| Museum of Jewish Heritage | |
|---|---|
 The Museum's Robert M. Morgenthau wing |
|
| Established | 1997 |
| Location | 6 Battery Place, Battery Park City • New York, NY |
| Type | Holocaust museum, Jewish Museum |
| Director | David Marwell |
| Public transit access | Subways 4, 5 to Bowling Green, J, M and Z to Broad Street, Buses M1, M6, M9, M15 and M20 to Battery Park. |
| Website | mjhnyc.org |
Coordinates: 40°42′22″N 74°01′08″W / 40.706211°N 74.018750°W
- Not to be confused with the Jewish Heritage Museum.
The Museum of Jewish Heritage, in lower Manhattan, was created as a living memorial to the Holocaust. The hexagonal shape and tiered roof of the building are symbolic of the six points of the Star of David and the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust. It opened September 15, 1997.
In addition to a large permanent exhibit on the Holocaust entitled The War Against the Jews, it also contains two other permanent exhibits on Jewish culture: Jewish Life a Century Ago, and Jewish Renewal. The three permanent exhibits are arranged chronologically, with Jewish Life A Century Ago on the first floor, The War Against the Jews on the second floor, and Jewish Renewal (focusing on contemporary Jewish culture, especially Israel) on the third floor.
Temporary exhibits and Safra Hall, a theater, are to be found in the Robert M. Morgenthau wing. The current temporary exhibits are "Beyond Swastika and Jim Crow: Jewish Refugee Scholars at Black Colleges and The Morgenthaus: A Legacy of Service. There is also a memorial garden, "Garden of Stones" designed by Andy Goldsworthy, in this wing. The garden consists of 18 boulders, each with a dwarf oak sapling growing from inside the hollowed-out stone. They symbolize resiliency. The number 18 was chosen specifically because the Hebrew word for life, chai, has a numerological value of 18. In 2009, the Museum opened a new digital, visitor experience about heritage and memory called the Keeping History Center.
Monitors, speakers, and projectors playing interviews of relevant persons punctuate the exhibits. 800 artifacts (many of them personal belongings) and 2,000 photographs are on display.
In 2005, the museum was among 406 New York City arts and social service institutions to receive part of a $20 million grant from the Carnegie Corporation, which was made possible through a donation by New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg[1][2].
As of 2005, Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau is the chairman of the Museum.
The Museum is affiliated with the Auschwitz Synagogue in Oświęcim Poland; and with JewishGen, the premier online site for researching Jewish roots.
See also
Notes
- ^ Sam Roberts (July 6, 2005). "City Groups Get Bloomberg Gift of $20 Million". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/06/nyregion/06donate.html. Retrieved November 11, 2009.
- ^ "Carnegie Corporation of New York Announces Twenty Million Dollars in New York City Grants". Carnegie Corporation of New York. July 5, 2005. http://carnegie.org/sub/news/anon2005.html. Retrieved November 11, 2009.
- Saidel, Rochelle (1996). Never Too Late to Remember: The Politics Behind New York City's Holocaust Museum. Holmes & Meier. ISBN 978-0841913677.
- Young, James E (1993). The Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials and Meaning. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. pp. 287-291. ISBN 978-0300059915.
External links
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