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The Council on the Jewish Experience in Shanghai (CJES) was
formed in 1994 as an international not-for-profit, nongovern¬
mental association. Its goals are to safeguard and develop the
historical evidence of the Jewish refuge in Shanghai, to pro¬
mote scholarly research and public information about the re¬
fuge, and to foster contact among the participants in that
experience.
Soon after World War II ended and the so-called Shanghai
ghetto was dissolved, the 17.000 surviving Jewish refugees be¬
gan to leave Shanghai for other countries; by 1950 almost all
had left the city. However, no agency maintained a central re¬
gistry of them after their departure. When CJES was formed in
1994, the first major task was to begin compiling a list of the
thousands of former Shanghai refugees scattered around the
world. Large contingents are in the USA and Canada, Israel
and Australia, and smaller numbers in Latin America and in se¬
veral European countries. Beginning with a few hundred, the
list now has over a thousand names and current addresses, and
more names come in all the time.
The preservation of documentary and other materials from
the Shanghai exile is a major objective of the Council. Where
such material is still in private hands, CJES reaches out to the
individual holders to encourage them to place the items in in¬
stitutions that are properly equipped and suitably staffed. CJES
offers free advice to assist in such placement. As CJES does
not want to develop a documentary collection of its own, it has
developed contacts with archives and museums all over the
world that will accept and store these materials and make them
available for scholarly purposes.
Where documentary materials are held in governmental ar¬
chives, CJES works to assure access to them for researchers.
Sometimes considerable effort is needed to open up restricted
records. For example, in 1996-97 CJES filed an action under
the Freedom of Information Act to compel the U.S. Central
Intelligence Agency to release many files on Shanghai and to
transfer them to the National Archives, where scholars would
be able to use them.
In the six years since its founding, CJES has become an in¬
creasingly well-known resource and is consulted by universi¬
ty faculty members and graduate students, museum curators,
conference organizers, authors and film makers. It has aided in
the creation of Shanghai-related exhibitions in North America,
Europe and Australia, and in the organization of several con¬
ferences and seminars. On request it offers advice to graduate
students looking for research topics or other specialized infor¬
mation. CJES publishes an occasional newsletter that draws at¬
tention to recently published books and films on Shanghai, and
to work that is still in progress. It also announces exhibitions,
reunions, seminars and conferences, and in general publicizes
new developments related to the Shanghai refuge. It also con¬
tains search notices in which private individuals or scholars
may look for persons or for information for research projects.
Several projects to develop data sources about the Shanghai
exile have been undertaken. A worldwide search for holdings
of the only daily newspaper published during the ghetto period,
the Shanghai Jewish Chronicle, has found many scattered is¬
sues but no comprehensive collection. They are to be micro¬
filmed or made available to researchers in another form. A se¬
arch also continues for records of the extensive interviews held
with all refugees departing Shanghai from 1946 to 1949. Other
existing data sources, such as the lists of refugees’ names and
places of origin published in the Emigranten-Adressbuch of
November 1939, have been — or will be — computerized to
make scholarly use easier. Discussions between CJES and
agencies of China’s national government and Shanghai’s mu¬
nicipal government have explored such issues as the preserva¬
tion of buildings connected with the Shanghai refuge, the
possible restoration of Jewish cemeteries, and the development
of markers and guide materials for various sites of the refuge.
Policy for CJES is made by its board of directors, consisting
of former refugees. The CJES Advisory Committee of Scho¬
lars, a distinguished group of a dozen international experts in
history, Judaica, literature, Chinese studies, and information
science, provides scientific and technical guidance to the
Council. All Jewish former refugee residents of Shanghai are
automatically members of CJES; there is no membership fee.
The work of CJES depends entirely on voluntary financial con¬
tributions. For further information please contact Ralph B.
Hirsch, Executive Director, Council on the Jewish Experience
in Shanghai (CJES), 3500 Race Street, Philadelphia PA 19104,
USA; fax 1.215.386.1270, e-mail <hirsch @igc.org>.
Ralph B. Hirsch, 1930 in Berlin geboren, lebte mit seinen
Eltern von 1940 bis 1947 in Shanghai, von wo aus er in die
USA einwanderte. Als Stadtplaner arbeitete er fiir Regierungs¬
stellen und als Professor. Heute lebt er in Philadelphia und in
Deutschland.
Refuge in
Shanghai
April 1997
SPECIAL "RICKSHAW REUNION" EDITION
Dear Shanghailanders,
On behaif of the Board of Directors of CJES let me
reunions it is primarily an occasion to get together
with old friends, relive old times, retell old tales, and
find out what has happened to each other in the past
few years. But this reunion is more.
The Rickshaw Reunion committee -- behind that
name hides its driving spirit, Walter Silberstein, and
those family members and friends whom he has
roped into helping with the countless tasks that ge
into making such an event -- has invited CJES te
prepare the program on Saturday morning which is
shown at the reunion, including various documentary
media (video and audio}, fiction, and history of the
refugee theatre.
In this 50th year since our wartime community
began to disperse we see an astonishing worldwide
rise of interest in the Shanghai experience. But make
0 mistake: each specialist, whether historian, novel¬
ist, theatre specialist or documentary film maker,
through the experience -- have first preserved, and
then made available, to serve as their raw material.
Both steps are equally essential. We hope that this
reunion will help many of you who have taken the
first step to take the second also.
Ralph B. Hirsch, for the CJES Board.
"How do we preserve historic evidence
of our Shanghai years", panel will ask
From three different perspectives, this complex
issue will be addressed at the reunion on Saturday
maming by @ noted panel of experts invited by CJES.
Steven Hochstadt, a historian at Bates College in
Lewiston, Maine, will speak on “Capturing memory
by oral history interviews”. The director of research
at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York, Frank Meck¬
lenburg, will discuss "The importance of documents,
personal and official”. The question "What can a
museum show about Shanghai?” will be considered
by Jacek M. Nowakowski, director of collections and
acquisitions at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
in Washington. Ralph B. Hirsch of the Council on the
Jewish Experience in Shanghai will serve as modera¬
tor and speak briefly about the recent work of CJES.
CIES obtains release of secret files
on Nazi activity in wartime Shanghai
Responding to a request filed by CJES under the
Freedom-of-information Act (FOIA), the US Central
intelligence Agency has released a large number of
previously withheld records that may shed important
light on the German government's activities in
Shanghai in the 1930s and 1940s. Researchers
going through records at the National Archives in
Washington had noticed that much material in the
Shanghai-related files of the wartime Office of
Special Services, the forerunner agency of the CiA,
had been withdrawn decades ago and was stil} in the
custody of the
Ralph Hirsch, ‘executive director of CJES, had filed
the FOIA request in May 1996. Seven months and
countless letters end ronan calls later, he was
notified by the CIA that the material would be
released and made available to researchers. Astrid
Freyeisen, a historian at the University of Wurzburg
who during her months of research at the National
Archives had compiled a long list of material that
was withheld by the CiA, called the result "a fabu¬
lous achievement” by CJES. “Assuring public access
to research material that can teil us more about the
main reasons we created CJES", said Hirsch.
Radio series explores personal fates
Four outstanding short radio documentaries on the
lives of individuals in wartime Shanghai were broad¬
cast in Germany last September by Südwestfunk,
the radio network based in Baden-Baden. These
documentaries, written by Ursula Krechel, a German
author and poet, are among the few attempts in the
German media until now to deal with the Shanghai
experience. The series was aired under the title
Fluchtpunkte: Deutsche Lebensiäufe in Shanghai. It
will be played at the reunion on Saturday afternoon.
Each piece is 20 to 25 minutes long and is based
solely on original documents and, in one case, on an
oral-history tape made in the 1960s. Three of the
subjects are Jewish refugees; the fourth is a German
diplomat who was attached to the consulate in
wartime Shanghai. The titles are: Richard Stein ¬
Schauspieler, Zeitungsverköufer, Eierhöndler; Ludwig
Lazarus - Buchhändler; Erwin Wickert - Rundfunk¬
attaché; Lothar Brieger - Kunsthistoriker.
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