Celebrating 100 Years

Dear Friend,

On the eve of YIVO’s centennial anniversary, we celebrate the endurance of YIVO’s mission to preserve and protect our heritage and culture. We look back with awe at the imagination, passion, intelligence and, yes, heroism of those who first conceived, collected and studied YIVO’s archives and library, then risked their lives to save this precious legacy from both Nazi and Soviet destruction.

We treasure what remains and search continually for new ways of making it available, accessible and understandable—through digitizing materials, developing online courses that reach a global audience, and offering educational and cultural programs—so that future generations will come to know their place and purpose in the chain of Jewish history.

Saving is not enough; digitizing is not enough. These are but first steps— essential though they be—for conveying to our children who we were, who we are, and who we can become. Conflicts within the Jewish global community may obscure our sense of this evolution, but YIVO’s archives and library are both anchor and inspiration—a great monument to Jewish civilization and an expansive guide that includes every form of religious observance; political and labor movements; folk medicine to modern medicine; children’s summer camps; Yiddish lullabies and other musical compositions; communal records from the 17th century to immigration records in the 20th; and maps of the transformation of Eastern Europe and Russia.

Our resources and programs nurture us today and will continue to inspire those who come after us. In a challenging time, we welcome the New Year and look forward to YIVO’s second century.

Thank you for being part of the YIVO community.

!מיר װינטשן אײַך אַ פֿרײלעכן און אַ ליכטיקן חנוכּה

We wish you a happy and bright Hanukkah.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Brent Executive Director & CEO

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