Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre fonds

Fonds consists of records generated by staff and volunteers of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre in the planning and administration of exhibitions, school programs, commemorative events, symposia, communications as well as a resource centre. Fonds has been arranged into the following series: Exhibition records, Newsletters, Event programming records. The Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre (VHEC) was opened in 1994 by the Vancouver Holocaust Centre Society (VHCS). The VHEC is devoted to Holocaust-based anti-racism education and commemoration. Its staff produce thematic exhibits, school programs and commemorative events, publish a newsletter entitled Zachor and administrate the Wosk Publishing Program. The VHEC holds Western Canada’s largest collection of Holocaust-related artefacts, Holocaust testimonies and archival records and manages a comprehensive library of books, films, educational resources, as well as rare books and special collections. The Vancouver Holocaust Centre Society for Education and Remembrance (VHCS) was founded in 1983 by a group of British Columbian survivors of the Holocaust and those with ties to the Warsaw Ghetto Committee and the Standing Committee on Holocaust Education of the Canadian Jewish Congress (Pacific Region). The society received charitable status in 1985. Its goal, realized in 1994, was to leave a permanent legacy to the province in the form of a Centre devoted to Holocaust-based anti-racism programming. In 1990, the VHCS partnered with the Jewish Community Centre on the Phase III development of its centre at 41st and Oak in Vancouver, and is located in the basement of that building.Key members of the Vancouver Holocaust Centre Society are:Dr. Robert Krell, Founding President, 1983-1998Robbie Waisman, President, 1998-2004Rita Axelrod, President, 2004-2007Jody Dales, President, 2007-2010Ed Lewin, President, 2010-2016Philip Levinson, President, 2016-Rubin Pinsky chaired the VHCS collections committee in the early 1990s.Early activities and programs of the VHCS occurred in the following areas:Remembrance, Holocaust documentation, outreach program, community education, publishing, exhibitions and collections, child survivor group, second generation group, fundraising and the construction of a Holocaust memorial.