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