YIVO

Vilna Collections Project

2016

$200,000

YIVO’s Vilna Collections Project will create the largest digital library of documents and books related to East European Jewish civilization and the largest online collection of Yiddish-language materials in the world. The global portal, which will be free to access, will preserve the major historical documentary record of Jewish life in Eastern Europe for future generations, and includes materials that were looted by the Nazis during WWII but later recovered. The project is a one-of-a-kind partnership between YIVO, which is a U.S.-based organization, and the government of Lithuania, where part of the original collection remains.

Pictured: YIVO founder and Research Director Max Weinreich (center) and others examine a portion of the more than 400 crates of original YIVO archival and library collections salvaged from the destruction of the Holocaust and from the pillaging activities of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg at the institute’s NY headquarters. 1947. Photograph by Alexander Archer.