Seymour Pomrenze

Seymour J. Pomrenze
President George W. Bush presents the National Humanities Medal to the Monuments Men Foundation for the Preservation of Art. From left, Robert Edsel and World War II veterans Jim Reeds, Seymour Pomrenze, Harry L. Ettlinger, and Horace Apgar (2007).
Born	Sholom Jacob Pomrenze (1915-09-01)September 1, 1915 Brusilov, Ukraine
Died	August 25, 2011(2011-08-25) (aged 95) New York City, USA
Nationality	American
Other names	Seymour Pomrenze
Occupation	Archivist and records manager

Seymour Pomrenze (1915-2011) was a Jewish-American archivist and records manager. He was the first director of the Offenbach Archival Depot, the primary Allied collection point for books and archival material looted by the Nazis.

Sholom (Seymour) Jacob Pomrenze (1915-2011) was born in Brusilov, Ukraine. In 1922, his family immigrated to Chicago. Pomrenze grew up in a heavily Jewish area, attended a Hasidic synagogue, and went to both secular and Hebrew schools. In 1939, while in college, he took job at the National Archives and Records Administration. Pomrenze joined the United States Army in April 1942, and was commissioned a second lieutenant in April 1943.

Pomrenze attended and held degrees from the Illinois Institute of Technology, the University of Chicago, and the Spertus College of Jewish Studies.

In December 1945, Koppel Pinson, the Joint Distribution Committee's representative in Germany, recommended that Pomrenze be the first head of the Offenbach Archival Depot (OAD). The OAD, part of the US Army's Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program, was the central collection point for books and archival materials looted from Europe by the Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce. Lieutenant Leslie I. Poste of the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program also recommended Pomeranze for the job, as did Judge Simon H. Rifkind, advisor on Jewish Affairs to General Dwight Eisenhower.

From February to May 1946, Pomrenze organized the depot's procedures and began working on returning books and religious artifacts. Among the items handled by the OAD were the Library Rosenthaliana, the YIVO collection, and the Strashun Library of Vilna, Lithuania. The latter was the premier Jewish library in Europe before World War II, and luckily survived the Nazi destruction of Vilna.