Tag Archives: American Jewish History

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: The Sea Captain’s House and the Mysterious Marble Heist

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Philadelphia paper manufacturer, Leon J. Perelman started collecting mechanical penny banks in 1958 after visiting a hobby show in Fort Madison, Iowa. Eventually, he amassed over 3,000 banks, tin and cast iron toys produced from the late 1860s through the 1910s. First patented in 1865, mechanical penny banks were designed to encourage children to save money by providing entertainment and amusement with one or more mechanical actions when a penny was deposited in the slot for safekeeping. Perelman’s collection was considered the largest private collection of antique toys in the world by some estimates. In addition to penny banks, Perelman’s collection also featured cap pistols, dolls, cast iron vehicles such as fire engines and stage coaches, and a reference library containing patent papers on mechanical banks. Although there is no mention in the official collection guide, the museum also contained antique glass and agate marbles.

                                                                                                                   Nathanial McDaniel (left) and Chris Cherubini (right) play with mechanical bank at Cayuga Federal Savings and Loan Association, 11th and Market Streets Branch, 1964Perelman initially used his Merion, Pa., home to display his antique toys, erecting an addition in 1962 to accommodate his growing collection and offer public museum hours. In a 1967 agreement with the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority, Perelman purchased the historic Abercrombie House near the corner of 2nd and Spruce Streets to create a new museum space. The four-story brick house, named for Royal Navy officer Captain James Abercrombie who purchased the site in 1758 and built the home shortly thereafter, was considered one of the largest Colonial- era homes in the city. The Philadelphia Historical Commission designated the property to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places in 1957. Perelman’s restoration of the building was part and parcel of the mid-twentieth century urban renewal taking place in Society Hill and other neighborhoods throughout the city. Renovations took two years at a cost of $300,000, with John Frederick Lloyd serving as the architect. The new Perelman Antique Toy Museum celebrated its grand opening in January 1969 with the Director of the United States Mint Eva Adams and Mayor of Philadelphia James H. J. Tate in attendance.

Perelman Antique Toy Museum brochure, undated

For nearly twenty years, the Perelman Antique Toy Museum amused children and adults alike, but on August 5, 1988, Perelman lost his marbles in a smash and grab job that would close the museum forever. Although the local press did not report on the museum heist in the days immediately following the robbery, Maine Antique Digest was able to interview museum curator, Michael Tritz about the day’s events. According to Tritz, he was preparing to open the museum for the day, when the thieves entered the museum, bound and gagged him, and forced him into a restroom. He recounted “I heard one of them upstairs hammering at the display cases. I thought he was getting into all of them . . . but all he could break was the case with marbles in it on the third floor.” The 5/8″ thick bulletproof glass foiled their attempt to steal any of Perelman’s coveted mechanical penny banks. Tritz estimated one of the thieves spent about 45 minutes trying to break the display cases while the other watched the door. Perelman shuttered the museum the day after the robbery. It wasn’t until The Philadelphia Inquirer published a piece on August 31, declaring the “Toy museum is no more,” that antique toy enthusiasts and museum goers learned about the robbery. There is no evidence the thieves were ever caught or the marbles recovered. Within a few weeks, Perelman sold the estimated $3 million toy collection to New York-based art and toy dealer, Alexander Acevedo who dissolved the collection in a series of invitation-only sales to collectors and dealers.

Letter to Leon Perelman regarding museum closing, October 22, 1988

Perelman’s papers, including records related to the operation of the Perelman Antique Museum, and his term as Dropsie University president are now available for research use in the Special Collections Research Center.

Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: WWII Troops Put on a Show

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Joseph L. Pollock in costume as Dr. Quilton J. Foss, 1945

Joseph L. Pollock was a social studies teacher, principal, and administrator for the Philadelphia School District from 1947 until his retirement in 1984. In the 1960s, Pollock worked for the Philadelphia Board of Education, first as assistant to the president of the Board of Public Education, and then as director of informational services, a new division formed to improve effective citizen and community participation in school affairs and serve as a resource center and dissemination agency for school information. In addition to his classroom teaching activities, Pollock also wrote and produced radio and television programs for the Philadelphia School District’s Division of Radio-Television Education in the 1950s.

A few years before his foray into the education sphere, while serving in the United States Army, and shortly after V-E Day (May 8, 1945), Pollock co-wrote a burlesque production of Bizet’s opera Carmen with fellow soldier Fredd Wayne  Originally intended as a three-day regimental show at the town hall in Tauberbischofsheim, Germany, in June 1945, the performance was so well received by soldiers and military personnel, that the Special Services Division booked the troupe for a tour that lasted eight months, ending in January 1946. Performances were held in Heidelberg, Wiesbaden, Berlin, Bremen, Brussels, Paris, Rome, Vienna, and Nuremberg, among other places. The show’s 142 performances were witnessed by more than 250,000 troops and civilians in post-war Europe.

Exterior of Walhalla Theater, Wiesbaden, July 1945

The original cast of G.I. Carmen consisted of 44 combat veterans from the 253rd Regiment, 63rd Infantry Division. Wayne was tasked with playing the lead role. Pollock initially played the role of Dr. Quilton J. Floss, a character parodying Milton Cross, an American radio announcer best known for his New York’s Metropolitan Opera House broadcasts. Pollock would later serve as company manager. Costumes for the production were obtained from the Scala Theater in Berlin and music provided by a thirteen piece band directed by jazz guitarist Marty Faloon. The bawdy comedy was done in the style of Ole Olsen and Chic Johnson’s Hellzapoppin, a gag-filled musical revue that ran on Broadway between 1938 and 1941.

Tophat Tales, October 21, 1945

Throughout the run of the show, articles and reviews in numerous GI, military, and civilian newspapers lauded the quality of the production. A day after G.I. Carmen arrived at Camp Tophat’s Paramount Theater in Antwerp, Belgium, the following rave review appeared in Tophat Tales:  “…Wayne and Pollock have caught the GI humour of a [Bill] Mauldin and transplanted it to the stage with a maximum of wit, originality, and the sure-fire knowledge of the likes of a soldier audience.”

Pollock’s papers, including records related to his work as an educator, his World War II military service, and the production of G.I. Carmen are now available for research in the Special Collections Research Center.

Jessica M. Lydon

Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Substance Use Disorder Awareness and the Board of Rabbis of Greater Philadelphia

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For years, there was a widely held belief amongst many members of the Jewish community that Jews were immune from alcoholism and addiction. According to Rabbi Abraham Twerski, a psychiatrist specializing in substance use disorder, “Any other diagnosis [was] acceptable…even schizophrenia.” This belief became untenable in the 1970s as more and more afflicted Jews could no longer be ignored. Some within the community sought to bring to light the pervasive denial while removing the damaging stigma associated with substance abuse. At the forefront was Dr. Twerski. He spoke publicly, advocated for the revision of the 12-step recovery model to fit Judaism, and founded the Gateway Rehabilitation Center in 1972. More advocates joined the fight not long after. In 1980, a group consisting of recovering Jews and their families called Jewish Alcoholics, Chemically Dependent Persons and Significant Others (JACS) formed in New Yok City. The group dedicated itself to encouraging and assisting Jews suffering from substance use disorder and their families while promoting knowledge and understanding of the disease as it involved the Jewish community.

Around the same time in Philadelphia, members of the Jewish Family and Children’s Agency, the Board of Rabbis of Greater Philadelphia, and other community leaders formed the Chemical Dependence Task Force. While the task force was able to plan and execute some amount of recovery programming and education, the group was only able to meet periodically due to their primary responsibilities. Sensing the need for an organization dedicated solely to promoting substance use disorder education and recovery in the Jewish community, task force members, along with other recovery community representatives, united to form the Philadelphia branch of Jewish Alcoholics, Chemically Dependent Persons and Significant Others. While initially associated with the NYC branch, Philadelphia JACS became their own entity by incorporating in August 1984. Philadelphia’s mission remained similar to NYC’s JACS programs including raising awareness through the media; offering yearly retreats to bring the afflicted and their families together; and starting AA, NA, and Al-Anon meetings in synagogues around the area.

From its inception, JACS shared strong ties to the Board of Rabbis of Greater Philadelphia. The Board of Rabbis provided office space as well as material, logistical, and programming support. But beyond support for JACS, perhaps the Board of Rabbis’ most significant contribution to the recovery community was the co-sponsoring and coordination of the 2nd National Conference on Addiction and Jews in 1987. After the success of the first conference in New York in 1986, the Council of Jewish Federations asked the Board of Rabbis “to convene and coordinate the next national conference to be housed in Philadelphia.” The title of the conference was “Addiction and Jews: Its Impact on the Individual, The Family, and the Community.” The programming cast a wide net and was considered a step forward for the Philadelphia recovery community.

To learn more about Board of Rabbis’ records collection, contact Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center at scrc@temple.edu or visit https://library.temple.edu/collections/5

Casey Babcock

–Project Archivist, SCRC

 

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: JCRC Records Open for Research

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The Special Collections Research Center is pleased to announce the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia Records are now open for research use. The JCRC records were donated to the Philadelphia Jewish Archives Center between 1976 and 2006 and acquired by the Special Collections Research Center in June 2009 where they were the focus of a two-year processing project. View the online finding aid or guide to the collection on the Libraries’ website.

The Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia (JCRC) was founded on January 30, 1939, as the Anti-Defamation Council but changed their name in 1943. The impetus for the formation of the JCRC was the rise of antisemitism in America after fascism took hold of much of Europe in the late 1930s. Jewish community leaders perceived the need for a unified voice dedicated specifically to fighting antisemitism and protecting the rights of the Jewish Community in Philadelphia. The JCRC’s mission has traditionally been defined as “…helping members of all religious, racial and ethnic groups to work and live together democratically and cooperatively by equalizing their treatment, enlarging their opportunities and deepening their mutual appreciation.” The Jewish Community Relations Council is still in existence and works as a constituent agency of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia.

The bulk of the records span JCRC history from its founding in 1939 through the mid-1990s. Subject strengths include the struggle against antisemitism and racism in any form, including violence, vandalism, and propaganda, or in any aspect of society, such as education, employment, and housing. Other well-documented subjects include prayer in schools, interreligious relations, the relationship between the black and Jewish communities, Holocaust remembrance, Soviet Jewry, and the state of Israel.

Survey of professional schools, 1950

Of particular interest are data, surveys, and compiled reports on the admissions practices of Philadelphia’s professional schools in the 1940s.

Also noteworthy are records pertaining to the Black-Jewish Loan Fund, a JCRC–created program which offered low or no interest loans to members of the black community interested in purchasing Jewish-owned business in neighborhoods of shifting demographics.

— Casey Babcock, Project Archivist, SCRC

HIAS Pennsylvania and Refugee Resettlement Work Panel

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On October 25, 2018, SCRC Associate Archivist Jessica Lydon, joined historian of Vietnam and migration, Professor Dieu T. Nguyen, and Executive Director of HIAS Pennsylvania, Cathryn Miller-Wilson, in Paley Library for a panel discussion.   Professor Lila Corwin Berman, Director of the Feinstein Center for  American Jewish History, moderated the panel which featured HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) Pennsylvania’s history, its various resettlement efforts, and the work HIAS PA is doing to address today’s refugee crisis.

Immigrants at port, undated

Lydon highlighted portions of the HIAS Pennsylvania Records collection held in Temple University Libraries Special Collections Research Center, most notably the organization’s resettling of Jewish refugees fleeing persecution in the Russian empire during the late 19th and early 20th centuries; advocacy work against restrictive immigration legislation including literacy tests and head taxes; and collaborative resettlement work with local VOLAGs (voluntary agencies) to assist Southeast Asian refugees in the aftermath of the Vietnam War.

Nguyen shared with attendees a chronology of key events surrounding Vietnam War-related refugees, how Vietnamese refugees regarded American aid associations that assisted them in the resettlement process, current characteristics and figures of Southeast Asian populations in Philadelphia and beyond, as well as her personal connections to these events, through the experiences of her two brothers.

HIAS PA staff welcoming Southeast Asian refugees, undated

Miller-Wilson spoke about HIAS PA’s current efforts to assist vulnerable populations and some of the challenges to this work including the Department of Homeland Security’s proposed wealth test regulation known as the “public charge rule,” which if enacted would deny green card and other visa applicants for using “one or more public benefit” in the past or being “likely at any time” to receive such benefits in the future.

–Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

 

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: 19th Century Sister Diarists

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Just as the Centennial Exhibition of 1876 was captivating visitors in Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park, Fannie and Amelia Allen began chronicling their social and intellectual pursuits in their diaries. The Allen sisters filled their diaries with short summaries of the day’s events and longer, introspective passages that revealed their personal ambitions and struggles to find a mate who was both desirable and an intellectual match.

Fannie Allen and Amelia J. Allen Diaries

In an entry dated April 20, 1876, Fannie (age 21) writes: “I am trying to school my thoughts and make myself contented with the blessings, and not wish for others, but it is hard, and it is only now and then, when I see some others not, as I think, situated happily as I am so I feel thoroughly contented. It is hard to see others happily mated, and neither Amelia or I is so, or likely to be…”. Amelia (age 22) expresses similar sentiment in a June 18, 1878 entry: “Years do not bring what I long for as every girl I suppose at my age wants – a lover whom I can respect. Times are either different now or we are hard to suit. I know not which but certain it is never have I seen the person I could care for in that light.”

Already working as a teacher, Amelia frequently writes about the challenges she experienced in the Hebrew Sunday School Society and Philadelphia Public Schools. Despite her desires, Amelia never married. She dedicated her life to education and social service. In 1885, along with other like-minded Jewish women, Amelia founded the Young Women’s Union, where under her tutelage adolescent girls learned domestic skills and in 1894 helped organize the women’s branch of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association.

Fannie Allen Diary, 1875-1885

As Fannie approached her late twenties, she spent less and less time recording her thoughts in her diary, but on August 25, 1884, she (age 29), made the following revelation: “I reopen this to say though I’m not married, I hope to be. It seems too wonderful. Not only do I expect to be a physician, but I hope to wed a Mr. Moses De Ford. A man who though younger than I, is my ideal in almost every particular. We were engaged Aug. 17 but expect to keep our betrothal a secret, even from my dear Mother until after I graduate and he is a physician, then as soon as he gains enough supporters, we hope to be married partners, no fear of deficient love on his side and mine.”

Nearly three years later on June 8, 1887, at the age of 32, Fannie married Moses De Ford, eight years her junior, but not before graduating from the Women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania. Fannie practiced medicine alongside her husband for over 30 years in the Kensington neighborhood, providing medical care to the immigrant population that worked in the textile mills and shipyards nearby, and advocated for better hygiene and sanitation for the working poor.

To learn more or request access to the diaries of Fannie Allen and Amelia J. Allen in the Special Collections Research Center, view the online finding aids here:
https://library.temple.edu/scrc/fannie-allen-diary
https://library.temple.edu/scrc/amelia-j-allen-diary 

–Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Police Squad Thwarts Tolerance Raiders

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Bureau of Police complaint report excerpt, March 16, 1939

On March 14, 1939, Detective Sergeant Jacob H. Gomborow assigned six detectives from the Philadelphia Bureau of Police’s radical squad to attend a meeting organized by the Committee for Racial and Religious Tolerance held at the West Philadelphia branch of the YMCA at 52nd and Sansom Streets. The committee was an interfaith group sponsored by well-known clergy and politicians including Daniel A. Poling, Rufus M. Jones, C. Davis Matt, and Francis J. Myers. Prior to the meeting, Gomborow had received information that a group of Nazis were planning to infiltrate the tolerance gathering and instructed detectives to sit in the audience to monitor the meeting for any disturbances. The detectives witnessed a number of persons heckling the speakers, making slanderous remarks against Jews, and nailing anti-Semitic literature and posters to the walls. One of those men, William J. Rigney, stood up repeatedly during the meeting, interrupting the speaker, proclaiming that “Hitler is right in what he is doing to the Jews” and “it is the Jews own fault.” The meeting was abruptly adjourned as a result of the disorder caused by these men. As they left, the detectives observed these same men distributing leaflets promoting racial and religious hatred and pasting anti-Jewish stickers on cars and store windows in the surrounding neighborhood.

“Attention, American Gentiles!” flier issued by Thomas Blissard Sr., March 1939

Detectives arrested eleven of the “Nazi strong armers” who were subsequently charged with inciting a riot. In the early morning hours of March 15, three others were arrested at City Hall, including Thomas A. Blisard, Jr. and Joseph A. Gallagher, while they were attempting to secure the release of those arrested outside the tolerance meeting. Joseph A. Gallagher, chairman of the Anti-Communist Society of Philadelphia, a group founded by the West Philadelphia High School teacher and Nazi sympathizer Bessie “Two Gun” Burchett, protested the arrests, claiming they were a “frame-up.” Gallagher also denied the literature found in his car, which included copies of the Father Charles E. Coughlin publication Social Justice, was anti-Semitic propaganda. Thomas A. Blisard, Jr. (aka Blissard or Blizzard) and his family were well known in the community and to police as rabid anti-Communists and self-described Coughlinites. At the time, Blisard was chairman of the Philadelphia Committee for the Defense of Constitutional Rights, a group originally formed to protest against the radio station WDAS. The station had dropped Father Coughlin’s broadcasts when he refused to provide advance scripts of his addresses. Blisard’s father made use of tolerance meeting arrests to further their cause, printing and circulating fliers publicizing the “persecution of gentiles” suffered at the hands of an “organized gang of Jews.”

Recently prepared for research use, the Jacob H. Gomborow Papers, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, document Gomborow’s activities as an officer and detective in Philadelphia’s Bureau of Police, responsible for leading the bureau’s radical squad in their investigations of anti-Semitic, subversive, and radical groups in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. View the online finding aid or catalog record to learn more about the Jacob H. Gomborow Papers or to request access to the collection in the SCRC reading room on the ground floor of Paley Library.

Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

“We Ought to Have Our Fences Up”: Nativism and Xenophobia in the Progressive Era

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An immigrant couple and their children., circa 1910. Philadelphia Jewish Archives photograph collection

As early as the 1890s, immigration bills with provisions for literacy tests were introduced in Congress as legislative measures to control the influx of immigrants into America. On several occasions these proposed literacy tests were passed by both houses of Congress, only to be vetoed later by the President.  In 1897, for example, Grover Cleveland rejected a proposed literacy law on the basis it was “unnecessarily harsh and oppressive.”

Beginning in 1907, the United States Immigration Commission, under the leadership of Vermont Senator William Paul Dillingham began its work to address the growing nationalist concerns over the ever increasing numbers of immigrants (over 1 million annually between 1905 and 1907) arriving each year. The Dillingham Commission completed its work in 1911 and concluded that immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe posed a serious threat to American society and culture and should therefore be greatly reduced. It further called for regulation of the “kind” or “type” of immigrants admitted to the U.S.

Dillingham Bill (S. 3175), March 1, 1912, Louis Edward Levy Family Papers

The Dillingham Commission’s work was part and parcel of a wave of xenophobic and nativist sentiment in the early twentieth century, which saw numerous immigration restriction bills introduced to Congress with measures that included not only literacy tests, but also head taxes and specification of “barred” or “undesirable” immigrants by geographic and ethnic origin, physical and mental health status, and socioeconomic means. As the twentieth century unfolded, this nativist sentiment drove a progression of severely restrictive immigration legislation.

William Howard Taft vetoed a 1913 bill including a literacy test, as did Woodrow Wilson in 1915, asserting that “it excludes those to whom opportunities of elementary education have been denied without regard to their character, their purposes, or their natural capacity.” Wilson vetoed a restrictive immigration bill containing a literacy test provision for the second time in 1916; however Congress was successful in overriding that veto.   On August 17, 1916, in support of the bill, Republican Senator William E. Borah of Idaho stated “we ought to have our fences up and be thoroughly prepared to protect those in this country who will be brought into competition with the hordes of people who will come here.”

The Immigration Act of 1917 enacted the literacy test as law and expanded the list of “undesirables” barred from entering the country including all persons originating from a geographic area termed the “Asiatic Barred Zone,” a region that included much of East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands.

Letter to Congressman J. Hampton Moore, February 28, 1912, Louis Edward Levy Family Papers

Many individuals and organizations engaged in debates on immigration as this legislation was introduced, including Louis Edward Levy, a prominent figure of Philadelphia’s Jewish community. Levy spoke out against the literacy test as a prerequisite to entry into the United States. He did so both as a private individual and as President of the Association for the Protection of Jewish Immigrants, in published writing and in speeches and testimony. Recently prepared for research use, the Maxwell Whiteman Collection of Louis Edward Levy Family Papers, housed in Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, includes some of these writings, extensive correspondence, and accounts of speeches that Levy gave on the subject.

The Levy Family Papers document the activities of Louis Edward Levy, the Association for the Protection of Jewish Immigrants, and other local and national immigrant aid societies and their efforts to mobilize and coordinate collective action against immigration restriction in favor of more liberal immigration policies. To use the Levy Family Papers, request materials from the finding aid  for use in the SCRC Reading Room in Paley Library, or view a digitized selection of files from the papers.

Anastasia Chiu, Resident Librarian
Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Friend-Finding Service for Refugees

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The task of acclimating to a new environment can be daunting for anyone relocating or settling in a new city or country. In addition to establishing a home, finding work, accessing health care and other services, and possibly learning a new language, developing friendships is an important part of feeling connected to a new community. In an increasingly technologically-dependent world, social networking tools and friend finder apps like Wiith, Hey! VINA, LykeMe, and Meetup can make easy work of connecting to like-minded individuals with similar interests. The challenges associated with establishing a social network in an unfamiliar place are certainly not new.

Recently, while processing and cataloging the records of the Philadelphia based social service agency Jewish Family Service held in the Special Collections Research Center, I discovered a card file containing profiles of WWII refugees. The profile cards were created by the Philadelphia Refugee Resettlement Committee, a committee established in February 1937 by the Jewish Welfare Society (later renamed the Jewish Family Service) to support the economic and social adjustment of individuals and families displaced by the war.

The Refugee Resettlement Committee saw one of the most basic social skills—the ability to make friends—as a necessity for the positive adjustment of refugees arriving in Philadelphia. To aid this process, the committee created a service staffed by volunteer “friendly visitors.” The committee would interview these “new Americans” after their arrival, creating a profile card summarizing the individual or family’s background and social preferences. Volunteers were then matched with refugees based on shared interests in the hopes of fostering a friendship.

Lauer family profile card, 1939

Max and Fridericka Lauer and their two sons were just one of the many families who were matched with Refugee Resettlement Committee volunteers between 1938 and 1941. The Lauers’ profile card indicates the eldest son, Lothar, immigrated to Philadelphia in September 1938 and enrolled as a student at Temple University prior to his family’s arrival in March the next year. Described as a cultured family, the following excerpt from the Lauers’ profile provides some insight into the challenges they faced in creating a social network on their own:

“Mr. and Mrs. Lauer have always been interested in music, the theatre, the opera–but have been unable to partake of these activities in this country because of a financial inability, and a lack of friends with whom to share these interests. Mrs. Lauer is also interested in bridge but states that the women she has met in her neighborhood are old Jewish women whose sole interest is the house, thus giving her very little in common with them. Mrs. Lauer does not speak English at all, Dr. Lauer speaks quite poorly. It would therefore be necessary to find a German-speaking volunteer for this family.”

–Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC

From the Philadelphia Jewish Archives: Philadelphia’s Holocaust Memorial

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Monument at 16th and Benjamin Franklin Parkway, April 27, 1964

As we enter the Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust and Yom Hashoah, the Special Collections Research Center asked Natasha Goldman, Research Associate and Adjunct Lecturer in Art History at Bowdoin College, to share her recent experiences at the SCRC and the connections she made that led to Temple’s acquisition of a previously “hidden collection.”

Goldman writes:  “In 2011, I started research on Nathan Rapoport’s Monument to the Six Million Martyrs (1964), arguably the first public Holocaust memorial in the US, located in Philadelphia at the corner of 16th St., Arch St. and Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Designed by artist Nathan Rapoport, famous for his Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Monument (1948), the sculpture has largely been ignored in the literature of Holocaust memory in the US.

Abram Shnaper, a Holocaust survivor, had initiated the monument’s commission on the behalf of the Association of Jewish New Americans, a Philadelphia survivor organization that he had founded in 1954. Together with the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, the groups raised $47,000 for the monument. Shnaper painstakingly documented the entire process, from raising funds, to writing letters to the artist, to sending telegrams to Israel to invite Israeli officials to the dedication ceremony. When I visited him in his home in 2011, Shnaper conveyed to me his wish that the documents stay in Philadelphia, close to the monument. 

After Shnaper’s passing, I visited his collection once again, this time at the offices of his son-in-law. I also visited the Temple University Libraries’ Special Collections Research Center, where I found the documents of the Jewish Community Relations Council—including files relating to the committee responsible for the monument in the decade after its installation. When Shaper’s son-in-law asked me where he should donate Abe’s papers, I immediately knew that Temple University would be the best home for his collection. It was Shnaper’s greatest wish that young people learn about the Holocaust so as to pass on the legacy of the six million and of the survivors. Finally, students at Temple University and scholars from near and far have direct access to these rich primary documents. They demonstrate the dedication of diverse Jewish communities to create one of the earliest US Holocaust monuments in public space.”

Selections from the Shnaper papers

Acquired by the SCRC in 2014, the Abram Shnaper Papers on the Monument to the Six Million Jewish Martyrs are open and available for research. View the online finding aid or catalog record for a description of the collection’s contents and to request access to the materials in the SCRC reading room.

Natasha Goldman’s article on Rapaport’s memorial, “Never bow your head, be helpful, and fight for justice and righteousness: Nathan Rapoport and Philadelphia’s Holocaust Memorial (1964),” will be published in the Summer 2016 in the Journal of Jewish Identities, issue 9, number 2. The article will also appear in her forthcoming book, Holocaust Memorials in the United States and Germany: From Grass-Roots Movements to National Debates (under advance contract; Temple University Press, Spring 2017).

— Jessica M. Lydon, Associate Archivist, SCRC