Vilna Governorate
Archives of the Center for Jewish History - Vilna
This collection contains records from the ORT Society in Vilna, covering its activities from its establishment in 1919 until its dissolution in 1940.
The files document the society’s administration, correspondence, and vocational training programs for youth and adults. A significant part covers agricultural support activities from 1920-1923, with records primarily pertaining to Jewish farmers in areas of modern-day western Belarus.
The collection also includes a small number of unrelated ORT records: correspondence from Riga, Latvia (1923) and from London (1924).
This collection contains records of the Vilna Jewish community (the Kehillah) from 1800 to 1940, with the bulk of the material covering the interwar period. The archive documents the Kehillah’s activities through various historical periods:
- Pre-1844: Early records on economic activities and property.
- 1844-1915: Documents from the Tsedakah Gedolah (the main Jewish charity) on administration, religious matters, and correspondence with Russian authorities.
- 1915-1919: Materials on relief aid during the German occupation in WWI.
- 1918-1920: Records of the Kehillah elections (December 25, 1918) and documents detailing the community’s suffering during the conflict over Vilna between Poland, Soviet Russia, and Lithuania.
- Interwar Period – 1940: Extensive records of the “New Kehillah” under Polish rule, covering departments like social welfare, education, and healthcare. It also includes documents from the Jewish Refugee Relief Committee (1939-1940).
The collection is a valuable source for studying Jewish autonomy, daily life in Vilna, and genealogy, and it contains materials related to prominent personalities like Rabbi Chaim Oyzer Grodzienski and Max Weinreich.
Zemach Shabad Collection documents Dr. Shabad’s career as a physician in Vilna (Vilnius) and to a smaller extent his involvement in Vilna’s (Vilnius) civil and communal lives.
The larger segment of the collection consists of patient’s medical records that provide information such as patient’s name, age, address, diagnosis, and proposed treatment. Earlier records are in Russian while starting in the mid-1920s the language changes to Polish.
A much smaller segment of the collection includes travel documents and correspondence with government officials regarding travel permits, correspondence with German officials, collections of folk songs, and materials pertaining to VILBIG (Vilna Jewish Education Society/ Vilner Yidishe Bildungs Gezelshaft) 1907-1934.
This collection contains records of the Vilna branch of the Hevrah Mefitsei Haskalah Society (OPE), dating from 1868 to 1933, with the bulk of materials from 1909-1919.
The files include meeting minutes, membership lists, correspondence, and school-related documents like curricula and report cards. A significant number of documents from the German occupation of Vilna (September 1915 – November 1918) are in German, though most of the collection is in Russian and Yiddish. The materials offer insight into the society’s activities in Jewish culture and education and include letters from prominent figures such as Shlomo An-sky and Zemach Szabad.
This collection consists of music manuscripts—specifically instrumental parts—for Yiddish operettas and musical plays. The materials were originally part of the Esther Rachel Kaminska Museum at the YIVO Institute in Vilna, which was established in 1927.
The collection features works by the foundational composers, authors, and arrangers of the Yiddish theater, including Abraham Goldfaden, Joseph Lateiner, and Peretz Sandler.Each manuscript is described by its available instrument parts, using abbreviations such as V-1 (First Violin), C (Clarinet), and D (Director’s part).
This collection documents the activities of the Jewish health organizations OZE and TOZ across Eastern Europe, including the Soviet Union, Berlin in the 1920s, and Latvia in the late 1930s. A noteworthy section of the collection is dedicated to the Vilna branch during the interwar period. These records, which include reports, correspondence, and financial documents, provide valuable information on the local collaboration between OZE and TOZ in Vilna, the activities led by its chairman, Dr. Tsemah Szabad, and the final liquidation of the OZE organization in the city. The files also show the crucial financial support provided by the JDC.
The Sofia M. Gurevitch gymnasium was a progressive school established in Vilna in 1906. Initially a Russian-language girls’ school, it returned to Vilna after World War I and evolved into a co-educational, Yiddish-language institution after 1922.
Affiliated with the TSYSHO secular school system, the gymnasium’s teaching method emphasized independent, student-led exploration. After Sofia Gurevitch retired around 1931, the school changed its name and continued to operate in Vilna until at least 1936.
This collection contains Yiddish theater materials that were originally part of the Esther Rachel Kaminska Theater Museum at the YIVO Institute in Vilna. The materials, which include play manuscripts, posters, photographs, and correspondence, date primarily from the early twentieth century, especially the interwar period. While the focus is on theater in Poland and Eastern Europe, the collection also includes items from the United States, Palestine, and other regions around the world. 1887-1942.
This collection contains documents of YIVO work and activities: resolutions from conventions and conferences, protocols from Board and Executive Office meetings, work agenda, financial records, correspondence related to financial matters, work, culture, science and education matters, cashbook, accounts, bills, registry books of incoming correspondence, publications; documents collected by YIVO: commands of Red Army and soviet institutions in Vilnius and Bialystok, resolutions, announcements, appeals; notes about Jewish society and agricultural structure in Poland, documents of political parties and social organizations (statutes; circulars, protocols from Central Committee and Board meetings, work outlines, financial records, appeals, cards, announcements, invitations, publications), documents about Jewish pogroms in Ukraine, Jewish one-time publications (jednodniówka) and periodicals, literature collections, and clippings. 1903-1941.