After liberation, Anna found in the warehouse of the “Kanada” section of Birkenau, where the robbed belongings of the deported and murdered Jews were collected before being sent to the Reich, a fine pair of white, gray, and maroon striped men’s pajama bottoms. Perhaps she felt attracted to the high quality garment due to her former profession and knowledge of fabrics. She later told curators that she took them in the hope that if she had a gift for her husband – a segulah (an amulet) – she would find him and reunite her family. With her surviving daughter Freida, Anna returned to Tomaszów Marzowiecki, to the town where she and Joseph had married and lived before the German occupation.
Anna spent two years unaware of Joseph’s fate during the war, and finally reunited with him in July 1945. Joseph, who had been imprisoned in various camps and was liberated by American soldiers in a sub-camp of Mauthausen, made his way on foot over 500 miles back to Tomaszów as well. Anna and Joseph later immigrated with Freida to New York City, where they both worked in the garment business and eventually settled in Forest Hills, New York.
Anna and Joseph Tenenbaum’s pajama bottoms are one of the nearly 100 artifacts from the Museum of Jewish Heritage collection on display in Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far away. This artifact allows Museum visitors to encounter Auschwitz through the personal history it represents.
It is these personal histories that Dr. Yaffa Eliach sought to illuminate and that the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust now preserves and displays. Dr. Eliach instilled in her organization the belief in striving to “restore human dignity to the victims” of the Holocaust. It is this belief that guides the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust in collecting and exhibiting artifacts like Anna and Joseph Tenenbaum’s pajama bottoms.
The Museum of Jewish Heritage’s collecting practice focuses on twentieth century Jewish history anchored in the Holocaust, concentrating on the time periods before, during, and immediately after the war. Within this scope, the collection specializes in family and social histories. The acquisitions staff work to obtain as many artifacts from a family as possible, so that through a variety of media – objects, documents, photographs – the collection communicates the fullness of each person’s life, and the various items inform each other and illuminate the family’s story.
To listen to these kinds of objects and to understand stories of the people who once held them sits at the core of memorial work. Much has been said about Auschwitz, and there is much more yet to say – and to be heard.
Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far away. is a far-reaching, wide-ranging exhibition that attracted over 600,000 visitors in Madrid where the exhibition had its world premiere, and currently is receiving a record-breaking number of visitors at the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust in New York City. The artifacts added to the New York City presentation emphasize stories of family, of humanity, of the lives of individuals tragically cut short or changed forever at Auschwitz.
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