Community Collecting Event and Scholar Talk: Jewish Immigrant Experience in the 1940s

The Framingham History Center and the Henry Whittemore Library will co-host a community collecting event and scholar talk centered around the experiences of Jewish immigrants arriving in the U.S. during the 1940s. The goal of the community collecting event is to provide area residents the opportunity to share meaningful artifacts and stories which the digital archivist can then capture and create an online digital collection. Visitors may bring up to three items to be photographed or scanned, such as old photographs, letters, postcards, pieces of clothing, textiles, and other artifacts. Artifacts pertaining to the theme of the Americans and the Holocaust traveling exhibition including the Holocaust, World War II, and local history during this time period, should relate to one’s own experience or that of a family member. Once the artifact is scanned or photographed, the Henry Whittemore Library will create an online digital collection that will be available in our repository and serve a wonderful way to showcase the community’s treasured memories for all to view. 

The collective event will be followed by a presentation given by Dr. Lori Gemeiner Bihler. Dr. Bihler is an Associate Professor of History at Framingham State University, where she teaches courses on modern European, U.S., and world history. Her research focuses on the refugee diaspora fleeing Nazi Germany before and during the war, as well as the role of race and religion on past migration and resettlement. Dr. Bihler is the author of Cities of Refuge: German Jews in London and New York, 1935-1945 (SUNY Press, 2018) and has received research fellowships from the British Council, the DAAD, and the Leo Baeck Institute. In addition, she is currently working on a book about history education and each spring semester, Dr. Bihler supervises matriculating social studies student teachers across the region. 

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