by Cynthia Wroclawski

A father proudly holds his baby daughter above his head; a couple leans out of a window smiling at the camera, the man’s arm draped around his sweetheart’s shoulder; a young brother and sister pose for a portrait picture. Such innocent snapshots could form part of any private collection, recording precious moments in one’s family history. What makes these photographs different is that they are part of the 110,000 plus collection submitted to the Hall of Names at Yad Vashem since its establishment. Representing a mere three percent of the victims recorded thus far in the Names Database, they powerfully illuminate the mosaic of Jewish life in Europe before the Shoah.

In its effort to restore the identities of Jews who perished in the Shoah, Yad Vashem has been collecting Pages of Testimony since the 1950s. Submitted by survivors, relatives or friends of victims, Pages of Testimony include biographical details—name, date of birth and death, occupation, and so on—and are preserved in the Hall of Names and on the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names. But the Page also has room for a photograph.

Unlike other types of historical documents from the Nazi era, a photograph evokes a sense of “knowing” the person. The image helps one to remember and relate to the individual, not as faceless a victim or statistic, but a vibrant human being who once lived a life like theirs—until the Nazis and their collaborators destroyed it.

Alexander Avraham, Director of the Hall of Names, stresses the importance of including photographs of the victims when submitting Pages of Testimony. “Attaching a photograph adds another dimension to the testimony. It gives the victim a face; it restores their identity. Although in most cases no photograph of the victim remained, we are also aware that many of the people who have submitted Pages of Testimony managed to save these treasured images. Today it is possible to scan a photograph directly from home computers and add it to the Names Database, while allowing the original to remain with its owner.”

Approximately 900 photos have been added to the collection since the Names Database was uploaded to the Internet last November. The scanning and digitization of photos is supported by a donation from the David Berg Foundation. However, some 45,000 photographs are waiting for additional sources of funding in order to be added to the online Database.

“Often, when I think of the Holocaust, I conjure up images of emaciated people in striped prison uniforms,” wrote Yvonne, a visitor to the online Database. “Your site shows people before they have spent months in a camps. It shows people who look like, well, just folks, which is the reality of the situation. Thanks for bringing that home.”

The author is Marketing Manager for the Online Names Database.

Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names awarded Project of the Year

Yad Vashem was conferred the “Project of the Year Award” by the International Association of Jewish Genealogy Societies for launching the Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names. This special award represents recognition and appreciation by the genealogic community for the Names Database’s impact and contribution to the research and study of Jewish family and community history. The award was granted at the 25th International Conference on Jewish Genealogy held in Las Vegas, Nevada, in July.

Names Database to be translated into Russian

With some 40,000 new Pages of Testimony submitted since the launch of the Names Database online almost a year ago, the total number of names registered stands at around three million. Estimates are that a large majority of the missing names belong to murdered Jews from the FSU. To gain access to this vast resource, Yad Vashem has begun to translate the Names Database into Russian.

The project, due to be concluded within the coming year, has been funded by the Nadav Foundation (Israel) and will be carried out by professional translators at Yad Vashem. Once completed, Russian speakers in the FSU and elsewhere - now representing only a tiny fraction (less than one percent) of the close to six million visitors to the website - will be able to search the Database and filling in Pages of Testimony online, thus joining the international effort to remember and memorialize every individual victim of the Shoah.

For access to the Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names, click here.
For resource materials related to the Names Database, click here.

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