Giving Charitable Giving as a Retirement Planning Tool by Neal P. Myerberg, Vice President, Charitable Life Income Plans. into consideration income pay- Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Using appreciated securities or able for life, tax savings and the nited States tax laws encou- other property, an individual transfer of wealth to the next Urage charitable giving as a can often obtain a greater re- family generation, individuals way of accomplishing valuable turn on the value of the assets and their planners often find estate and financial planning through a Charitable Remainder that a Planned Gift provides while providing for charity in- Trust than if the property were more economic benefits than stead of paying significant taxes. sold, the taxes paid, and the many other forms of planning. This concept is called Planned proceeds reinvested. This is Thus, a Planned Gift partners Giving and is widely applied by particularly apparent with real the individual with a favorite estate and financial planners for estate that has appreciated in charity and not with the Internal their clients who are philanthrop i c . value but which does not pro- Revenue Service. Through certain Life Income duce enough income. A transfer YIVO’s Planned Giving pro- Plans, such as Charitable of the real estate to a Charitable fessionals can help its suppor- Remainder Trusts, Charitable Remainder Trust can provide ters and friends determine if a Reverse Mortgages, and Chari- major economic benefits through Planned Gift is beneficial. Please table Gift Annuities, individuals increased income and tax inquire, in confidence, at no ob- can maximize the productivity savings. ligation, by calling Ella Levine, of their investments by conver- The application of Planned Director of Development, at ting them into fixed annuities, Giving techniques is often com- (212) 294-6128. She will be while eliminating or deferring plex. However, Planned Giving pleased to assist you. As an estate taxes or taxes on capital professionals can provide infor- added benefit, you will help gains. mation to help one analyze whe- YIVO to carry on its important Planning for retirement is one ther a Planned Giving vehicle is work while providing well for of the major applications of right for that individual. Taking yourself and your family. 4 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 YIVO Establishes New Academic Advisory Council

he YIVO Executive Com- chart future paths. We look Associate Professor, Jewish Tmittee, on behalf of the full forward to the positive input.” Studies Department, Drew Board, established the Institute’s To guide the YIVO Board and University; Dr. Anita Norich , first International Academic staff in developing and modi- Associate Professor, Department Advisory Council on May 17, fying YIVO’s curriculum, pub- of English Language and Lite- 2000. The Council, composed of lications, and other academic rature, University of Michigan; ten distinguished scholars from programs, the Council will Dr. Mark Slobin , Professor, the United States and Canada, advise on the latest professional Music Department, Wesleyan will both advocate for scholars developments and trends in University; Dr. Michael F. who utilize YIVO’s archival and Eastern European Jewish Studies Stanislawski , Nathan J. Miller library holdings and will help as well as the expectations of its Professor of Jewish History redirect YIVO‘s role as a major scholars and graduate students. and Associate Director, Center research institution for the study The International Academic for Israel and Jewish Studies, of Eastern European Jewish Advisory Council, which will Columbia University; Dr. Ruth civilization. meet quarterly, held its first Roskies Wisse , Professor of “This Advisory Council re- session on November 17, 2000 Yiddish and Comparative news a tradition of direct in New York City. Literature, Department of involvement by scholars in Current members are (in al- Near Eastern Languages academic strategic planning phabetical order): Dr. David and Civilizations, Harvard at YIVO,” Dr. Carl J. Rheins Fishman , Professor and Chair, University; and Dr. Steven J. commented. “The Academic Department of Jewish History, Zipperstein , Daniel E. Koshland Advisory Council will help Jewish Theological Seminary of Professor in Jewish Culture and YIVO enhance its strengths and America; Dr. Gershon Hundert , History, Stanford University. Montreal Jewish Community In the immediate future, the Claims Conference Professor of Jewish Studies, Council will develop a strategy [continued from page 1] Department of Jewish Studies, for the Max Weinreich Center McGill University; Dr. Gregory and recommend new directions The YIVO Encyclopedia will S. Hunter , Associate Professor, for the YIVO Archives and the reflect current scholarship in all Palmer School of Library and Library, incorporating modern fields, and will draw upon the Information Science, Long technologies and management newly accessible records and Island University, C.W. Post practices. The Council will also archives in countries of the Campus; Dr. Samuel Kassow , help identify new funding former Soviet Union. Hundert, Dana Research Professor of sources for the Institute’s aca- working in collaboration with History, Trinity College; Dr. demic programs. staff of the Max Weinreich Center Allan Nadler , Wallenstein and a team of other scholars, intends that by "describing the way of life of the lost communities and people, the compendium will serve to document the distinguished individuals who labored on behalf of the greater Jewish community, as well as those who participated in political and religious movements, the scholars, artists, musicians, actors, writers and others of note. Nothing Jewish will be considered foreign." This reference work, targeted to university, synagogue and home libraries, is one of the most significant publishing endeavors The newly appointed YIVO International Advisory Council at its first meeting on November 16, 2000 (L-R): in YIVO history. It is anticipated Anita Norich, Ruth Wisse, Gershon Hundert, Mark Slobin, Michael Stanislawski, Gregory Hunter, Allan that it will be released in 2004. Nadler and David Fishman. Not pictured: Samuel Kassow and Steven J. Zipperstein. 5 American Immigrant Autobiographies Project Under Way ore than half a century new country. Many include Director Max Weinreich. Mafter they were written, the first-hand information on ma- Project advisors include autobiographies of Jewish immi- jor Jewish social and political Professors Arthur Goren of grants to the United States are movements and on Jewish Columbia University, an author- being translated into English geographic mobility in the ity on American Jewish history; and published. With the help of United States. A first draft of Anita Norich of the University a grant from the National Foun- the anthology, under the work- of Michigan, an expert on dation for Jewish Culture, YIVO ing title of To Unburden My Yiddish literature; and David researchers are sifting through Heart, is anticipated by the Fishman of the Jewish Theo- 220 autobiographies that were summer of 2001. Its publication logical Seminary, a specialist submitted to YIVO as contest will posthumously fulfill an in the history of East European entries in 1942. ambition of then-YIVO Research Jewry. “The most interesting works will be published as an anthology and summa- ries of the others will be stored in a database to make them more accessible to researchers,” said Daniel Soyer, one of the project editors. Soyer (Assistant Professor of History at Fordham University) and co-editor Jocelyn Cohen (who re- cently completed her Ph.D. in U.S. History at the University of Minnesota), have begun reading through the collection. The writers discuss their family back- Clara Schacter (top, second from left), a participant in YIVO’s 1942 autobiography grounds, education, work and contest, with other members of the executive committee of the East New York home lives, reasons for emigra- Workmen’s Circle School No. 2. The Workmen’s Circle eagerly endorsed the ting and adjustment to their contest, and many members contributed their stories. Donor: Clara Schacter. New YIVO Yiddish CD “Taybele and Her Demon” Released

aybele and Her Demon’ and Other Produced by Donna Gallers, the 90-minute “‘T Selections from Yiddish Literature,” a CD/cassette intersperses the texts with excerpts new two-CD or cassette of music by today’s finest klezmer groups. The set of Yiddish readings accompanying booklet offers a short biography and klezmer selections, is of Rogow, synopses of each work by Paul now available. Performed Glasser, Associate Dean of the Max Weinreich by David Rogow, YIVO Center, and introductions by Professors David linguist and managing Roskies and Nahma Sandrow. The new CD/ editor of the YIVO-bleter, cassette is accessible to both native Yiddish this recording includes speakers and Yiddish students. both serious and humor- Both the new offering and Rogow’s first ous works of Sholem collection, “‘Bontshe Shvayg’ and Other Aleichem, Aaron Zeitlin, Selections from Yiddish Literature,” are on sale at Chaim Grade, Der the gift shop in the Center for Jewish History Tunkeler, Moyshe-Leyb (917-606-8220) and at the Workmen’s Circle Halpern and others. Jewish Book Center (800-922-2558, ext. 285).

6 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Leadership Forum: Your Heritage Journey Begins at YIVO nder the development of a creative and accurate EPYC Uable direc- curriculum is an end product of this new Jewish tion of Cathy awareness and commitment. Zises and Rita K. Levy, Chair, Charles Rose Joins YIVO Board the YIVO Lea- dership Forum harles J. Rose has been elected to YIVO’s committee will CNational Board. He is a General Partner in host a cocktail Bentley Capital Management, Inc., a New York fundraiser, Rita K. Levy Cathy Zises City-based firm with nearly $350 million under “Your Heritage management. Rose is an equity analyst/portfolio Journey Begins at YIVO,” on Thursday, January manager. Prior to 1998, Rose was an institutional 18, 2001. The event will introduce a new portfolio manager at Lynch & Mayer, Inc. and, generation to the breadth of YIVO’s archival 1992-1996, he was a partner at the large hedge resources by focusing on aspects of five Eastern fund Omega Advisors. Rose began his investment European cities and towns. “We want to attract career at Oppenheimer & Co., Inc., where he was our contemporaries to this pioneering event,” one of the top-rated chemical industry equity Levy said, “and to help them understand the analysts and was consistently ranked as an tremendous resources available at YIVO.” By Institutional Investor All-American. Rose holds opening up YIVO to a wider audience and a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Columbia teaching people more about their heritage, the University as well as an M.B.A. from Harvard Leadership Forum hopes to increase support for Business School. YIVO in the coming years. Rose is active in a range of Jewish organizations. “If you want to understand the breadth of At YIVO, he is a member of the Leadership Forum YIVO’s holdings, ‘Your Heritage Journey’ will and is Chair of the 2001 YIVO Mission to Germany, teach you how archival searches are done—YIVO the Czech Republic and Lithuania. He has partici- will highlight five cities and towns to show the pated in the 1999 YIVO mission to Lithuania, immense possibilities when you seek your roots,’ Poland and Russia. Zises elaborated. Guests in the Great Hall at the He is very involved in the Sutton Place Syna- Center for Jewish History will experience a gogue, the Wall Street Division of UJA-Federation plethora of materials and sounds about families, and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith Charles J. Rose Jewish institutions, music, street scenes, and and is a member of the Board of Jewish Education famous personalities from Kovno, Shavl, Warsaw, and the Folksbiene Yiddish Theatre. Rose is a Przemysl, Margareten and Bialystok. “We hope to graduate of Workmen Circle/Arbeter Ring Schule have a good crowd of people willing to make in New York. YIVO a long-term commitment,” continues Zises. “This is our heritage and our children’s future.” Women's Committee to Sponsored by Cathy and Seymour Zises, the Host Inaugural Luncheon “Your Heritage Journey” fundraiser will benefit the new Educational Program in Yiddish Culture Save the Date (EPYC) curriculum project. On Monday, May 21, 2001, the YIVO Women's This pilot curriculum on East European Jewish Committee will hold it's first luncheon, "A culture is being developed for both Jewish and Heritage - Me'dor Le'dor" at the Center for secular high schools. Giving levels begin at $180 Jewish History, to honor committee members (Fraynd/ Friend), to $360 (Shtitser/ Supporter), Fanya Gottesfeld Heller and Sima Katz. Special $720 (Bal-toyve/ Benefactor) and $1,000 (Boyer/ tributes will be paid to Esther Ancoli-Barbasch Builder). Those who give $10,000 or more to and Esther Mishkin. support EPYC will join the Vilna Gaon Society/ Professor Yaffa Eliach, author of There Once Chairman’s Circle. Was a World: A 900-Year Chronicle of the Shtetl Levy is chairing the “Your Heritage Journey” of Eishyshok, will be the guest speaker. fundraiser with Charlie Rose and new Leadership Event Chair Etta Wrobel noted, "This will Forum member Jonathan Mishkin. “We hope to be a celebration—to honor members of our raise people’s consciousness about what YIVO has committee, and to tell their stories. It will be a stored in its vast repository, and show YIVO’s first step, and a proud tribute to a Jewish future." relevance today to us as Jews,” Levy noted. “The

7 ww w .y i v o i n s t i t u t e . o r g YIVO Web Site Attracting Thousands of Visitors Since its launch on June 1, search engines update 2000, YIVO’s web site has their listings with the received over 10,000 “hits” correct address of the (online visits). Most of the hits new YIVO web site.” are coming from Internet surfers Newman also noted in the United States, but the that a growing number number of visitors from Israel, of Jewish Studies, Australia, Canada, Germany, Holocaust Studies, and other European countries is Yiddish, Jewish also on the rise. genealogy, and library “We get an average of 35 web sites are adding visitors a day,” reports Roberta YIVO to their featured Newman, YIVO’s Director of set of links. New Media. “The number is Visit the web site at increasing as more and more www.yivoinstitute.org.

Poyln Meets the World at Frankfurt Book Fair oyln: Jewish Life in the Old Country was honored centrally located Exhibition Hall 4.1 which was Pat the Frankfurt Book Fair, the world’s largest devoted to literature and the arts. annual trade fair for publications and media, held To underscore the choice of Poyln as its central in Frankfurt, Germany, from October 18-23, 2000. presentation title at the fair, Aufbau-Verlag in At the fair 6,643 exhibitors from 105 countries cooperation with Hessische Rundfunk (RH), the presented 380,000 books, magazines, multimedia radio and television authority for the province of products and art works. Hesse (of which Frankfurt is the largest city), Each year, a country arranged a special exhibition of 56 selected is chosen as the fair’s photographs from the book. The exhibition ran guest of honor, and from October 10-22 in the HR Frankfurter the country’s intel- Funkhaus building. Elegantly framed and lectual achievements, installed in a large and well-lit exhibition hall, shown in its publica- Kacyzne’s exquisite photographs of Polish Jews tions, is the central from the 1920s could be contemplated in all their theme of the fair. splendor by visitors. At the opening, Luc Poland was selected Jochimsen, editor-in-chief of the Hessische this year, along with Rundfunk, Salomon Korn, the chairman of the Poyln. Marek Web, Jewish community of Frankfurt, and Arno YIVO Chief Archivist Lustiger, a popular German-Jewish writer and and editor of Poyln, journalist, addressed the large crowd. Lustiger visited the fair and also read from his own translations of some of met with Bernd Kacyzne’s Yiddish poetry. F. Lunkewitz of The appearance of Poyln, Eine Untergegangene Aufbau-Verlag, the Jûdische Welt was also noted in the leading YIVO’s Marek publisher of the book’s German edition, which German newspapers. The Frankfurter Allegemeine Web (L) with was on exhibit at the fair. Zeitung published a major review by Arno Bernd F. Lukewitz Poyln: Jewish Life in the Old Country, is an award- Lustiger, which was reprinted in translation in the of publisher winning album of pre-war photographs by Alter English-language edition. The popular cultural Aufbau-Verlag. Kacyzne, edited by Marek Web and originally weekly Die Zeit illustrated its special book fair published in 1999 by Metropolitan Books in issue with several Kacyzne photographs. Many association with the YIVO Institute. The German- local and national newspapers wrote reviews of language volume, Poyln, Eine Untergegangene the Kacyzne exhibition. Jûdische Welt, was published in September 2000 by After closing in Frankfurt, the exhibition travels Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin, to coincide with this year’s in Germany, first stopping in Berlin and then book fair. The Poyln album was prominently Munich. Discussions are underway about bringing displayed at the Aufbau-Verlag bookstand in the the Poyln exhibition to the United States.

8 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Fo r mer Deputy Mayor of Paris Hi t l e r ’ s Professors in Romanian, And Museum Chair Vis i t s Italian Edition to Follow laude-Gerard Marcus, former Deputy Mayor Romanian- Cof Paris and Honorary Member of the French Alanguage edition Parliament, visited YIVO in August. Marcus is of Max Weinreich’s also Chairman of the Musée et d’histoire du Hitler’s Professors: The Judaïsme, which hosted the YIVO exhibition Part of Scholarship in “The Power of Persuasion: Jewish Posters from Germany’s Crimes Interwar Poland” earlier this year. During his Against the Jewish YIVO visit he discussed further collaboration People (Universitatile efforts between the two institutions. lui Hitler: Contributia intelectualilor la crimele Germaniei împotriva evreilor) has been released by Editura POLIROM, Iasi, Romania, with a new introduction by Sir Martin Gilbert. It is translated by Radu Pavel Gheo. The Romanian edition appears in a limited run of 2,000 copies. The Italian language rights to Hitler’s Professors have been sold to Il Saggiatore of Milano. A first Claude-Gerald Marcus, former Deputy Mayor of Paris (L), with Krysia Fisher, YIVO Photo Archivist. run of 4,000 hardback copies is planned. After More than a Half Century at YIVO Bina Weinreich Retires ina Weinreich has been associated with YIVO Language and Folklore: A Selective Balmost since it first moved to the United Bibliography for Research.” States in 1940. At the age of 18, she was a student In the early 1970s, Bina returned to YIVO here and studied with the greats of the time— as a full-time staff member. Her many jobs Max Weinreich, Jacob Shatzky, Shlomo Noble, included: editor of the YIVO-bleter and Abraham Menes, et al. In class, she met her YIVO Annual, unofficial assistant to the future husband, Uriel Weinreich, as well as Uriel Weinreich Yiddish Summer Program, other young people who would later become member of the Research and Planning renowned: Shmuel Lapin (later executive Commission, chair of the Publications director of YIVO), Joshua Fishman (world- Committee, and editor-in-chief of YIVO News. famous sociolinguist), Khane Mlotek (YIVO As a specialist in folklore, Bina co-curated a music archivist), Yosl Mlotek (long-time edu- YIVO exhibit on Yiddish folklore, presented cation director of the Workmen’s Circle) and many academic papers, chaired sessions and Mendl Hoffman (emeritus member of the read papers at YIVO conferences. In 1988 YIVO YIVO Board of Directors). published her book Yiddish Folktales (translated Mrs. Weinreich began her YIVO work as the into English), which received glowing reviews assistant to the Director of Research, Dr. Max and was later published in Italian and Japanese Weinreich. As Dr. Weinreich’s assistant, she used translations. her knowledge of Spanish to compile a bib- For the last ten years, she has been a key mem- liography of Judezmo (Ladino) books that ber of the Max Weinreich Center, teaching a had been donated to YIVO. She interviewed graduate course in Yiddish folklore, language Holocaust survivors, preserving the recordings and literature. A number of her students, fol- for the sound archive of spoken Yiddish. A few lowing her example, now are themselves years later, she and Uriel worked together to lay teachers of these subjects. the groundwork for the Language and Culture Over the coming years, Bina Weinreich hopes Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry; she also helped him to concentrate on her folklore research. We wish with his dictionary, a twenty-year endeavor. In her a healthy, happy, productive future! 1959, the Weinreichs jointly published “Yiddish

9 News Update Zamler Project in Hasidic Communities Forges Ahead he Zamler Project, which began in the fall of Project archivist Abraham Joshua Heschel T1999, continues to interview members of personally took many of the photographs in the hundreds of shtiblekh founded by survivors of lost Jewish European communities over the past 50 years. Efforts initially focused on Brooklyn, but have widened to include contemporary Eastern Europe. Recent interviewees include a 92-year-old Holocaust survivor from Galicia and the daughter of the highly respected Kozhnitzer Rebbe of Warsaw. A computerized slide show of images collected during the early stages of the Zamler Project is part of the “YIVO at 75: Milestones and Treasures” Rabbi Nochum Moshe Twersky of Kovel-Rachmastrivka, blessing Jewish soldiers. courtesy of Yitz Twersky exhibition currently on display in the YIVO Gallery at the Center for Jewish History. exhibit. During a trip to Poland and Ukraine in The slide show, prepared by Zamler archivists, August, he also interviewed some of the few includes street scenes of Borough Park; views of remaining Jewish residents of pre-war Hasidic shtiblekh and synagogues in the New York area; centers, including Gora Kolwaria (pre-war home Hasidic rebbes and their followers; observance of of the Gerer Rebbe), Zinkov and Chechelnik. Jewish holidays, including the tiniest and largest Heschel also interviewed a Polish woman who, in succahs in Borough Park; and historic and the 1930s, worked in the home of the Amshinover contemporary images of Hasidic sites in Ukraine Rebbe in Amshinov. and Poland. These last include the surviving Some of the slide show images appear courtesy Grand Rabbi synagogues and tombstones of Hasidic leaders. of photographer Lance Breger. Rare turn-of-the- Isaac Meir The show also features wall posters and photos of century photos of Hasidic rebbes are part of the Heschel of ceremonial objects. private collection of Yitz [continued on page 32] Kopyczynitz (1862-1934). Copyright Chasdei Moshe - Kopyczynitz Pr oject Judaica Opening Doors to the Next Generation of Scholars new Jewish high school program opened three sponsoring institutions: humanities from Athis fall in Moscow, sponsored by Project the RSUH litsei; other general studies from Judaica, the Russian university-based program of faculty of the Lipman School; and Judaic studies Jewish Studies and archival research. The Project from Project Judaica. Judaica High School Program, with an inaugural The employment of young, Russian-born class of 26 tenth-grade students, is supported Judaica specialists is an exciting feature of the financially by UJA-Federation of New York. It new program. Anya Sorokina, a graduate of represents a collaboration of three organizations: Project Judaica and instructor in Yiddish lan- the Russian State University for the Humanities guage and culture, studied Yiddish at RSUH (RSUH) Preparatory High School (litsei); the with the renowned octogenarian Yiddishist, Lipman Jewish Day School; and Project Judaica. Shimon Sandler, as well as at YIVO. Another Project Judaica was created in 1991 as a joint faculty member, Artur Klemper, is a fifth-year effort of the Jewish Theological Seminary, YIVO student at Project Judaica. Institute for Jewish Research and the RSUH. The new high school program represents an The pioneer class has begun an ambitious important step in the continued revitalization of curriculum of Yiddish and Hebrew languages, Jewish educational and cultural life in the former East European Jewish history, and Jewish Soviet Union. Project Judaica has already created literature, under the leadership of Helena a new group of young Russian Judaica scholars Kolchinskaya, administrator of the High School who are beginning to train the next generation. program. Academic instructors come from the

10 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Br i t a i n ’ s First Holocaust Center YIVO Volunteer Visits Beth Shalom By Esther Mishkin walked through the beautiful and inviting Imemorial rose garden at Beth Shalom, Britain’s first Holocaust memorial just outside London. It was full of flowers and streams, where relatives had planted bushes to remember family members who did not survive. In this garden, among the sculptures, my memories turned to the 6,000,000 gone and to each lost community, big and small, including my own. The Smiths, a Baptist family, decided to build a memorial to the Holocaust on their own land with their own money, in 1995, after visiting Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem. In their view, although YIVO’s Esther Mishkin with Stephen Smith in the memorial the Jews were the victims, “the Holocaust was a rose garden at Beth Shalom. Christian problem.” Beth Shalom is smaller than other Holocaust memorials. The rooms are full of information on the life and times of vibrant communities from YIVO Institute for Jewish Research the prewar period through the ghettoes and 15 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10 0 11 - 6 3 0 1 camps. Its compact size facilitates learning and contemplation. I want to help YIVO preserve our Jewish heritage. In the finely decorated library, I talked with ❏ $50–Entitles you to YIVO’s newsletter in Yiddish Stephen Smith, head of Beth Shalom, about how and English. much I liked it. I also discussed YIVO’s history and role in the pre-war Vilna Jewish community. ❏ $100–Poster reproduction from YIVO’s collection. I presented him with a copy of Poyln: Jewish Life in ❏ $180–A packet of YIVO postcards the Old Country, YIVO’s award-winning album of photographs by Alter Kacyzne. He thanked YIVO ❏ $360–A Yiddish recording and me, saying that the book would enrich the Beth Shalom library. ❏ $5 0 0 – A book from YI V O ❏ Esther Mishkin, a retired social worker, is a member $1000 and more–All of the above and a listing of the YIVO Women’s Committee and has been a in YIVO News. volunteer at YIVO for the past six years. Born in ❏ Other Kovno, Lithuania, she lost both her parents and two brothers in the Kovno Ghetto while she alone survived. Enclosed is my contribution of $ . Please charge my gift to:

❏ VISA ❏ MasterCard YIVO Mourns We express heartfelt condolences to Card No. Exp. Date our Board member Motl Zelmanowicz, on the recent loss of his wife, Dr. Naomi Signature Pat Zelmanowicz . Her devotion to the Yiddish language, to writers and to all Please make checks payable to YIVO Institute for of Yiddish culture was unique. She will Jewish Research. Your gift is tax deductible. be sorely missed. Name The YIVO Board and staff mourn the Address passing of Morris Morowitz , lifelong Yiddishist and father of Jacob Morowitz, City/State/Zip YIVO National Board of Directors and President of the Chicago YIVO Society. Telephone (h) (w) May his memory be for a blessing. Bruce Slovin and the YIVO Family Fax e-mail

11 YIVO Yiddish Summer Program at Columbia University peaking Yiddish This year’s enrollment was high—56 students “Sand living our from Belarus, Canada, Cuba, Czech Republic, daily lives in Yiddish Germany, Netherlands, Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, are no longer natural for most of the Jewish “W e must create natural ‘svives’ population,” said Itzik Gottesman, Associate (milieus) for nurturing Yid d i s h , ” Editor of the Yiddish Itzik Gottesman Forverts. He was deli- vering the keynote address to the gradu- Russia, South Africa and, of course, the United ating Yiddish summer States. The students’ geographical diversity was Itzik Gottesman speaking program students in matched by the diversity of their backgrounds, at siyem. August. “We must including visual artists, graduate students, trans- create our own natural svives (milieus) for nur- lators, historians, linguists, musicians, lawyers, turing Yiddish. To foster that, we need to have singers, librarians and retired persons. contact with the older generation.” Morning Yiddish grammar and literature classes Gottesman said he was interested in folklore were taught by Hanan Bordin, Mijal Gai, Naomi because it is based on living people. “One cannot Kadar, Rivke Margolis, Avrom Nowersztern, say that nobody sings Yiddish folk ballads any- Mordkhe Schaechter and Sheva Zuck. Afternoon more, when it is still possible for me to sit in an conversation classes were taught by Pessl Beckler, older singer’s apartment and listen to him sing Semel Stern, Rivke Margolis, Benyomin Moss, such a ballad. Knowing Yiddish is a key to the Leye Robinson and Kalmen Weiser. The folkdance older generation—use the opportunity.” workshops included traditional Yiddish Gottesman’s message was appropriate for the folkdance, led by Michael Alpert, and Hasidic annual siyem (ceremony of completion) for YIVO’s dance, taught by Jill Gellerman. The Yiddish 33rd session of the Uriel Weinreich Program in folksong workshop was led alternately by Lea Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture. His Szlanger and Adrienne Cooper. Irena Klepfisz address was preceded by greetings from Yankl taught a translation workshop, and Hy Wolfe Salant, YIVO Director of Yiddish Language directed the theater workshop, which gave a Programs, and remarks by Dr. Carl Rheins, YIVO stunning performance at the siyem. Chava Executive Director. Following the speeches, Weissler, Kobi Weizner, Anita Norich, Eleanor students demonstrated what they had learned Reissa, Egon Mayer, Dovid Rogow, Jeffrey over the previous six weeks by presenting songs, Shandler, Samuel Kassow and Dovid Fishman original poems, skits and essays—all in Yiddish. gave lectures. There was even a multimedia performance with To receive a brochure for the 2001 zumer-program, bunnies, hunters and Yiddish song—a 21st please contact Yankl Salant at: (212) 294-6138, fax: century Yiddish equivalent of “Rashomon.” (212) 292-1892, e-mail: ysalant@yivo.cjh.org. Scholarship Funds and Recent Contributors It is only fitting that the scholarship funds and recent donors be mentioned by name as recognition of their enduring dedication. Dr. Zellig Bach Scholarship Fund Ester Kodor Koyn-Priz Far Yidish- Golda Masha Plotkin Scholarship Rev. Samuel A. Baker Memorial Lerers (Esther Codor Cohen Prize for Bessy L. Pupko Scholarship Fund in Scholarship Yiddish Teachers) Memory of Zelig, Abraham and Leah (Manya) Eisenberg Scholarship Frances Litwer Krasnow Memorial Joseph (Osia) Pupko and Paula Pupko Fund Scholarship Olkenitzkaya Arn Un Sonya Fishman-Fundatsye Nita Binder Kurnick Scholarship The Ruth & Misha Schneider Far Yidisher Kultur (Aaron and Sonia Shmuel Lapin Memorial Scholarship Memorial Fund Fishman Foundation for Jewish Leib Lensky Scholarship Fund in Sholem Aleichem Kultur-Tsenter Culture) Memory of Sara and Meir Kshiensky Louis Williams Scholarship Fund Forverts Association The Max and Anna Levinson Norman and Rosita Winston Fruchtbaum Foundation Foundation Scholarship Fund Abe Goldberg Yiddish Language Sara Norich Memorial Scholarship Harry and Celia Zuckerman Scholarship Fund Scholarship

12 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Yale and YIVO Cooperate New Scholarship Established errold P. Fuchs, a long-standing member of the The fellowship is Fuchs’s second major gift to JYIVO Board, and member of the Yale College encourage collaboration between YIVO and Yale. class of 1963, has established a new annual en- In 1995, Fuchs established an endowment that dowed fellowship at Yale. Starting in 2002, it will allows YIVO and the Slifka Center for Jewish Life permit a Yale undergraduate or graduate student at Yale to sponsor joint academic programs. The to spend four weeks pursuing a research project in first such collaboration occurred in May 2000, the YIVO Archives or Library. when the Yale-YIVO Endowment joined with Yale University and the Littauer Foundation to sponsor Calling All Alumni of the an international conference on the life and work of Yiddish writer Sholem Asch. It attracted such Yiddish Summer Program! distinguished scholars as David Roskies, Naomi IVO is seeking all alumni of the Uriel Warnke, Anita Norich, Paula Hyman, Ruth Wisse, YWeinreich Program in Yiddish Language, and Avraham Novershtern. Literature and Culture. A program newsletter— Zumer in nyu-york (Summer in New York)— will be sent to all students and faculty who participated A Jewish Heritage Mission in at least one zumer-program since 1968. The first issue will appear in Spring 2001. Join Us on Our Journey to Germany, We want to create a true network of zumer- the Czech Republic & Lithuania, programniks past and present, including those from the earliest years. If you are an alumnus and May 24 - June 4, 2001 have not received a questionnaire, please contact Yankl Salant (see below) or fill it out on the YIVO website at http://www.yivoinstitute.org. If you are in contact with participants from the early years, please give YIVO their names and addresses, or email addresses. Contact Yankl Salant at (212) 294-6138, or fax: (2120 292-1892, or email to [email protected].

Yiddish At YIVO It all began in Vilna in 1925. None of the photographs or movies you have seen, nor the books you have read, nor Yiddish Summer Program the museums where you have cried, could ever adequately prepare you. Touch and feel the Jewish world that vanished! Six-week intensive program in Yiddish Recast a mere journey into an inspiring expedition into Language, Literature and Culture, at all Europe’s richest Jewish heritage. levels, taught at Columbia University. • Depart JKF, May 24, 2001 for Berlin, home to Western Europe’s For more information, call third largest Jewish community • Visit Theresienstadt, Ponary, Ninth Fort, the Slobodka Yeshiva in Kovno, former ghettos, the (212) 294-6138. Mausoleum of the Gaon of Vilna, the Jewish museums, the Holocaust Memorial and Orianienburgerstrasse Synagogue in Continuing Education Berlin, Franz Kafka House in Prague • Meet with representatives Yiddish Language and Literature of local Jewish communities and institutions and speak to the last Elementary, Intermediate & Advanced. of the Holocaust survivors • Stay at deluxe hotels • Depart Vilna for JFK, June 4, 2001. New Offering: Your learning experience will be enriched by Scholar-in- Yiddish Literature in Translation Residence Professor Samuel Kassow of Trinity College (Hartford, CT), who will accompany the group in Prague Spring 2001 semester and Lithuania. begins at the end of January. For more information, call Total Price: $3,895 For more information, call Ella Levine at YIVO: (212) 246-6080. (212) 294-6154. Reservations must be submitted no later than February 20, 2001.

13 First YIVO 75th Anniversary Lecture Deborah Lipstadt Discusses Victory over Holocaust Denial n October 19, Professor encouragement she had received form, The Irving Judgment: Mr. ODeborah E. Lipstadt dis- from Jews and non-Jews, includ- David Irving v. Penguin Books cussed “Holocaust Denial: A ing Emory University, through- and Professor Deborah Lipstadt has New Form of Anti-Semitism” out the preparation and trial. just been published by Penguin before a crowd of more than 250 The judge’s verdict in book in the United Kingdom. people. Her lecture was the first of YIVO’s 75th Anniversary Dis- tinguished Lecture Series. Lipstadt, Dorot Professor of Modern Jewish and Holocaust Studies at Emory University, de- scribed the strategies used in her defense against writer David Irving’s suit over her book, Denying the Holocaust: The Grow- ing Assault on Truth and Memory (Free Press/ Macmillan, 1993). In a suit filed in England, where the burden of proof lies with the accused, Irving claimed Lipstadt and publisher Penguin Books wrongly portrayed him as a Holocaust denier. Professor Professor Deborah Lipstadt and YIVO Chairman Bruce Slovin touring the “YIVO at Lipstadt noted the tremendous 75” exhibit before her lecture. YIVO Pays Tribute to Memory of Dina Abramowicz n September 18, YIVO held former Head Librarian of YIVO; Oa tribute evening in memo- Fanya Gottesfeld Heller, writer ry of Dina Abramowicz, the and member of the YIVO beloved YIVO librarian, who Board; Professor Avraham worked until her death at Melezin, a member of the Paper nearly 91. She had worked at Brigade and Simon Palevsky, YIVO for 53 years. Close to 250 long time friends and col- people—family, friends, fellow leagues in Nusach Vilne. The last librarians, scholars, researchers, speaker, Esther Hautzig, author writers and admirers—paid of children’s books, shared her their respects to Abramowicz, memories of Abramowicz as who dedicated her life to the the children’s librarian in Vilna. study and dissemination of "When I was six years old, Dina Yiddish language and culture. used to examine me about the The evening opened with content of each book, before Bruce Slovin’s personal remi- handing me a new book to niscences about Abramowicz read," Hautzig noted. and a short video of her at Closing the tribute evening, work and at leisure. The YIVO Executive Director Carl keynote speaker, Professor Rheins announced the crea- Samuel Kassow of Trinity Col- tion of two funds: the Dina lege in Hartford, reviewed the Abramowicz Emerging Scholar importance of Abramowicz’s Fellowship Fund and the Dina work, its roots in her native city Abramowicz Memorial Book of Vilna, and her impact on Fund. Contributions can be Bruce Slovin reminiscences generations of scholars. Other made to either fund through about Dina Abramowicz. speakers were Zachary Baker, YIVO.

14 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Yehuda Bauer Putting The Holocaust in Historical Perspective he story of the Jews is the central story of resistance have to “be revised in all directions.” “T the Holocaust,” noted Dr. Yehuda Bauer, The popular images are over generalized. They Head of the Center for Holocaust Research at Yad also omit discussion of Jewish life before and Vashem and Professor of Holocaust Studies at during the ghettos/Holocaust. Bauer cited daily Hebrew University in Jerusalem in his YIVO survival strategies, as well as heroic efforts by lecture on November 21 at the Center for Jewish different communities and community leaders. “It History. “Much more academic research has been was not just the death,” he stated. done on the actions and attitudes of the Author of several books, including The Holocaust perpetrators and bystanders.” in Historical Perspective (1978) and Jews for Sale? Bauer went on to discuss the importance of Nazi-Jewish Relations, 1939-1945 (1994), Bauer's studying and understanding the points of view of most recent book, Rethinking the Holocaust has just the victims, an area of research not favored by been published (2001) by Yale University Press. academics. Among the many other provocative Certainly those who attended this lecture found ideas Bauer outlined, was that images of Jewish some of their own ideas challenged by Yehuda Bauer and will be rethinking their own Bel Kaufman perspective on the Holocaust. Sholem Aleichem Remembered: el Kaufman, the Bgranddaughter of the celebrated Yiddish author Sholem Al e i c h e m , and the author of the 1964 bestseller, Up the Down Staircase, deligh- ted the YIVO audience with her poignant remi- niscences in her address, “Survival With Humor: Memories of Sholem Aleichem,” delivered on October 23 at the Center Dr. Yehuda Bauer (3rd from right) before his YIVO lecture on November 21, 2000. With him are (L to R) Dr. Carl Rheins, Dr. Sylvia Brody, Benjamin and Vladka Meed, Bel Kaufman with her for Jewish History. Ambassador Herbert Okun, Dr. Daniel Soyer and Dr. Arnold Richards. grandfather author Sholem This was the inaugural Aleichem, 1916. program of a series co- Keith Weiser sponsored by YIVO and the Sholem Aleichem Memorial Foundation, of Beginnings of Yiddish Press in Poland which Ms. Kaufman’s husband, Mr. Sidney Gluck, he Max Weinreich Center's lecture series began is president. Ton November 6 with the Aleksander and Alicja Kaufman spoke movingly of her grandfather’s Hertz Memorial Lecture. Keith Weiser, a doctoral legacy of humor and insight as reflected in his candidate in Yiddish Studies at Columbia Univer- writing and in his attitudes towards life. She sity, spoke on “Noyakh and Tsvi Prilutski and the described her emotion on visiting the great Beginnings of the Yiddish Press in Poland.” The monument to Sholem Aleichem on Sholem early Yiddish press, said Weiser, owed its consi- Aleichem Street in Kiev, a city once soaked in derable success in no small measure to the work Jewish blood. Of Sholem Aleichem's enduring of Tsvi and Noyakh Prilutski. Keith Weiser fame, Kaufman noted that wherever she travels, Tsvi Prilutski was an eminent journalist and the love people feel for him “spills over on me.” editor. His son, Noyakh, was an extraordinary Sholem Aleichem wrote in his will that he would political and cultural activist. Founder and leader like to be remembered with laughter, or not at all, of the Diaspora nationalist party Folkspartey, Kaufman commented, and he asked that on the Prilutski was a campaigner for Jewish national anniversary of his death, his family and friends rights and a pioneer of Yiddish scholarly work. gather to read one of his merry stories aloud. This The Prilutskis' first newspaper, Der veg, estab- tradition, first carried out by Kaufman’s grand- lished in 1905, set high standards, but closed after mother, her aunt, her brother, and herself, has three months. Five years later, they founded Der continued unbroken since 1916. moment, which was published until 1939. 15 YIVO Public Programs – Spring 2001 Distinguished Lecture Series Feb. 14 at 7:30 PM Tuesday April 10 at 7:30 pm Leslie Epstein Cynthia Ozick and Sidney Offit Growing Up with Hollywood and the Holocaust: Personal Reflections In Conversation Leslie Epstein grew up in Hollywood, the son and nephew of Cynthia Ozick is a world-renowned fiction and essay writer, legendary screenwriters Philip G. and Julius J. Epstein (Arsenic whose work has been translated into more than 15 languages. and Old Lace, Casablanca, and others). He attended Yale, and Her work has won many honors, including the John Cheever later, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship. Epstein is the acclaimed Award (1999), and has been anthologized in Best American Short author of eight works of fiction, including King of the Jews (1979), Stories of the Century (1999). Her most recent book is Quarrel & a novel about the Lodz Ghetto; and most recently, Ice Fire Water Quandary: Essays (2000). (2000), a continuation of the adventures of Leib Goldkorn, a Sidney Offit is a writer, teacher, and the curator of the George character from earlier novels. Professor Epstein is the Director of Polk Journalism Awards. His novels include Memoir of the the Creative Writing Program at Boston University. Bookie’s Son (1996) and books for young readers. Mr. Offit is the former Senior Editor of Intellectual Digest and is currently Wednesday February 28 at 7:30 pm President of the Author’s Guild Foundation Anna Foa A joint program of YIVO and the Sholom Aleichem Memorial Foundation. The Jews of Europe From the 14th Century to the Present: Identity and Creativity Thursday April 26 at 7:30 pm Anna Foa is Associate Professor of History at the University of Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Again and Again: Ensuring the Legacy of the Holocaust Perugia and a research fellow at the University of Rome. Her talk will draw from her recent book, The Jews of Europe After the Black In commemoration of Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Death (2000), a work which challenges widely held assumptions Day), Fanya Gottesfeld Heller, author of Strange and Unexpected to depict the history of Jewish life in Europe as the story of Love, A Teenage Girl’s Holocaust Memoirs, will draw on her creativity and stability, as much as of catastrophe. Professor Foa experience as a teacher and scholar to explore the exten-sion of will be introduced by Andrea Grover, Adjunct Associate the impact of the Holocaust to human rights today. Heller will be Professor of Humanities at New York University. introduced by Froma Zeitlin, Professor of Classics and Comparative Literature at Princeton University.

Film and Discussion Series: The Hungarian Jewish Experience

All films $7.00/Students and seniors $3.50. Tickets may be Zionist leader, who by negotiating with Adolf Eichmann, saved purchased from the Center for Jewish History box office. To order with a the lives of some 1,700 Jews. He survived the war and moved to major credit card, call (917) 606-8200. To order by mail, indicate the Israel, where he ran for Knesset in 1953. Accused of collaborating program(s) for which you want tickets and send check payable to: with the Nazis by Greenwald, Kastner responded with a libel Center for Jewish History/Box Office suit. The trial examined Jewish behavior during the Holocaust 15 West 16 Street, New York, NY 10011-6301 and gave rise to great controversy. Now, almost fifty years later, this riveting docudrama explores the different understanding of Monday March 19 7:30 pm these events that has evolved within Israeli society. Triumph of Survival: A Jew from Hungary Speaker: Motti Lerner, Screenwriter, The Kastner Trial Israel, 1999, 63 min., Hebrew with English subtitles Monday May 14 6:30 pm Filmmaker Naomi Azar accompanied her parents on their trip back to Hungary and captured their hitherto untold stories. We Sunshine see constant tension between their nostalgia for Hungarian Hungary/Germany/Canada/Austria, 2000, 180 min., English traditions and anger at fellow Hungarians, between the need to Istvan Szabo, the acclaimed director of Mephisto and Colonel Redl minimize the impact of the Holocaust on their lives and the need brings together an all-star cast (Ralph Fiennes, William Hurt, to remember. Azar, a member of the “second generation,” reflects Rosemary Harris, and others) in this epic history of a Hungarian on the struggle between recognition of the effect of the Holocaust Jewish family. The story of the Sonnenscheins spans three on her life and appreciation for her parents’ efforts to establish a generations and over one hundred years and provides a happy, normal life for their children. microcosmic view of Hungary’s turbulent history. It charts, in Speaker: Dennis Klein, Professor, Kean College human terms, the impact of ideology and fanaticism on 20th- century private lives. Monday April 23 6:30 pm Speaker: Israel Horovitz, Playwright, and co-screenwriter, The Kastner Trial Sunshine Israel, 1995, 184 min. Hebrew with English subtitles The trial of Malkiel Greenwald, better known as the “Kastner Trial,” electrified Israel in the 1950s. Kastner was a Hungarian

16 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Music, Theater and Literature All music, theater, and literature programs are jointly sponsored by Translation and narration will be provided by Miron and actress YIVO and the Sholom Aleichem Memorial Foundation Neva Small, a star and performer in many films, such as Fiddler on the Roof, as well as in Broadway and Off-Broadway Monday February 12 at 7:30 pm productions. Joseph Wiseman and Pearl Lang Readings from Sholem Aleichem and Itsik Manger (English and Yid d i s h ) Sunday April 29 at 2:00 pm Joseph Wiseman has starred in many hit film and theater Emily Corbató productions over the past 50 years. He received a Drama Desk Heritage: Music by Jewish Composers Award for the title role in H. Kippart’s In the Matter of J. Robert This concert of music by Jewish composers organized and Oppenheimer. Wiseman’s film credits include Viva Zapata, Dr. No, performed by acclaimed classical pianist Emily Corbató includes and The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. His many contributions pieces by contemporary composers such as Ernest Bloch, Felix to Jewish literature and theater, include helping to shape the Mendelssohn, and George Gershwin. It also includes stunning long-running radio and television series, The Eternal Light. works by less recognized masters such as Vivian Fine and Robert Recently he has been involved in a translation project focusing Cogan, some of which have never before been performed on the Yiddish poetry of Itzik Manger. publicly in New York. Pearl Lang is a world-famous dancer and choreographer who Emily Corbató has performed at Carnegie Recital Hall and worked as a soloist with Martha Graham’s Company. She has Merkin Concert Hall in New York, and the National Gallery of appeared in Broadway musicals, including Carousel and Finian’s Art in Washington, D.C. She has been involved in performing, Rainbow, and has taught at the Yale University School of Drama recording, and editing for publication the piano works of and the Juilliard School of Music. In 1992, she received the American composer Ernst Bacon, and she is featured on the CD, National Foundation of Jewish Culture’s Jewish Cultural Ernst Bacon: Remembering Ansel Adams and Other Works. Achievement Award. As the Director/Choreographer of the Pearl Lang Dance Theater in New York, she draws much of her Wednesday June 6 at 7:30 pm repertoire from her Jewish heritage. Leonard Wolf and Suzanne Toren Vini-der-pu Thursday March 22 at 7:30 pm Issachar Miron (composer/narrator), Kenny Karen (voice and “Ot iz er, Edvard Ber..” So begins the Yiddish translation (Dutton’s piano), and Neva Small (narrator) Children’s Books, 2000), of A.A. Milne’s classic, Winnie the Pooh. Join us for delightful readings in Yiddish and English by Leonard The Heart and the Rose Wolf and Suzanne Toren. With Varshever, varshever, varshever tort A concert of English, Yiddish and Hebrew inspirational anthems, (Cottleston, Cottleston, Cottleston Pie) and more surprises! love longs, dance music, children’s songs, and poems from The Leonard Wolf, Yiddish translator of Winnie the Pooh, is a univer- Heart and the Rose, a new CD by Issachar Miron, a leading Israeli sity teacher and writer of poetry, fiction, social history, and composer of popular, liturgical, and classical music. biography. His work has appeared in The Atlantic, Harper’s, The In the 1950s, Miron’s song Tzena Tzena Tzena Tzena was the first New Yorker, and other literary magazines. He is the translator of song from Israel to become an international hit. His work also Pantheon’s Yiddish Folk Tales and of the works of many great 20th includes oratorios, symphonic, and choral music. He is a prize- century Yiddish poets and writers. winning poet, director and writer of many films and radio and Suzanne Toren has appeared on and off Broadway, and in television programs. regional theaters throughout the U.S., as well as in television Vocalist Kenny Karen is a cantor and acclaimed studio singer, shows, including Law and Order. She is particularly well known who is sometimes referred to as “King of the Jingles.” He is the for her work in the Yiddish theater and regularly performs with only male studio singer to have been inducted into the recording Leonard Wolf in the Golden Peacock Troupe, reading Yiddish industry’s Hall of Fame. poetry and stories. Exhibition Wednesday May 30, Exhibition Opens to the Public prewar Warsaw Yiddish Art Theater and the postwar Jewish Yiddish Theater Star Ida Kaminska Remembered (1899-1980) State Theater in Warsaw. She starred in many stage productions and in the Academy Award-winning film, The Shop on Main This commemorative exhibition will explore the life of Ida Street. Kaminska and her Yiddish theater family. Ida Kaminska’s The exhibition is open to the public Mondays-Thursdays, 9:30 mother, Esther Rokhl Kaminska was a pioneer in Yiddish art am-5:00 pm, except for Jewish and federal holidays. theater, acted in the first Jewish films made in Warsaw, and was a Exhibition made possible through the generous support of Ewa and founding member of the famed Vilna Troupe. Ida followed in her Josef Blass and Victor Markowicz mother’s footsteps by becoming an actress and co-founding the

All events are held at the Center for Jewish History. Admission is free and open to the public unless otherwise noted. Seating is limited. Please call 212.246.6080 to reserve a place.

17 YIVO Library adds to Baltic and Ukrainian Collections IVO is bolstering its collec- ces a concert in honor of the of over 200 sites of mass Ytion of Judaica from the 100,000th book circulated by murder of Jews during the former Soviet Union, especially the Ghetto library. The librarian Holocaust. from the Baltic States of Latvia, was the late YIVO librarian • Vilnius Ghetto: Lists of Prisoners, Lithuania and Estonia. A gen- Dina Abramowicz. Its director compiled by Irina Guzenberg erous grant from the Irving was Dr. Herman Kruk, whose (1996-98), a full list of inmates Tershel Book Fund in Latvian diary has been translated from of the Vilna Ghetto and labor and Baltic Jewish Studies ena- Yiddish into English, and will be camps, based on a May 1942 bled the Library to enter into an published next year by YIVO census taken by the Nazis. agreement with MIPP Interna- and Yale University Press. • Holokausts vacu okupetaja tional, a dealer specializing in Among the many other new Latvija 1941-1944 (Riga, 1999), publications from the Baltics. accessions from the Baltics are: published in Latvian. It is a Among the items received • The Great Synagogue of Vilnius, detailed history of the perse- under the agreement is the exhi- by Alge Jankeviciene (1996), a cution of Jews in Latvia bition catalog, Vilna Ghetto detailed description of the during World War II. The Posters—Jewish Spiritual architecture and history of the book makes use of archival Resistance. The catalog, with Great Synagogue in Vilna. documents and trial records. explanations in English, Yiddish • Hands Bringing Life and Bread, • The Estonian Folklore Archives and Lithuanian, shows 16 Vilna compiled by Dalija Epsteinaite (Tartu, 1995) includes infor- Ghetto posters from the collec- and Viktorija Sakaite (1999), mation on Jewish sound tion of the Vilna Gaon Jewish an illustrated work on Lithua- recordings. State Museum. Mostly hand- nians who risked their lives • The Estonian National written, the posters are silent rescuing Jews in the Holocaust. Bibliography, 1675-1940, testimony to the vibrant cultural • The Book of Sorrow, compiled compiled by the library of the life behind the Ghetto walls of by Yosif Levinson, contains Estonian Academy of Sciences 1942-1943. One poster announ- illustrations and descriptions (1993). It covers published books and articles in German, Ukrainian Memorial Books Russian, English, Swedish, Presented to Library Esperanto, French, Yiddish and other languages. iriam Weiner, author of in World War II. Each entry two award-winning books includes the soldier’s name, The library received the M following books that were on Jewish roots, has presented father’s name, date and place of the YIVO Library with three me- birth, date and place of death, published in Ukraine: • Evrei na Ukraini, by M. morial books published by the and religion or ethnicity. Jews YIVO’s head Search-Publishing Agency. are clearly identified. Shestopal, (1999) a description librarian, Aviva Listing soldiers from the Additionally, Weiner presented of the Jews in Ukraine, their Astrinsky (L), Zakarpats’ka, Volins’ka and YIVO with the project’s intro- history, customs and receives the Khmel’nits’ka regions, the books ductory volume, Bezsmertia: traditions. Ukrainian are part of a 250-volume series kniha pamiati Ukrainy 1941-1945 • Na zlami vikiv (1998) comme- memorial books entitled Kniha pamiati Ukrainy, (Immortality: Memorial Book of morates the 1000th anniversary from Miriam of Jewish life in Ukraine. Weiner. which lists all six million Ukraine 1941-1945). Published in Ukrainian soldiers who died Kiev, the 800-page book traces A Belarus publication of the histories of battles and lists special interest is Niametska- all decorated Ukrainian WWII fashystski henatsyd na Belarusi soldiers. Weiner had received (1941-1944). Published in Minsk the introductory book from in 1995, it includes documents Professor Petro Pachenko of the on the Nazi genocide in Belarus. Ukrainian Academy of Science • Two history books—Stranitsy and Roman Vishnevsky, director istorii evreev Belarusi (Minsk, and deputy director of this 1996) and Evrei Belarusi: iz nashei commemoration project. obshchei istorii, 1905-1953 (Minsk, Weiner is author of Jewish Roots 1999)—include archival in Poland and Jewish Roots in the documents on the history of the Ukraine, co-published by YIVO Jews in Belarus and focus on and Weiner’s Routes to Roots periods of destruction and Foundation. persecution. 18 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 A Selected Bibliography New Yiddish Culture in Germany Reaches YIVO Library he YIVO Library recently acquired several important Yiddish literary works that have been Tpublished in Germany over the last few years. They cover a range of subject and genre, from exhibition catalogs to works in translation. At the same time, klezmer music is extremely popular in Germany, and one German publisher, Verlag M. Naumann, has begun to publish new Yiddish translations of classic European children’s literature. Taken together, these phenomena suggest an ongoing German engagement with Yiddish language and culture. Here is a sampling of YIVO’s recent acquisitions: • Asch, Sholem. Mottke der Dieb: Oper in Zwei Yiddish, with accompanying musical notation. Akten. Text von Jonothan Moore; Musik und Dov Seltzer composed the music; director Deutsch von Bernd Franke. Bonn: Bonn Chance!, Schmuel Bunim (who died before the appear- 1998. ance of the volume) created the playful illus- This booklet, sent to us by David Mazower, trations; and the RockTheater Dresden, which great grandson of Sholem Asch, accompanied a produced the play, developed the German text. 1998 Bonn production of Asch’s Motke Ganef. • Ottens, Rita and Rubin, Joel. Klezmer-Musik. The play, a rich depiction of the Jewish under- Kassel: Baerenreither; Muenchen: Deutscher world, first appeared as a novel in 1916 and was Taschenbuch Verlag, 1999. later adapted for the Yiddish stage; productions This book presents the varied history of have starred Isaac Samberg and Mike Burstein. klezmorim and their music, from their roots in The booklet includes a synopsis of the play as medieval Rhineland to the East European shtetl well as biographical sketches of Sholem Asch, to the contemporary period. It analyzes rituals, Jonothan Moore and Bernd Franke. It also in- musical styles, and personalities. cludes an extended conversation between Franke and Paul Esterhazy on themes of the play, his • Rabon, Israel. Die Strasse. Translated by Thomas musical strategies, and his interest in the work Soxberger. Salzburg : Residenz, 1998. of Asch and in Yiddish literature in general. • Skirecki, Ingetraud (compiled and edited). • Jiddische Buecher und Handschriften aus den Die Wunder von Chanukah: Juedische Fest- und Niedelanden: Eine Ausstellung der Abteilung fuer Feiertage in Geschichten. Berlin: Aufbau Verlag, Jiddische Kultur, Sprache und Literatur. Dusseldorf: 2000. Heinrich-Heine-Universitaet und Amsterdam: Classic Yiddish short stories in German trans- Menasseh ben Israel Instituut voor joodse lation, written by Zalman Shneur, Sholem sociaal-wetenschappelijke en cultuurhistorische Aleichem, and Y.L. Peretz, are organized around studies, 2000. the Jewish holidays and This catalog accompanied an exhibition of rare Shabes. Included are Yiddish books and manuscripts from libraries in drawings of Anatoli Kaplan Holland and Germany. The exhibition covers (1922-1980), a biography of biblical commentaries, liturgical works, travel Kaplan, a glossary of terms reports, theater, community life, and a collection and an essay by Heinrich of wit and humor. The catalog includes a Simon, “The Annual Circle selected bibliography; an introduction by Dr. of Jewish Holidays.” Marion Aptroot, one of the curators of the • Zychlinsky, Rajzel. Gottes exhibition; and facsimiles of pages. blinde Auguen: ausgewahlte • Kuchenbecker, Antje. Zionismus ohne Zion: Gedichte. Aus dem Birobidzan: Idee und Geschichte eines juedischen Jiddischen von Karina States in Sowjet-Fernost. Berlin: Metropol, 2000. Kranhold. Herausgegeben This book discusses the origins and history of von Karina Kranhold und the Jewish Autonomous Region in Russia from Siegfried Heinrichs. its early formulations, through its founding in Chemnitz: Oberbaum, 1934, to its contemporary condition. 1997. Poems of the Yiddish poet Reyzl Zychlinsky are • Manger, Itzik. Die Megille: The Complete Songbook. pr esented in Yid dish with Dresden: Megille Verlag, 1998. German translation. Manger’s classic Yiddish verse rendering of the Purim story appears in English, German, and Itzik Manger’s Die Megille: The Complete Songbook.

19 A Labor of Love How YIVO Preserves Our Cultural Treasures tanley Bergman, head Sof YIVO’s Preservation Department pulled on his cotton gloves and sprinkled erasing powder onto a page of a 111-year-old copy of the Yiddish book Klyatshe (The Nag), by Mendele Moykher Sforim. He gently rubbed out a dark smudge in the corner of a dog-eared page. The book, with handwritten notes by the author, was one of more than 100 items that Bergman was restoring for the “YIVO at 75: Milestones and Treasures” Books and calendar ready for preservation treatment at the exhibition (see page 1), now on display at the YIVO Preservation Laboratory. Center for Jewish History (CJH). Besides cleaning smudges and straightening dog-ears on dozens of A Decade of Dedication pages, Bergman humidified the book and mended Over the past ten years, the Preservation whatever damage he could before the exhibit. The Department has worked to stabilize YIVO’s historic paperback volume is now on display in a archival collections. The department has micro- special cradle inside a vitrine next to the YIVO filmed more than 1.5 million of the most brittle reading room. pages and documents, making them available to “My mission in life is preserving our people’s researchers without further compromising the treasures,” said Bergman. “These documents are originals. Newspapers were re-housed in acid-free the cultural record of the Jews of Eastern Europe.” wrappers, and thousands of unique historical In the weeks before the exhibit opened, the lab posters were stabilized and encapsulated in Mylar stabilized, conserved and archivally mounted sleeves for easy viewing and safe handling. books, documents, photographs, posters, and "We have to look for the most important national periodicals. One piece, and cultural treasures," Stanley Bergman noted. a 1936 Yiddish poster "We try to preserve them first." for the film Love and Sacri- In the new state-of-the-art preservation lab, fice, required flattening, YIVO is tackling the specific preservation needs of cleaning, mending, each of the paper-based collections, including the backing with buff paper many rare books from the YIVO library. Future and then encapsulation in projects planned include the re-housing of 3,000 Mylar. fragile pamphlets; preservation and encapsulation Normally out of the of the YIVO poster collection; developing and limelight, YIVO’s implementing a computerized database for the Preservation Department photographic archives; and completing item level is also showing off its preservation of the remaining 800 archival boxes careful and artful efforts in the Vilna collections. in a display that explains various tools and pro- cesses for the treatment of Rare Vilna Newspapers Found documents. On view on While processing collections for preservation, the CJH mezzanine level, staff found copies of the Vilner tog (Vilna Daily), the display features dated 1937 through August 17, 1939. Over- examples of items that looked by a YIVO microfilm project in the were conserved and 1960s, these unique newspapers describe daily encapsulated, situated life in Vilna ten days before Germany invaded Poland. The newspapers now have been micro- Stanley Bergman (L) and his assistant, Tatiana next to similar items Alisonova, in the Preservation lab. before preservation. filmed for posterity.

20 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Im p o r tant Synagogue Music “Lost” Nowakowski Music Collection Donated to YIVO he manuscript music collec- Nowakowsky Foundation. His write hundreds of synagogue Ttion of renowned Odessan grandson David Novack facili- compositions. Although only composer and choirmaster tated the gift. Cantor David two works were published in his David Nowakowsky (1848-1921) Lefkowitz of the Park Avenue lifetime (Shirei Dovid and Tefilas is now housed in YIVO’s Music Synagogue, who has produced N’iloh), his music was copied Archives, thanks to the David a comprehensive catalog and from manuscript and passed database of Nowakowsky’s from cantor to cantor. musical compositions, delivered Nowakowsky was well-known the 14 archival boxes of music even in secular Russia and manuscripts to YIVO. Europe. When Tchaikowsky When Nowakowsky moved attended an performance of the from his native Malin to Odessa, Nowakowsky symphony for Russia, he became assistant orchestra, he apparently com- to Nissan Blumenthal, Chief mented, “In Nowakowsky was Cantor of the Brody Synagogue, lost a first degree talent, and it and later to his successor, Pinhas is a pity that he did not devote Minkowsky. himself to secular music.” Nowakowsky was responsible The historical Nowakowsky for training the Brody choir. He collection, which had been lost also served as Music Director of for nearly two generations after the Odessa Orphan Asylum and the Second World War, is an taught at various area music important addition to the syna- schools. Despite his active pro- gogual music collections in the fessional life, he managed to YIVO Music Archives. YIVO and Argentina’s Radio Jai Build New Partnership n a recent trip to Buenos Aires, YIVO Sound turn provide Radio Jai with music for future OArchivist Lorin Sklamberg spent an broadcasts. afternoon at Radio Jai, Latin Sklamberg returned from Buenos America’s first Jewish radio Aires with 35 78-rpm discs and 86 station. Founded in 1992 in the LPs, including klezmer wake of the Israeli Embassy performances by Sam bombing, Radio Jai broadcasts Liberman, Berel Stal and Jewish music, talk shows and Sergio Feidman (father of news 24 hours a day, seven clarinetist Giora Feidman); days a week, including a folk and theater songs Center: a label of one of the LPs weekly program by the rendered by Benzion Witler, obtained from Buenos Aires branch of YIVO. Sarah Gorby, Henri Gerro and Radio Jai. While touring the station’s Rosita Londner; bilingual offices, Sklamberg excitedly Yiddish-Spanish material by rummaged through several piles Max Zalkind; cantorials by David of long-playing and 78-rpm discs, Hickopf and comedy routines by including recordings by many of José Griminger. Argentina’s most renowned Yiddish music and These rare treasures fill a major gap in theater performers. Miguel Steuermann, Radio YIVO’s collection and will allow future resear- Jai’s Executive Director, graciously agreed to chers a glimpse into the Yiddish cultural heritage donate the discs to YIVO’s Sound Archives if of Argentina. Sklamberg would provide a CD with “the cream of these treasures” for the station’s collection. Radio Jai features an up-to-date web site, www.radiojai.com.ar, Steuermann then suggested an ongoing exchange with links to its own live broadcasts and programming schedule program between Radio Jai and YIVO. He also as well as links to general and Israeli news, the weekly Torah offered to initiate an on-air collection campaign portion, Jewish cultural events in Buenos Aires, and Jewish music. encouraging listeners to donate their Yiddish Radio Jai’s web site links Latin American Jews, no matter where recording collections to YIVO, which would in they live, to a virtual, global community.

21 New Accessions to the YIVO Archives

HO L O C A U S T Poland, as well as extensive careers. This is only the second • Teresa Cahn Tober donated the documentation of the activities sports collection in the YIVO notes written by her uncle, of the Suwalki and Vicinity Archives. Benevolent Association. Arthur Zimand, which were • Sol and Florence Axelrod smuggled out of the Janowska • Jewish identity cards were donated their collection on the Road extermination camp in also contibuted by Samuel Jersey Homesteads, a commu- Lviv, Ukraine. The notes are to Homewood and by an anony- nity of Jewish chicken farmers his mother, Rose, and to a Pole mous donor via Dr. Benjamin and needle trades workers, who tried to help him; Zimand Nadel. located in Monmouth County, did not survive. New Jersey. • Jack Welner donated the • Jana Frank Wallach donated a Yiddish text of a long poem • Dorothy Goldberg donated a large collection of documents that was recited by workers in large supplement to the pa- generated by the imposed various “resorts”—industrial pers of her father, the Yiddish- Jewish Councils in the Prague enterprises—in the ghetto of language Socialist editor Isaac and Theresienstadt ghettos. Lodz, Poland. Levin-Shatskes, including many photographs of Jewish • Chaya Lifshits Waxman and • Holocaust-related materials life in prewar Dvinsk, Latvia. Lillian Lifshits Faffer donated were also donated by Susan approximately a hundred Kardos and Isaac Kowalski. • Helen and Norman Goldsmith identity cards of Jews depor- donated supplementary mate- ted from the Biala Podlaska HI S T O R Y rials to the papers of the Labor ghetto. They also donated Zionist activist Morris Moishe • Andrew Hoffman donated, over a hundred prewar Goldsmith. photographs of the Jewish via Carol Oshinsky, the papers community in Suwalki, of his brother, Tibor Hazi • David and Lena Breslow Hoffman, and of his sister-in- donated a large collection of law, Magda Gal, who were documents on the Workmen’s world-class table tennis Circle activities in the Bronx. players and winners of numer- • Perry Pesakh Milbauer do- ous championships. They nated a large addition to the started their careers in records of Camp Boiberik, a Hungary, but, as Jews, had to non-partisan, Yiddish-centered emigrate to the U.S., where summer camp for children they continued their sports and adults.

Family group, Dvinsk Latvia, 1937. Donor: Dorothy Goldberg. Identification card of Aaron Abram issued by the Amsterdam Judenrat, 1942. Anonymous donor.

22 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 New Accessions to the YIVO Archives

• Dr. Gail Malmgreen donated relatives in the former Soviet congregations in Sullivan three Yiddish posters from Union, from the 1930s-1960s. County, New York. Israel. • Anita Smith and Theresa Sadin • Michael Deutsch gave addi- • Lawrence Schleifer donated, donated the premarital corres- tional materials to the records via Cecile Greif, a German- pondence of their parents in of the Boys’ Congregation of Jewish calendar from 1927/28. Pinsk, Belarus, from 1923. Talmud Torah Tifereth Israel of Brooklyn, and Martha Kaplan • Roni Gechtman donated his • Lilian V. Falk donated her donated additional documents copies of Bund leaflets from grandfather’s letters, written to her family’s papers. interwar Poland. The originals in Vilnius from 1914 to 1941. are in Polish archives. • Elise Fischer donated personal LA N G U A G E , • Sol Zucker, Dr. Daniel Soyer documents of her late uncle, and Renee Miller donated Irving Robins, who enlisted in LI T E R A R Y AND buttons and leaflets related to the U.S. Army in 1920. FO L K L O R E the 2000 U.S. Presidential • Pearl E. Manne donated her • Rachel Biderman donated election and to events in the mother’s letters, written in the the papers of her husband, Middle East. Bronx in 1942-43. Yiddish-Hebrew-English Zionist writer and editor LA N D S M A N S H A F T N • Sanford Silverman donated Israel Mordechai Biderman. Isaac Shapiro’s self-published AND GENEALOGY English exercise book. Shapiro • Marion Glassman donated a • Gabriel Spitzer donated the came to the U.S. in 1876. large increment of letters and memoirs of his great aunt, manuscripts of her father-in- Rosalie Braverman, describing • Gary Mokotoff donated a copy law, Yiddish novelist and critic her childhood in interwar of the Kobriner Benevolent Baruch Glassman. Poland. Association’s 40th anniversary souvenir book, dated 1929. • Professor Joseph Tussman • Issy Pilowsky donated the donated a large number of memoirs of his father, Joseph • Dr. Eric L. Friedland donated manuscripts and other docu- Pilowsky, concerning Poland his translation of parts of the ments to the papers of his and South Africa, spanning Novograd-Volynskiy (Zvihl), mother, Yiddish poet Malka from World War I to the 1960s. Ukraine, memorial book. Heifetz Tussman. • Irene Benson donated approxi- • Dorothy Shapiro donated • Adah Fogel donated addi- mately 200 letters from materials on Jewish tional materials, including her English translations, to the papers of her father, Yiddish novelist and poet Menachem Boreisha. • YIVO’s distinguished folklor- ist, Bina Silverman Weinreich, donated a large increment to the papers of her husband, YIVO’s great linguist Uriel Weinreich. She has also do- nated approximately 350 LP recordings. • Dr. Richard Tomback donated additional documents to the Dan Belafsky, papers of his parents, the semi-pro baseball YIVO zamlers David and Leah player, Perth Tomback. Amboy, New Jersey, circa 1905. Donor: Hehalutz booklet written by Freda Whittaker, London, 1943. Donor: Eiran Harris. [continued on page 26] Morton Frankel.

23 New Accessions [continued from page 25]

• Dr. Sharon Fliterman King actress who performed in discs, and other Jewish music donated the manuscript of her Poland, the Soviet Union and materials. English-language novel about Israel. These include drawings • Miguel Steuerman, Executive the Holocaust. It is intended by the great Yiddish novelist Director of Radio Jai, the for adolescents. Efraim Kaganowski. Jewish-oriented radio station • Zamler Eiran Harris has sent in • Isabella Leitner donated a set in Buenos Aires, donated 85 lp some unusual items, including of nine lithographs by Gerson discs, as well as 35 78-rpm portions of a manuscript of the Leiber. Each lithograph incor- discs, all recordings made by Book of Esther in a Yemenite porates a portion of Leitner’s artists whose careers were script. poem, which is a reflection on centered in Latin America. her surviving Auschwitz. • Chaim Beider donated an • Ruby Jacobs donated 170 78- essay about his soon-to-be- • Sophia Adler donated a 1957 rpm and 48 LP recordings. published lexicon of Soviet tape of the Yiddish poet Levi • Bella Baron donated 42 record- Yiddish writers. Berman reading his 1910 tran- ings, consisting of both 78s scription of the Purimshpil and LPs. TH E A TER AND ART (Purim play) performed in Siauliai (Shavl), Lithuania, • Louise Albert donated 30 78- • Olga Sztein donated the pa- interspersed with memories rpm recordings of Yiddish pers of her mother-in-law, and songs by Yiddish poet theater and cantorial music. Julia Flaum, a leading Yiddish Nahum Yud, orginally of • Lucy Leventhol Brody dona- Mohilev, Belarus. ted, via Living Traditions, 24 • Simon B. Golden donated 78-rpm recordings. materials of the touring • Rosalind Dann donated 41 LP “Nawenad” Yiddish theatrical recordings. troupe. This group performed sophisticated revues for • Barbara P. Marcus donated 16 Jewish refugees in Switzerland 78-rpm recordings of klezmer, during and after World War II. Yiddish theater and cantorial He also has donated his par- music. ents’ correspondence, which • Milton and Edith Miller reflects their wanderings in donated 12 78-rpm recordings. Europe before and during the war. • Irwin Miller of the Jewish Historical Society of Greater • Doris Gold donated additional Stamford, CT, donated ten 78- materials of the Folksbiene rpm discs of klezmer and Yiddish Theater in New York. Yiddish theater music. • Bob Tartell donated materials • Charlotte Schwab donated of the Gilbert & Sullivan eight recordings, as well as Yiddish Light Opera Company Jewish ritual objects. of Long Island, New York. • Felix Fibich donated two MUSIC AND DANCE videos about his unique Jewish-based choreography. • Lori Pandolpho and Leo H. Seitelman, co-presidents of • Sidney Stark donated seven Temple Beth Emeth v’Ohr reel-to-reel tapes of concerts Progressive Shaari Zedek of by the Labor Zionist Alliance Brooklyn, along with Rabbi Farband Culture Chorus, from William Kloner, donated a 1946-1971. large collection of cantorial • Irv Fletcher donated four reel- and liturgical items, including to-reel tapes of Yiddish music 276 78-rpm recordings, 33 lp Breindl Lerman (on right) and sister pose in Pinsk, Belarus, sung by him. circa 1920-1930. Donor: Dorothy Goldberg.

24 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 extensive papers form one of the most important collections in YIVO. • Celebrated writer Bel Kaufman donated a photo- graph of her as a young child sitting on the knee of Sholom Aleichem, her grandfather. • Debra Price donated photo- graphs from the International Workers’ Order. • Morton Frankel donated pho- tographs of Jewish life in New Julia Flaum, Yiddish actress, and Yiddish writer Ephraim Kaganowski, post-war Jersey prior to World War I. Poland, circa 1958. Donor: Olga Sztein. • Marvin Itzkowitz donated • Shmuel Rubinstein donated, husband, the Polish architect photographs of Bundists in via Assaf Astrinsky, a tape of Stanislaw Szczek, which Loszyce, Poland. the singing and reciting of his include architectural, icono- • Anne Marie Boisson donated brother, Avrom Rubinstein, graphic and historic evidence family photographs as well as who was a South African about several hundred syna- photographs of Jewish life in Labor Zionist activist as well gogues in Poland. Mr. Szczek, Mainz and Pinsk from the as a Yiddish performer. who was not Jewish and who 1930s. worked entirely at his own • Isabel Belarsky donated expense, assembled these • Chava Fried donated a personal documents of her materials over several dec- photograph of her husband, father, the basso Sidor ades. Most synagogues are Efraim, and the other editors Belarsky. represented by architectural of the Yiddish wall newspaper • Thomas Garber donated a drawings done in his hand. from the Jewish Displaced Below, Uriel copy of “Stars of David: Music Persons Camp in Bad Gastein, • Dr. Judah Marmor donated Weinreich (L) in by Singers of Jewish Austria. photographs of his father, the U.S. Army, near Heritage,” a CD-ROM prominent Yiddish editor, • Stanley and Ruth Rosenberg the town of Fulda, compilation based on a set of critic and literary historian donated Rosh Hashanah Germany, February audio cassettes published in Kalman Marmor, whose postcards from the 1920s. 1946. Donor: Bina Italy that feature Jewish opera Weinreich. and concert singers. • Frances Schrager donated, via Professor Laura Fishman, 22 pieces of Yiddish-theater sheet music, six of which are new to YIVO’s collections. • Shaindle Borenstein donated, via Sonia Hamlin, printed and hectographed music sung in the Yiddish-oriented Boiberik summer camp.

PHOTOGRAPHIC AND VISUAL MATE R I A L S • Joanna Szczek donated, via Dr. Michael Steinlauf, a large increment to the papers of her

25 Donors of $1,000 - $4,999

he YIVO Institute for Jewish Research thanks the following donors for helping to preserve our TJewish heritage through their generous support. In the last issue, Yedies acknowledged gifts of $5,000 and above. This issue recognizes donors of $1,000 - $4,999 from October 1, 1999 - October 31, 2000. Donors of $5,000 will appear in the next edition of Yedies. Anonymous (2) Eve and Anthony Bonner Rena Costa Foundation, Inc. Rena Costa Paul A. Abecassis Elizabeth and Warren Brody Richard & Rosalee C. Davison Rosina K. Abramson and Jeffrey Glenn Jules H. Bromberg Foundation, Inc. Carmela and Milton R. Ackman Rose Anne and Lucien Burstein Rosalee C. and Richard Davison

Wilma and Arthur Aeder Marilyn and Marshall D. Butler Rosalind Devon

Helen V. and Sheldon M. Atlas Harry and Marilyn Cagin Charles Dimston Philanthropic Fund Lillian and Elliot Eisman Roz and Michael H. Baker Marilyn and Harry Cagin Rosalyn and Irwin Engelman Krasdale Foods, Inc. Carter Stone & Company, Inc. Sigmund Balka Leslie Carter George Epstein

Amy and Stephen M. Banker Casdin Capital Partners, LLC Bambi and Roger H. Felberbaum Sharon and Jeffrey W. Casdin Esther and Dr. Mark Barbasch Herbert G. Feldman Charitable Sanford L. Batkin Irving Chutick Foundation, Inc. Foundation Louise and Jack Terry MSB Strategies Janet and George P. Felleman Martin Begun Emanuel and Anna Cohen Foundation, Inc. Phil and Cheryl Fishbein Millburn Corp. Gloria and Morris L. Cohen Jack Fishman Jayne and Harvey Beker Congregation Tifereth Joseph - Anshei Sheila and Larry Fishman Hermitage Capital Corporation Przemysl John Bendall, Jr. Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy Conners Capital Management Inc. Richard P. Fishman Arthur W. Berger Sandra and Daniel A. Conners Max & Clara Fortunoff Foundation Inc. Joan and Joseph Birman Jaime P. Constantiner Alan M. Fortunoff

Each issue of Yedies highlights items from the YIVO collections. The following images are from the “YIVO at 75: Milestones and Treasures” exhibit, currently on display at YIVO.

Members of YIVO’s Aspirantur (graduate studies) program, Vilna 1939. Lucy Young Jewish men pose by weaving workshop looms in a Dawidowicz (first row, 3rd from left) wrote From That Place and Time (New York, vocational school for yeshiva students, Sighet, Rumania, 1989), a memoir of her stay in Vilna on the eve of World War II. (YIVO Archives) 1920s-1930s. (YIVO Archives) 26 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 From October 1, 1999 – October 31, 2000

Samuel and Jean Frankel Foundation Eugene M. Grant and Company Linda and Ilan Kaufthal Jean and Samuel Frankel Eugene M. Grant Ezra Jack Keats Foundation, Inc. Gillian E. Friedman Kraft Haiken & Bell LLP Lillie and Martin Pope Bobbe and Edward R. Haiken Miriam and Richard S. Friedman Pearl and Ralph Kier Barlow Partners, Inc. Meyer and Tzippe Fruchtbaum Patricia G. and George A. Hambrecht R.A.K. Group, LLC Foundation Randy Kohana Mordkhe Schaechter Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Susan and Roger Hertog Nathan & Helen Kohler Foundation Caryl and Stanley Fuchs Marilyn Buel George H. Heyman, Jr. Jerrold P. Fuchs Eastlake Securities, Inc. Ellen and David S. Hirsch Murray Koppelman Ruth Gay Marc L. Holtzman Carolyn and Steven Kotler Ellen Berland Gibbs Overseas Shipholding Group, Inc. Helen Krieger Lucille and David Gildin Chris and Morton P. Hyman Steve Krieger Gilsanz Murray Steficek, LLP Mel Ilberman Ramon Gilsanz Lowenthal, Landau, Fischer & Bring, Inter Documentation Company B.V. P.C. Myrna and Norman J. Ginstling Marlene and Edward J. Landau International Duplication Centre, Inc. Carl Glick Marcy Gilbert Laskin Charitable Foundation, Inc.

Rachel Maidenbaum Gober NELCO Sewing Company, Inc. Leona and Meyer Laskin Ania and Leon Jolson Specks & Goldberg Dalia and Laurence C. Leeds Margaret and Perry Goldberg Drs. Tamara and Charles Kaner Eileen G. and Peter M. Lehrer Gilbert & Carol Goldstein Morris J. & Betty Kaplun Foundation, Philanthropic Fund Inc. Seymour and Barbara J. Leslie Carol and Gilbert Goldstein Zvi Levavy Foundation Barbara J. and Seymour Leslie Michael S. Gordon Emile Karafiol Carol L. and Jerry W. Levin Yvette and Larry Gralla Sima and Nathan Katz

Richard Grand Foundation Susan and Jerome L. Katz [continued on page 30] Marcia Grand Memorial service on the anniversary of Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (April 19, 1943). Photo taken in DP Camp in Cremona, Italy, 1946-1950. (YIVO Archives)

Leaflet announcing public meeting in support of the newly formed State of Israel. May 1948. (U.S. Territorial Collection, YIVO Archives) 27 Donors [continued from page 30] Milstein Properties Arthur and Marilyn Penn Charitable Abby and Howard P. Milstein Trust Urban Foundation/Engineering, LLC. Marilyn and Arthur Penn Elsie and Leon Levy Esther and Jonathan Mishkin Barbara and Louis Perlmutter Bobbi and Harvey Lewis Carole and John A. Moran Philip Morris Companies Inc. Ella Lidsky Ornella and Robert E. Morrow Stephanie French Madeline and Irwin Lieber Weiss, Peck & Greer, L.L.C. Philip Morris International Inc. Jay C. Nadel Lucius N. Littauer Foundation Inc. David E.R. Dangoor William Lee Frost Ruth G. and Edgar J. Nathan Marcell & Maria Roth Fund Inc. John L. Loeb Jr. Foundation New York Times Company Foundation, Irene E. Pipes John L. Loeb, Jr. Inc. Ann and Harold Platt Barbara and Arthur Gelb Wertheim, Schroder & Company, Inc. Lee Harris Pomeroy Architect Eleanor and Mort Lowenthal Estate of Elias Newman Sarah and Lee H. Pomeroy Ida and Max Lubliner Deborah and Samuel Norich Louis Pozez Mack Company Des Moines Company Rabina Realty Inc. Carol and Earle I. Mack Edward Ochylski Mickey Rabina William Mack Charitable Trust Nancy and Morris W. Offit Lewis Rabinowitz Phyllis and William L. Mack Rahill Capital Jack Resnick & Sons, Inc. Elizabeth H. and James R. Maher Barbara and Joel R. Packer Judith and Burton P. Resnick Mark Family Foundation Jill Gellerman Pandey Heidrick & Struggles, Inc. Susan and Morris Mark Rose and Hyman H. Parrell Gerard R. Roche Vladka and Benjamin Meed Patricof & Co. Ventures, Inc. Nanette and George S. Rosenberg Joseph Meyerhoff Family Charitable Susan and Alan J. Patricof Tina Rosenberg Funds Terry M. Rubenstein

Jewish Melodies, Album 1, performed by Sidor Belarsky, basso cantante, Bookstore in the Jewish quarter of Paris, ca. 1920. (Territorial accompanied by Lazar Weiner, piano. Cover illustration by Saul Raskin. Photographic Collection, YIVO Archives) Recorded ca 1947, New York City. (YIVO Sound Archives)

28 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Lief D. Rosenblatt Sara and Martin L. Solomon Nina and Walter H. Weiner

Ruth and Arthur Rosenblatt Eva and Edward Sperling TPMC Realty Corporation David R. Weinreb Nitza and Henry Rosovsky Norman & Carol Stahl Foundation Carol A. Stahl Weiss Peck & Greer Rubenstein Associates, Inc. Suzanne and Stephen H. Weiss Amy and Howard J. Rubenstein Laidlaw Holdings Asset Management, Inc. Lilyan Wilder Nan and Herbert F. Schwartz Alan Stahler Judith Wilf Sherry L. and Barry F. Schwartz Fairchild Corporation Irja and Jeffrey Steiner Louis Williams Foundation, Inc. Nancy Bissell and Robert Segal Elliot Scher Vera Stern Seidman & Co., Inc. Calhoun Winton Herta and Samuel N. Seidman Max Stollman Foulston, Siefkin L.L.P. AON Group Limited Sequa Foundation of Delaware John R. Wise Marjorie and Norman E. Alexander Mikel L. Stout Esq. Vedder, Price, Kaufman & Kammholz Lehman Brothers Inc. Helene and Morris Talansky Charles B. Wolf, Esq. Jean and Martin D. Shafiroff Tanner & Co., Inc. Workmen’s Circle Branch 48-81 - Natalie and Howard Shawn Estelle N. and Harold Tanner Cultural Committee

Sholem Aleichem Folk Shul No. 21, Inc. Sara and Benjamin Torchinsky Herman Wouk Foundation, Inc. Bella Gottesman Betty and Herman Wouk Dorothy C. Treisman Patricia and David Shulman Eta and Henry Wrobel Union of Needletrades, Industrial & Chris-Craft Industries Inc. Textile Genevieve G. and Justin L. Wyner Ann L. and Herbert J. Siegel Jay Mazur YIVO Committee of Miami Mae S. Silver John and Mira Jedwabnik Van Doren Mindel Wajsman

Silverstein Properties, Inc. Wagner Family Foundation Marjorie and Aaron Ziegelman Klara and Larry A. Silverstein Leon M. Wagner 72A Realty Associates Dr. Adina and Michael C. Singer Sima and Rubin Wagner Arthur D. Zinberg

Todd James Slotkin Ocram, Inc. Matilda and Philip Zinn Joan and Ira H. Slovin Marco Walker

Marion Scheuer and Abraham D. Gladys O. and Allen C. Waller Sofaer

Libe un Laydenshaft (Love and Sacrifice). Poster for a Yiddish film. New York, 1936.

Di Klyatshe (The Nag) by Mendele Moykher Sforim. Printed in Odessa, 1889. The handwritten corrections are believed to have been made by the author.

29 Letters to Yedies

We encourage our readers to write (by regular mail or e-mail) with comments and responses to Yedies. Mourning Dina Abramowicz Dear Editor: Learning about the death of Dina Abramowicz made me very sad. I got to know Dear Editor: I was saddened to read of the passing Ms. Abramowicz a few years ago when I visited of Dina Abramowicz, with whom I felt a personal YIVO to find pictures for a book I was planning to connection. Many years ago she “put me on” to the publish. The book was a contemporary history of YIVO library’s invaluable collection on the Jewish the Vilna ghetto, written by Grigory Szur. labor movement in England. That enabled me to Ms. Abramowicz listened carefully to my compose a solidly documented chapter on the sub- request, but asked me to come back later. I went ject of my dissertation, which later became a book, back to YIVO that afternoon, because I did not The Jewish Immigrant in England, 1870-1914. In my want to disappoint this fragile, but impressive, old struggles to master Yiddish, she readily came to lady. She told me then that she was related to the my aid as I worked my way through the Yiddish author of my book in a very personal way. press. She was a unique asset to YIVO and to Ms. Abramowicz told me that she herself was a scholars and students. I am therefore sending a survivor of the Vilna Ghetto. When the ghetto was contribution for the Dina Abramowicz Book Fund. liquidated in 1943, she was put on a train ‘to a Lloyd Gartner, Tel Aviv University labor camp.’ She managed to get off that train just Department of Jewish History after it had departed for its unknown destination. Ramat Aviv, Israel The only thing she could think of doing was to walk to the fur factory Kailis, now transformed Dear Editor: I was delighted to see that YIVO was into a military uniform repair workshop—the only organizing a tribute to Dina Abramowicz, then place in Vilna she knew that Jews were still terribly saddened to discover that it was a memo- working as forced laborers. rial tribute. I contacted YIVO seeking information She received a hostile reception there. People on the original of the Little Jargon Storybook referred said that by her illegal presence, she was not only to in Israel Zangwill’s Children of the Ghetto. I was putting her own life at risk, but also theirs. Finally, referred to Dina Abramowicz, who spent a great she was approached by a man who offered her ref- deal of time with me on the telephone, explaining uge for a fortnight. She said to me, ‘This man was the history of the Maaseh-Bukh and other Yiddish your author, Grigory Szur. He actually saved my collections of medieval folktales, as well as the life.’ Later Dina Abramowicz managed to escape origins and variants of several legends discussed the barracks and join the partisans in the woods. in Zangwill’s novel. A few days later, a thick enve- To my knowledge, Abramowicz never found the lope from YIVO arrived in the mail. It contained opportunity to write this story down. With this photocopies of items from the YIVO collection. I letter, I just want to share this memory of Dina had always hoped to meet Dina Abramowicz and Abramowicz, this admirable personality, whom I thank her in person. Indeed, both her voice and will never forget. her prodigious energy had suggested to me that Jan Mets she was a much younger person. Publisher, Mets en Schilt Meri-Jane Rochelson Amsterdam, Holland Associate Professor Dear Editor: Dina Abramowicz has personified Florida International University YIVO for me since I made my first visit there North Miami, FL in December 1959. True refinement seems to express itself through noble service. Although Dina Abramowicz—who always addressed me formally, as chaverte, then Dr. Wisse—was always Become a Member of YIVO Tod a y in the service of others, I always felt that I was trying to live up to her standards of a purer Help ensure that our children and our world, the highest level of scholarship and the children’s children will study, enjoy and Vilna aristocracy. May her memory be blessed. remember the history, language and Ruth Wisse, Harvard University culture of our East European ancestors. Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations Cambridge, MA

30 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 Letters to Yedies

75th Anniversary Exhibition Dear Editor: I was deeply interested, indeed moved, by my visit to the Center—let alone Dear Editor: Hearty congratulations on the YIVO amazed by your archivist’s capacity to summon Anniversary Exhibition. Since we are partners in up pictures from Alytus, Lithuania on screen from the preservation of our beloved Yiddish language the time my mother was a girl there. I wouldn’t be and culture, we share with you the pride and joy surprised if she knew Shimele, the village clown, about this milestone event, as we shared the work but I know she would be astounded at the idea and sorrow back in 1994 and 1995, when you lent that, 75 years later, someone could summon up his us a helping hand. We hope that you will be there picture on a computer screen for her son to see, again for us when we put on our own “IWO at 75” half a world away. exhibition in 2003. Admiring appreciation, Dr. Saul Drajer, Chairman Jack Rosenthal IWO President, The New York Times Company Foundation Buenos Aires, Argentina New York, NY

Dear Editor: Thank you very much for such a Dear Editor: Thank you very much for your kind wonderful evening at YIVO on October 19, 2000. I letter inviting me to visit the exhibition comme- truly enjoyed meeting Professor Deborah Lipstadt morating the 75th anniversary of the founding and members of the YIVO Board as well as the of YIVO. Thank you also for having sent me the enriching discussion, the delicious dinner and the last issue of the YIVO Yedies which I read with opportunity to attend the “YIVO at 75” exhibition, great interest. As a token of my appreciation, with the guidance of Mrs. Ella Levine (Director of please find enclosed a copy of the catalogue Development and External Affairs) in Lithuanian. prepared for the YIVO exhibition that Mrs. Fira Dr. Lipstadt’s lecture, “Holocaust Denial: A New Bramson and I organized in our University Form of Anti-Semitism” was a thrilling experience Library. The vermissage was very well attended. and a great success. Academics like Dr. Lipstadt Prof. Dr. Stefan Schreiner remind us of the need to preserve and fight, if Director, Institutum Judaicum necessary, for our history and dignity. Universität Tübingen, Germany Dina Kopilevic Argentina Embassy of Lithuania Washington, DC Dear Editor: I would like to take this opportunity to introduce to you Radio Jai, the first Jewish radio Thanks to YIVO station in Latin America. The station was founded in 1992 in Buenos Aires, a few months after the Dear Editor: It is hard to express my surprise and Israeli Embassy was bombed. Since those difficult delight upon receiving the box with copies of days, our cultural message has become one of the YIVO-bleter, Yidishe shprakh, a copy of the YIVO most important milestones in Argentinian Jewish Annual and the second volume of the Language and life (incidentally, the local YIVO hosts a regular Culture Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry. I cannot recipro- Radio Jai program, Di Naye Yidishe Sho). cate in kind, but I can assure you the materials will Over the past eight years we have developed be put to good use here in Düsseldorf. additional expressions of Jewish culture, including Professor Marion Aptroot a small recording company and a publisher. We Abteilung für Jiddische Kulture, have had the great privilege of bringing The Sprache und Literatur Klezmatics to Argentina twice. Their shows were a Düsseldorf, Germany big success in our city. We and YIVO also discussed ways of exchanging material and Dear Editor: Many thanks to Dr. David Fishman information. This small but meaningful project and Dr. Hershel Glasser for coordinating the could be the beginning of a continued cultural Yiddish Seminar program. It was most interesting exchange aimed at expanding and enriching and informative—from the first lecture on Yiddish Jewish cultural life worldwide. orthography to the last lecture on Yiddish litera- Lic Miguel Steuermann, Executive Director ture in Israel. I look forward to the next series. Radio Jai, Buenos Aires, Argentina Florence Solomon New York, NY Editor’s Note: See related article on page 21.

31 Scholars from Baltic States Visit YIVO parked by the International Visitor Program of Carl Rheins noted. "There are many points of Sthe United States Department of State, a dele- common interest and resources to share. We hope gation of five historians and researchers from this is just the beginning of a new collegiality." the Baltic States visited YIVO on August 8 to meet The U.S. State Department’s International with Marek Web, Head Archivist, Aviva Astrinsky, Visitor Program seeks to improve and expand Head Librarian, Lorin Sklamberg, Sound Archivist relations between the United States and other and other YIVO staff. countries, and to build cultural, educational The delegation included John Zins, United States and professional links. Department of State English Language Office; Markas Zingeris, Deputy Executive Director of Make a Special Tribute Research in Holocaust, International Commission for Evaluation of Nazi and Soviet Occupational For a Special Occasion Regimes Crimes in Lithuania; Argo Kuusik, Director, Museum of Tallinn Technical University; Donor’s Name Dr. Rudite Viksne, Researcher, Historical Institute of Latvia; Ronaldas Racinskas, Executive Director, Addresss International Commission for the Evaluation of Nazi and Soviet Occupational Regimes Crimes City State Zip in Lithuania; Dr. Antonijs Zunde, Associate Profes- sor, Department of Contemporary American and Enclosed is my contribution of $ Western European History, University of Latvia. "This was an important opportunity for YIVO to ❏ In honor of: ❏ In memory of: explore greater understanding and professional exchanges with libraries and archives in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia," YIVO's Executive Director Name/Occasion

Please make checks payable to: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research

Please charge my: ❏ MasterCard ❏ Visa

Account # Exp. Date

Signature

Please send a personal acknowledgment card to:

Name

Address A delegation of distinguished scholars from the Baltic Sates—Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia—during their August visit to YIVO. They met with YIVO Executive Director City State Zip Dr. Carl Rheins (center). Thank You! Zamler [continued from page 10] Twersky, who graciously permitted the Zamler Project to copy them. YIVO Institute for Jewish The contemporary Eastern European photographs Research and interviews collected by Heschel complement 15 West 16th Street, materials currently being gathered in the New New York, NY 10 0 11 - 6 3 0 1 York area by the Zamler Project. Archivists have Phone: (212) 246-6080 also established numerous new local contacts, Fax: (212) 292-1892 scheduled interviews for the future, and gathered e-mail: [email protected] posters, field recordings of Hasidic gatherings, Remember YIVO in your will. printed materials and other archival materials. 32 YIVO News Winter 2000-2001

YIVO News Winter 2000-2001

YIVO News Winter 2000-2001 www.eydes.org

YIVO News Winter 2000-2001

NE W S

YIVO Institute for Jewish Re s e a rc h

YIVO Institute for Jewish Research Non-Profit IIVV OO U.S. Postage PAID 15 West 16th Stree t , Newburgh, NY New York, NY 10011-6301 Permit No. 252 YY