46 | MAY 7 • 2020 

Looking Back

From the William Davidson Digital Archive of Jewish Detroit History

accessible at www.djnfoundation.org

Commemorating the End of WWII
F

riday, May 8, marks an important 
anniversary. It has been 75 years 
since VE Day, the official end of 
World War II in Europe. Beginning 
on Sept. 1, 1939, with Nazi Germany’
s 
invasion of Poland, the war lasted 
nearly six years. The war in the Pacific 
was not yet over, it would end three 
months later in August 
1945, but victory for the 
Allies there was a fore-
gone conclusion.
The destruction of 
the despicable Adolf 
Hitler and his equally 
loathsome Nazi allies 
was indeed something 
to celebrate. There were 
spontaneous, mass demonstrations 
of joy in the streets of cities through-
out America, Canada, the United 
Kingdom and other Allied nations. In 
Downtown Detroit, thousands of citi-
zens waved flags, hugged one another 
and even jumped into the fountain on 
Cadillac Square.
Metropolitan Detroit and 
Michigan, nicknamed the “
Arsenal of 
Democracy,” had certainly done their 
part toward winning the war. This area 
manufactured a large percentage of the 
hard material needed to win the war: 
tanks, airplanes, guns, shells and more. 
The physical cost of the war was 
huge. The Allies spent billions of dol-
lars on war goods and amassed huge 
debts. Across Europe, a swath of cities 
and national economies were left in 
ruins, to say nothing of destroyed 
homes and stores, churches and syna-
gogues. 
More important, the human toll of 
the war was horrific. More than 60 
million lives were lost, including mili-
tary and civilians,
In some ways, VE Day held the 

same meaning for Jews in Detroit as 
for all other Americans. The men and 
women in the military would no lon-
ger have to fight and die in Europe. 
The William Davidson Digital 
Archive of Jewish Detroit History is 
full of stories about Jews serving in 
the American Armed Forces during 
the war. According to estimates from 
the Jewish Welfare Board in Detroit, 
more than 10,000 Jews from the city 
joined the military. Page 18 in the 
May 18, 1945, issue of the JN is a good 
example. It has a wide range of stories 
about individual Jews in the services 
and, more sobering, a list of casualties 
including wounded, missing in action 
and prisoners of war. 
For American and Detroit Jews, 
however, VE Day had a more poignant 
message: The Nazi death camps had 
been liberated; the Holocaust was over. 
This was also a sad thing to consider. 
Many Jewish families in Detroit lost 
relatives in the Holocaust.
The end of the war also resulted in 
another serious issue. As a result of the 
war, millions of people were displaced 
persons; nearly a million DPs were 
Jews. A front-page essay in the May 
11, 1945, issue of the JN summarized 
the problem: “VE Day Intensifies 
Challenge to Jewry for Rescue Efforts.”
In short, VE Day was certainly, with-
out a doubt, something to celebrate. 
But in the aftermath of the war, anoth-
er battle was about to begin. It can be 
reported that, once again, Detroit Jews 
did their part by helping displaced 
persons arriving in Michigan, those 
interned in European camps and those 
who made their way to Palestine to 
establish Israel in 1948. 

Want to learn more? Go to the DJN 
Foundation archives, available for free at www.
djnfoundation.org.

Mike Smith
Alene and 
Graham Landau 
Archivist Chair

