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Affidavit signed by Rabbi Eliezer Silver, 1942.

MANUSCRIPT MATERIALS
In This SectionManuscript MaterialsPhotographsMicrofilmAudio/Visual MaterialsNearprintThe archival and manuscript holdings of the American Jewish Archives include nearly 800 major manuscript collections and over 16,000 smaller collections. A brief description of the major manuscript collections, as well as a selection of full-text inventories (finding aids), is available on this website. Many of the small collections have been catalogued in the AJA online catalog.

Brief descriptions of major manuscript collections are arranged into the following categories:

Researchers can also view an alphabetical list of all full-text inventories (finding aids).

All major manuscript collections, and a portion of the small collections, are catalogued in the AJA online catalog.

PHOTOGRAPHS
The AJA Photograph Collection consists of well over 13,000 images. It is heavily used by scholars, film makers and videographers, among others, to illustrate books, articles, films, and television programs. The complete photograph collection is catalogued in the AJA online catalog.

MICROFILM
The AJA's microfilm collection consists of over 3,000 reels, including copies of the papers of Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis, Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, and the records of the Socialist Labor Party of America. The American Jewish Archives has also established microfilm branches located on the campuses of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York, Los Angeles, and Jerusalem. These branches contain nearly half the microfilm holdings of the main American Jewish Archives in Cincinnati. Thus, researchers are often spared the need for frequent and costly travel to Cincinnati or of reliance on correspondence with the Archives. For further information contact:

NEW YORK
Klau Library, New York
HUC-JIR
Brookdale Center
1 West 4th Street
New York, NY 10012-1186
212.674.5300
http://www.huc.edu/libraries/NY/contact/

LOS ANGELES
Frances-Henry Library
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
3077 University Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90007-3796
213.749.3424
http://www.huc.edu/libraries/LA/contact/

JERUSALEM
Abromov Library
Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion
13 King David Street
Jerusalem 94101, Israel
02.620.3270
http://www.huc.edu/libraries/JE/contact/

AUDIO/VISUAL MATERIALS
The AJA holds nearly 3,000 audio and video recordings consisting of oral histories, lectures, religious services, and music. A portion of this collection is catalogued in the AJA online catalog.

NEARPRINT
The archival-manuscript holdings of the American Jewish Archives are complemented by a large collection of ephemeral or fugitive materials: newspaper and magazine clippings, leaflets, brochures, pamphlets, and organizational news releases. These materials are brought together in the "Nearprint" collection, which is divided into three catagories:

  • Biography
  • Special Topics and Institutions
  • Geography

The Nearprint collections reflect the day-to-day development of Jewish life in mid and late twentieth-century America. Scholars invariably find in this collection data that does not appear in manuscript or non-ephemeral published sources. The majority of this collection is catalogued in the AJA online catalog.

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