In May 1939 Nicholas Winton, the British stockbroker who engineered the rescue of nearly 700 Czech children, wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt asking for America to take in refugee children. Many of these children’s families would be deported to ghettos and death camps. National Archives Archivist David Langbart wrote a post in the Archives’ blog, “The Text […]
In 2005 the United Nations General Assembly designated January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, as an international day of remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust. This year marks the 70th anniversary of the liberation. This Resolution, A/RES/60/7, was motivated by a rejection of Holocaust denial, as well as an effort to […]
As the war in Europe was drawing to a close, stories of rescue and bravery under the most difficult of conditions began to surface and make their way to the US. The JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency) was at the forefront of bringing news to the American Jewish community. On October 5, 1944 the JTA published […]
In 1980 President Jimmy Carter, citing a joint resolution of Congress, proclaimed the week of April 21-28 as Jewish American Heritage Week. Both documents identify April as an appropriate time for drawing attention to Jewish heritage: Passover; the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; Yom haAtzmaut; Solidarity Sunday for Soviet Jewry; and Yom haShoah. For […]
In 1955 the Israeli Knesset passed a law establishing a special day of commemoration for Holocaust victims as well as those who resisted. The law provided that the day, to take place on the 27 of Nisan, would be marked by: two-minutes of silence halting all work and road traffic; memorial gatherings in Army bases and […]