Bay Area Holocaust Oral History Project

The mission of the Bay Area Holocaust Oral History Project (BAHOHP) is to gather oral life histories of Holocaust survivors, liberators, rescuers, and eyewitnesses. The project is developing and maintaining a catalogue database for public use. Their goal is to provide students, scholars, resource centers on the world, and the general public access to their archives.

BAHOHP seeks to counteract Holocaust denial, and believes that the alarming upsurge of hate crimes and intolerance makes the need to record these stories all the more urgent. The Oral History Project regards recorded personal testimony as a powerful antidote for Holocaust denial.

BAHOHP recently merged with the Holocaust Center of Northern California (HCNC) to form a single organization under the HCNC name. This new organization creates a central resource in Northern California for Holocaust education and remembrance.

Lani Silver and R. Ruth Linden* founded the Holocaust Media Project, predecessor of the Bay Area Holocaust Oral History Project, in 1983. They co-directed the project until 1985. Silver was executive director from 1985 to 1997. Since then, the project has been headed by Anne Grenn Saldinger. Today, the project has some 1700 audio and video recordings of survivors, witnesses and children of survivors. In addition, the collection contains close to a thousand transcripts and other materials.

BAHOHP gathers a complete life story of the interviewee, focusing on details surrounding the Holocaust. The questions will vary according to the specific experiences of each individual. The interviewer has an advanced degree in psychology or social work and experience conducting survivor interviews.

BAHOHP keeps a copy of each tape and sends the master and a duplicate copy to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. In addition, the interviewee is given a copy of his or her interview at the conclusion of the taping. R. Ruth Linden, Ph.D. donated copies of the original archives (1981–1984) to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority in Jerusalem, on 7 September 2007 through the Israeli Consulate in San Francisco.

BAHOHP has agreed to record the memories of SPK, AK, and Warsaw Uprising veterans. The Polish community are delighted to be working with the Jewish community on this project.

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