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Bone Button Borscht
A tired beggar reaches a small town on a cold, wintery night, seeking food and a warm bed. When the poor locals are reluctant to assist, he promises to make a delicious soup from six bone buttons.
Chocolate Outs Jews on Yom Kippur
Crypto-Jews living in Mexico in the 17th century, under the surveillance of the Inquisition, developed sticky subterfuges to avoid being outed for their undercover Jewish practices, including those that related to chocolate drinking.
Flourishing in France
Liberal Judaism in France, which just marked its 100th anniversary, is more vibrant than ever before. France's 14 synagogues are all full for Shabbat services, rent large concert halls to accommodate High Holiday demand, and have such popular religious schools that families have to wait in long lines to sign up.
Facts Make You Free
The Holocaust horror stories my parents told me as a young child forced me to shoulder a heavy emotional load. First I contemplated revenge against the Nazis. Later I tried escape into normalcy by blotting out painful memories. As the years passed, I discovered that going to the places where these terrible events occurred eased the psychic burden.
History Held Hostage
In 1998, shortly after joining the staff of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, I was invited to a meeting with the director of the International Tracing Service (ITS). The director had come to Washington in hopes of copying some archival collections I had helped the Museum acquire. When he was asked about access to ITS's massive and secretive Holocaust-era collections, he reported that the International Commission of ITS had decided in principle to open the ITS archives-but not for three to five years, the estimated time required to make digital copies of the millions of documents in its possession. The director declined further discussion.
The Jews Who Lived Among Us
In the early 1930s, about two hundred Jews lived in Siegen, a small city 100 miles north of Frankfurt, Germany. Today there are none, but they have not been forgotten. For more than three decades, Klaus Dietermann, a local schoolteacher, has been obsessed with documenting and restoring the memory of this vanished Jewish community. He wants local residents not only to lament the loss of the town's Jews to the Nazis' horrors, but also to celebrate their noteworthy contributions to Siegen life.