Jewish Studies: Images & Primary Sources

Filled with more than a million documents and hundreds of movies and radio shows, this archive houses an extraordinary range of resources on the past century of American Jewish history.

The largest and most comprehensive body of information on Jewish art in existence. Over 200,000 pictures, sketches and documents have been digitized and are now freely accessible to the public.

Detailed information about this 'central repository for the cultural and historical legacy of the Jewish people,' a project of five respected research facilities. The Web site has online multimedia catalogs of their libraries and archives, and descriptions (including some images) of the center's exhibits and family history resources. The Center, in New York City, has materials on Ashkenazic or Sephardic resources, Yiddish language, Jewish art, and genealogy.

CAHJP was founded in 1939 to gather historical documentation reflecting the collective past of the Jewish people. Formally established in 1969, it is overseen by the Government of Israel, the Jewish Agency for Israel, the Historical Society of Israel, the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv University and Bar-Ilan University.

Gateway to the digital collections of the Leo Baeck Institute, documenting German-speaking Jewry in the modern age.

Biographies of Jewish painters, sculptors, and photographers.

The 10 Most Famous Jewish Artists and Painters.

A collection of over 4,300 videotaped interviews with witnesses and survivors of the Holocaust. Part of Yale University's department of Manuscripts and Archives, the archive is located at Sterling Memorial Library.

Yiddish theater icon's papers, housed at the American Jewish Historical Society.

Steven Bergson, a Canadian Judaica librarian and comics fan, maintains this blog about comics with Jewish characters or Jewish themes. It also includes announcements about events related to Jewish comics-- publications, museum exhibitions, lectures--and for discussion about the Jewish comics themselves.. Move over Superman and Wonder Woman, here come Sabraman, Ragman, and Matzogirl!

On Oct. 29, 1944, at the edge of a fierce fight for control of the city of Aachen, Germany, a correspondent for NBC said: 'We bring you now a special broadcast of historic significance: The first Jewish religious service broadcast from Germany since the advent of Hitler.' The service was led by Army Chaplain & Rabbi Capt. Sidney Lefkowitz, and PFC Max Fuchs served as cantor. Anniversary video from the American Jewish Committee archives.

Companion site to a Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) 'documentary about a distinctive, traditional Eastern European religious community' that found 'its most vital center in America.' The program focuses on families in New York. The site provides background information and brief essays about the Hasidism movement within Orthodox Judaism, a transcript, details about the film and producers, a bibliography and filmography, photos, and classroom resources.

The Milstein Family Communal Archives Project, led by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, is a collaborative effort to chronicle the Jewish experience in 20th Century New York City, as reflected in the archives of five UJA Federation of New York agencies: 92nd Street Y, The Educational Alliance, F-E-G-S Health and Human Services System, NYANA (New York Association for New Americans), and Surprise Lake Camp.

This collection of 17,000 photographs from the YIVO archives is a visual record of pre-World War II Jewish communities. In some cases, the pictures are all that remains. Online albums document holiday observance, Yiddish writers, immigration, women's roles, and formal studio portraits. Users must register to search the full catalog.

This NCJW Oral History Project chronicles the growth of an important American Jewish community. The interviews provide windows into the Jewish community's impact on academic, business, civic, cultural, medical, political, religious, and social evolution and development in Pittsburgh, as well as national and international events.

The USC Shoah Foundation Institute's Visual History Archive makes available over 52,000 video testimonies of Holocaust survivors. This is the University of Michigan Library LibGuide to the resource.

Provides a detailed description of the stamps in the Singer collection housed at the Emory University Library's Special Collections and Archives. Includes stamps issued by Israel from 1948-2002, stamps honoring notable Jews and depicting events from the Bible, and examples of stamps produced by the Jewish National Fund as a fundraising source.

Dedicated to collecting and recording the dramatic history of pioneer Jews in the Desert Southwest, including the Crypto-Jews who trace 'their family histories back to Spain and Portugal.' Features materials on Jewish pioneers, railroad builders, ranchers, and merchants; synagogues and religious objects; finding aids; photographs and transcripts of over 20 oral histories.

In 1934, Stalin created the Jewish Autonomous Region in the region of Birobidzhan in Siberia as a Soviet alternative to Palestine. This online version of an exhibit created for the Judah Magnes Museum uses archival photographs and multimedia to document the experiment and its failure. It examines the notions of Jewish identity, culture, and community.

Showcases Jewish documentary film footage in the world. The vaults contain material shot in Israel before and after the establishment of the State in 1948, motion picture records of many Jewish communities in the Diaspora and two special collections relating to the Holocaust.' Users may browse a vintage poster collection and view selected movies online. Includes links. Searchable.

Founded in Vilna, Lithuania, the YIVO Institute is one of the foremost centers of Jewish learning. Online galleries have artifacts and photographs of the Jewish Labor Bund, actress Ida Kaminska, treasures from the archives, posters from prewar Poland, artifacts from the Vilna Ghetto and more.