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ELAYNE GROSS
Preserving History
WENDY ROSE BICE SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
Former JHSM
director Aimee
Ergas to receive
group’s Simons
History Award.
ABOVE: Dr. Tor Shwayder and Aimee
Ergas in front of a local panel about
Detroit baseball she created for
“Chasing Dreams: Baseball & Becoming
American,” an exhibit she curated at the
Detroit Historical Museum.
I
f Hollywood were to cast someone to play
historian Aimee Ergas in a movie, the
casting director would call for a curious
entrepreneur of knowledge, a woman of aver-
age height wearing a sun hat and red shoes
who, like most historians, is eager to share
her litany of facts and anecdotes.
The public will have a chance to meet
Aimee Ergas when she receives the Jewish
Historical Society of Michigan’s 2017
Leonard N. Simons History Award at 7:30
p.m. Wednesday, May 10, at Temple Kol
Ami, where she and her husband, Dr. Tor
Shwayder, are members.
“Few who have received this award have
the street-level history chops that Aimee
does,” said JHSM president Neil Gorosh. In
selecting Ergas for this award, the selection
committee noted Ergas’ voluminous docu-
mentation of Michigan’s Jewish history.
“You can be standing next to Aimee in a
crowded coffee shop and, without missing a
blink, she’d be sharing anecdotes about Jews
in baseball, inspiring stories of women who
served in the military and expound on the life
of [the late local philanthropist and leader]
Max M. Fisher.”
The Simons Award, established in 1991
and presented annually by JHSM, honors
those who not only preserve Michigan’s
Jewish history, but also promote awareness
of outstanding Jewish contributions.
Ergas, whose pediatric dermatologist
husband helped develop her habit of always
wearing a sun hat, also wears multiple
professional hats. She is an archivist at the
Walter P. Reuther Library-Archives of Labor
and Urban Affairs at Wayne State University,
overseeing the collections of the Jewish
Community Archives and other special proj-
ects. She also serves as research adviser to
JHSM.
Educated at Wellesley College and Tufts
University, Ergas’ Jewish historical career
began some 25 years ago when she signed
on as a volunteer to write articles for JHSM.
She then began to help curate exhibits, bring
internationally renowned historians to the
area, and to research the people behind the
stories that have helped to create an under-
standing of the footsteps of Michigan’s Jewish
foremothers and forefathers.
TOP-NOTCH ARCHIVIST
A feminist at heart, it was fitting that in 2003
Ergas became JHSM’s first director, male or
female. In that role, she advanced JHSM from
an obscure society into a viable organization
by initiating new programs and attracting
new members, donors and partners.
Encouraged by colleagues, she then
entered the archival administration pro-
gram at WSU in 2007, leading to her current
position where her projects have included
archiving the papers of Judge Avern Cohn
and Fisher. Ergas officially left JHSM in 2012,
after producing the “Haven to Home” exhibi-
tion at the Detroit Historical Museum, but
continues to support the organization as
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April 27 • 2017
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