Jewish Cultural Reconstruction, Inc.
Jewish Cultural Reconstruction, Inc. (JCR) was an organization established in 1947 to collect and distribute heirless Jewish property in the American occupied zone of Germany after World War Two.[1] Shortly after its founding, it became the cultural arm of the Jewish Restitution Successor Organization (JRSO).[2] About 150,000 heirless items (mostly books from the Offenbach Archival Depot whose owners could not be identified) were distributed by the JCR to libraries in the United States and abroad,[3] among others to the library of the Israelitische Cultusgemeinde Zürich (ICZ) in Switzerland.[4]Hannah Arendt, then managing director of the Jewish Cultural Reconstruction, Inc., handed over parts of the library of the Breslau Rabbinical Seminary in Germany which was suppressed by the Nazis in 1938. The oldest books of the Breslau collection date back to the 16th century, among them a 1595 print of Flavius Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews.[5][6] Funding for the JCR's operations was provided by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the Jewish Agency for Palestine. Among the leaders and officers of the organization were Salo Baron, Hannah Arendt, Leo Baeck, and Gershom Scholem.[7] The JCR ceased operations in 1952.
References
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Further reading
- Shlomit Steinberg. Orphaned Art: Looted Art from the Holocaust in the Israel Museum, Exhibition Catalogue, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, 2008
- Shlomit Steinberg."Provenance Research in Museums: Between History and Methodology", Taking Responsibility, Nazi-looted Art – A Challenge for Museums, Libraries and Archives, Magdeburg, 2009, pp. 307–319
- Shlomit Steinberg, “The Road Paved with Good Intentions: Between Berlin and Jerusalem 1945-1955”, Auf der Suche nach einer verlorenen Sammlung, Das Berliner Judisches Museum (1933-1938), Exhibition Catalogue, Berlin, 2011, pp. 48–57
- Shlomit Steinberg, "The Road to recovery: From the Central Collecting Points to a Safe Haven – The J.R.S.O, Dossier". In Schriftenreihe der Kommission fur Provenienzforschurg 3, Christopher Bazil and Eva Blimlinger (eds.). Bohlau Verlag, Wien-Koln–Weimar, 2012, pp. 119–132
- Elisabeth Gallas: Kulturelles Erbe und rechtliche Anerkennung. Die JCR, Inc. nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg, in: Jahrbuch für Antisemitismusforschung, 22. Metropol, Berlin 2013, ISBN 3863311558, pp. 35 – 56 (in German)
- Elisabeth Gallas: "Das Leichenhaus der Bücher." Kulturrestitution und jüdisches Geschichtsdenken nach 1945. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2013 ISBN 3525369573 (in German)
External links
- Hashavat Avedah : a history of Jewish Cultural Reconstruction, Inc.. Master's Thesis by Dana Herman (2008).
