54 | NOVEMBER 19 • 2020
Looking Back
From the William Davidson Digital Archive of Jewish Detroit History
accessible at www.djnfoundation.org
Somber Memories
F
or many years, memorials for
Kristallnacht have been held in
Detroit and around the world. I was
reminded of this while reading a recent issue
of the JN. There was a notice: the “March of
the Living” encouraged the commemoration
of Kristallnacht by inviting “individuals,
institutions and houses of worship” around
the world to keep their lights on during the
night of Nov. 9 as a token of
remembrance.
Most of us know the story
of Kristallnacht. In English,
“Crystal Night,
” or more
to the point, “the Night of
Broken Glass,
” refers to the
extreme antisemitic violence
in Germany on Nov. 9-10,
1938. Hordes of brown-shirt-
ed Nazis and their civilian supporters went
on a rampage, beating and arresting more
than 30,000 Jews, leaving an estimated 7,000
Jewish businesses and 267 synagogues in
ruins. The shards of broken glass that glit-
tered in the streets led to the descriptor of
“Kristallnacht.
” This was a major step along
the path to the Holocaust.
I decided to see what I could find on
Kristallnacht in the William Davidson
Digital Archive of Detroit Jewish History.
To say the least, the event has never been
forgotten. Over the years, there have been
announcements of memorials for and many
feature articles about Kristallnacht in the JN.
The first reports in the Detroit Jewish
Chronicle were contemporary, before
Kristallnacht was a widely used term. The
first use of the term that I found in the
Archive was in Editor Philip Slomovitz’
s
“Purely Commentary” column in the JN on
May 13, 1961.
However, the antisemitic event was
heavily covered in the Chronicle, beginning
on Nov. 11, 1938, with a “New Wave of
Anti-Semitism In Germany and France as
Result of Shooting of Nazi Official.
” There
were similar headlines over the next two
months. For example, on Nov. 18, 1938,
was “Roosevelt Leads Outraged World in
Registering Protest Against Persecution of
Jews in Germany,
” and on Dec. 30, “Breach
Between U.S. and Germany Widens.
” And,
so on.
Unfortunately, all the reports and con-
demnations of Nazi antisemitism did not
stop Hitler and his evil henchmen from per-
petrating the Holocaust.
Later feature articles in the JN,
while decidedly somber, were
more encouraging. They show
that Detroit Jews have not
forgotten their history. Indeed,
many Detroiters had firsthand
experience. Some of them were
able to get out of Germany
soon after Kristallnacht; oth-
ers were survivors of both
Kristallnacht and the Holocaust.
On the 50th anniversary of
Kristallnacht, Andrea Jolles wrote
“
A Night Burned In History”
(Nov. 4, 1988 JN). The cover
article for the Nov. 10, 2000 JN,
“Broken Glass, Broken Dreams,
”
is about Marianne Wildstorm’
s
efforts to help Shoah victims with
restitution. For the 75th anniversa-
ry of Kristallnacht, Esther Allweiss
Ingber wrote about survivors shar-
ing memories in “Night of Broken Glass”
(Nov. 7, 2013 JN).
Many obituaries note those who survived
Kristallnacht and made their way to Detroit.
One that caught my eye was for cantor
Harold Orbach, “Temple Israel’
s Beloved
Voice,
” in the April 24, 2014, issue of the
JN. It related that he and his brother had
escaped Nazi Germany after Kristallnacht.
Kristallnacht will always stand as an
example of extreme antisemitism and mob
rule. The memory of that night is kept alive
in the William Davidson Archive.
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
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