YIVO Archival Documents Exhibition in Lithuania

On September 19, 2019, YIVO Executive Director and CEO Jonathan Brent spoke at the exhibition, “Documents of the YIVO Archive,” in The Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences in Vilnius, Lithuania. The Wroblewski Library is one of the Lithuanian state institutions partnering with YIVO on the Edward Blank YIVO Vilna Online Collections project.

The exhibition featured YIVO materials that have been housed at the Wroblewski Library since 1948 and are being preserved and digitized as part of the YIVO project.  They were on public view for the first time since the end of World War II.

During World War II, the Nazis used the YIVO building in Vilna as a sorting center, forcing Jews to select materials to be sent to Germany to become the basis of the planned Institute for the Study of the Jews in Frankfurt. The Jews responsible for sorting the material, known as “The Paper Brigade,” risked their lives to smuggle large quantities of books and documents out of the building and into the ghetto, where they were hidden.

These materials were saved again after the war by Antanas Ulpis, a Lithuanian librarian who hid them from Soviet destruction in the Church of St. George.  They were found again only after the fall of the Soviet Union. The Wroblewski Library exhibition reveals the diversity of materials that are being preserved and digitized as part of the YIVO project, including documents relating to synagogues, publishing houses, and hospitals in Vilnius and as well as other Lithuanian cities, such Kaunas and Telšiai.  The YIVO project encompasses almost two million documents and 12,000 books located in Vilnius, Lithuania, and New York City.

“This is a very important exhibit of YIVO materials that represent a wide spectrum of topics, from medical records to pogroms in Ukraine to the record of YIVO documents turned over to Nazis,” said Jonathan Brent. “These materials have more than historical value because they start people thinking, they start a conversation.”

The exhibition was on view at The Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences September 11, 2019 – October 4, 2019.  For more information about the Edward Blank YIVO Vilna Online Collections, please go to vilnacollections.yivo.org.