By David Langbart Thanksgiving is considered by many to be the quintessential American holiday. As Thanksgiving 1918 approached, Americans had more reason than the usual to give thanks. On November 11, 1918, Germany signed the armistice that brought World War I to an effective end. In the wake of that event, the United States made … Continue reading Thanksgiving around the world
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. I would wager that few NARA staff members, especially those hired during the past five years, and most researchers are familiar with the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG) nor its website: www.archives.gov/iwg. The website contains a wealth of valuable information not … Continue reading A Brief History of the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG)
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. Some seventy years ago, this past August, the first major collection of captured Japanese documents in the Pacific Theater to arrive at Pearl Harbor were those captured in August 1942 when the 2nd Marine Raider Battalion, under Lt. Col. Evans F. Carlson, made a harassing raid on Makin … Continue reading Seventy Years Ago: The Makin Island Raid, August 1942
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. Seventy-years ago, on November 9, 1942, forty-nine year old Allen W. Dulles arrived in Bern, Switzerland to head up the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) operations in Switzerland. Dulles was lucky to be in Switzerland. His train passed from Vichy France into Switzerland only minutes before the Germans … Continue reading Allen Dulles and No. 23 Herrengasse, Bern, Switzerland, 1942-1945
By Jason Clingerman The past Saturday, I was visiting the Florida Keys and took a bike tour of parts of Islamorada, a village which spans several islands. The meeting place for the tour was a memorial to the victims of the 1935 Labor Day hurricane located near mile marker 82 of U.S. Route 1. Our guide … Continue reading Plumage of Pomp: The Labor Day Hurricane of 1935
By Jason Clingerman 70 years ago today, Japanese Americans at the Tule Lake Relocation Center celebrated a harvest festival by wearing costumes. At the Tule Lake Relocation Center, later the Tule Lake Segregation Center, over 24,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned because of suspected disloyalty to the U.S. government under Executive Order 9066. Starting in 1943, Tule … Continue reading Halloween at the Tule Lake Relocation Center
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. One clear, chilly evening this week fifteen years I was alone in the foothills above the town of Ascona, Switzerland, wondering “how in the world did I end up here?” The answer begins in December 1996, in the wake of revelations about Switzerland having dormant bank accounts of … Continue reading An American Archivist at Ascona, Switzerland, October 1997
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. The National Archives holds a substantial quantity of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) records. And in the forthcoming years even more records will be accessioned. The FBI case files contain a variety of documentation, including FBI agent reports; teletype-messages; prosecutive summaries; accounts of interviews and physical surveillance; letters; … Continue reading The Challenge of Federal Bureau of Investigation Records: Abbreviations and Euphemisms
Today's post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. Seventy years ago, on September 19, 1942, one of the most important intelligence organizations in the Southwest Pacific Area was created and not long afterwards its commander, Sidney F. Mashbir, arrived in the theater to take command of it. This was the Allied Translator and Interpreter Section, … Continue reading Seventy Years Ago: Colonel Sidney F. Mashbir and the Allied Translator and Interpreter Section (ATIS), September-October 1942
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher. Nancy Yeide, head of the Department of Curatorial Records at the National Gallery of Art (NGA) in Washington, D.C., in December 1997, began doing provenance research on the NGA’s holdings to ascertain whether any of the works of art had provenance problems. In the wake of the revelations … Continue reading The National Gallery of Art, the National Archives, and Art Provenance Research
