In September 1939, 3.3 million Jews lived in the Republic of Poland. In 1945, only 300,000 were still alive. Polish Jews were more than half of the victims of the Holocaust. Additionally, hundreds of thousands of Jews from all over Europe were taken to Poland to be killed there. Sources on the Holocaust in Poland are thus central to EHRI’s mission. Despite widespread destruction, countless sources do survive in the country itself as well as across the world. Although the task of gathering information about these holdings with its many different languages, source types, and archival systems is quite daunting, EHRI made it one of its priorities.

Sandra works for the Yad Vashem: E-Learning Department at the International School for Holocaust Studies. For EHRI she is involved in Training and Education (work package 4) as Project Manager of the Interactive EHRI Online Course in Holocaust Studies.

I believe that through education, the transmission of information, and the knowledge of facts and values, we can change people’s attitudes, world views, and behavior, thus enriching their lives and hopefully creating a more equal and tolerant world.

‘Berlin/London: The Lost Photographs of Gerty Simon’

EHRI Partner The Wiener Library’s summer exhibition displays the remarkable work of German Jewish photographer Gerty Simon, and features many of her original prints from the 1920s and 1930s.

The latest EHRI Document Blog post by Christine Schmidt (Wiener Library) takes a close look at challenges in developing a “testimonial literacy” (in the words of Noah Shenker) for reading and interpreting early eyewitness accounts in the Library’s collection, particularly as they become more widely accessible through digital platforms and resources.