Historic Link Established Between Massuah and Yale University
[1991 Canadian Friends of Massuah Newsletter]

An historic link was established recently by Massuah Center for
Holocaust Education and Yale University to develop a video library
of Holocaust survivor testimonies that will be shared by both
institutions.

"We are very proud that Yale University has acknowledged the
excellence of Massuah and that this joint venture has been
undertaken to permanently record these monumental events and have
them available for students and researchers in Israel and the
United States," stated Alex Grossman, chairman of the Canadian
Friends of Massuah.

"We trust that this will be but the first of more projects we will
be undertaking together in the future."

In Israel, the tapes will be kept in the library of Massuah's
"Canada House," the new audio-visual centre built by Canadian
supporters.

A core component of the Massuah curriculum consists of the
personal testimonies presented by volunteers who are all Holocaust
survivors. Since many of these men and women are already past
middle age, it was deemed vital to permaently record their
histories for use in the future.

A similar understanding has been reached at Yale University which,
in 1982, established the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust
Testimonies. Funding was provided by the Charles H. Revson
Foundation, Alan M. Fortunoff, Yale University and other donors in
the United States. By 1989, the collection numbered over 1200
testimonies from survivors in the U.S. and Canada and educational
films related to Holocaust studies.

The need to record the stories of survivors now living in Israel
led to this new development.

Prof. Geoffrey H. Hartman, the Karl Young Professor of English and
Comparative Literature at Yale and himself a survivor, serves as
Faculty Advisor of the Archive. Born in Germany, Hartman was one
of the several hundred children spirited into England at the
outbreak of World War II.

Having lost most of his family during the war, Harman subsequently
emigrated to the United States where he completed his education.
He has been a member of the Yale faculty since 1967 and is a poet,
essayist and critical theorist. In 1987, he was one of three Yale
professors appointed to Mellon Term Chairs to explore new areas of
research.

The Archive is housed in Yale's Sterling Memorial Library which
was designed by a Yale graduate and completed in 1930. The
building is gothic in style resembling a cathedral and is, indeed,
considered to be "a cathedral to learning."

Master copies of the video tapes of survivors residing in Israel
will be prepared for both institutions for use by researchers.
Abbreviated versions will be made available to schools, libraries
and organizations.

---

After protraced negotiations, the prestigious United States
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. has just agreed to
become a third partner with Yale University and Massuah.

With this addition, a significantly increased number of videotapes
will be produced for the library and other project ideas will be
more feasible.

The Museum was established with the support and participation of
the United States government, which donated the land on which the
Museum was built.

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