YIVO's 88th Birthday

August 7, 2013 marks the 88th anniversary of the establishment of YIVO. It was at this five-day conference in Berlin in 1925 that leading scholars from Western and Eastern Europe came together to craft a vision for what would become YIVO, the Yiddish Scientific Institute.

A few months later in October, supporters in Vilna (Wilno, Poland; now Vilnius, Lithuania) founded the Society of Friends of the Yiddish Scientific Institute, which became the main headquarters of YIVO. Concurrently in New York, an American branch of YIVO was established.

Vegn der program fun dem tsunoyffor fun yidishe visnshaftler mit  fortreter fun kultur-organizatsyes, RG 82, Folder 2377

In a document written shortly before the Berlin gathering, linguist and literary historian Nokhem Shtif proposed an agenda. In order not to waste the opportunity of having a group of scholars together in one place, he suggested that the program include not only planning for the new institute, but also the presentation of academic papers.

The first page of this document, Vegn der program fun dem tsunoyffor fun yidishe visnshaftler mit  fortreter fun kultur-organizatsyes (About the program for the convention of Jewish scholars and representatives of culture organizations), is presented below.

Caption: Vegn der program fun dem tsunoyffor fun yidishe visnshaftler mit  fortreter fun kultur-organizatsyes, RG 82, Folder 2377

Read "This day in Jewish history / Eastern European Jewish culture gets a life preserver" in Haaretz. [Full access to this article requires registration with Haaretz or logging with Facebook.]

Read the article on YIVO in The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe.

Make a special birthday gift to YIVO by becoming a member or renewing your membership. Join before August 12 and receive 1 additional month with your annual membership.