Canadian Jewish Heritage Network Launches
On June 6, 2011, Canadian Jewish Congress Charities
Committee National Archives (CJCCCNA) and the Jewish
Public Library Archives (JPL-A) formally launched the
The Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (www.cjhn.ca)website.
The launch was an opportunity to give recognition to the
project's funders and to introduce the site to local community
leaders, library and archives professionals and academics from
related disciplines. The principal funding for the development of
the CJHN came to the Canadian Jewish Congress Charities Committee
from the Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Family
Foundation. Speaking at the official launch of the site on
June 6, Stephen Bronfman, Chair of the SSBFF, noted that the new
website allows users to "share the wonderful rich history of Jews
in Canada" so that these stories are now "open to be explored by
Jews and non-Jews alike."
As noted by Benjamin Shinewald, CJC and CJCCC National Executive
Director and Acting CEO; "The CJHN is a model for honouring and
preserving our history and traditions - not by locking it away in a
dusty archive - but by celebrating, cultivating and sustaining our
history for a stronger Canadian Jewish future. The core message of
building directly on our communal memory to shape and improve our
communal future is a truism that we all should keep in mind."
The CJHN website is a seamless blend of two repositories'
holdings; actually a virtual 'mind-meld' of two institutions into a
single functional entity helping researchers. Our repositories are
in two locations: the CJCCCNA in the centre of a University
Triangle of Concordia- University/ Université de Montréal, McGill
University and UQAM, while JPL-A is in the heart of the Jewish
community campus, close to Jewish Day schools and Federation
agencies. Through designing the web site together we have a new
awareness of the specifics of each others' collections and how they
relate to each other. It has also become natural for us to consult
each other in areas of archival acquisition, both when we speak to
potential donors of documents, and through educating the interested
public via the website.
Now users can visit our collections from the comfort of their
desks, searching the online catalogue for archival collections
dating from the 18th century onwards. Using the site's selection
cart, one can select, e-mail, print or order archival material
directly from the web.
At this time, more than 25,000 database records from the
archival collections are currently online, as well as over 1,500
digitized historic photographs and archival documents. Many
complete multi-page documents are available in PDF format. The
digitized documents currently online include minutes, annual
reports, anniversary publications, sermons, and ephemeral
material.
Users of the site can also delve into the CJHN's genealogical
research database, which already contains close to 50,000
genealogical records and over 5,000 associated images. This section
of the site was funded by a special donation from Penny Rubinoff of
Toronto. Speaking at the launch, Rubinoff noted: "Genealogy is a
fanatical pursuit for many of us and on-line non-census
historical Canadian data on Jewish families have been
lacking, especially compared to many other countries.
It will not only be Canadians who benefit from this database but
genealogists around the world whose families have had Canadian
roots."
Notes Shannon Hodge, JPL Archivist: "Archives are not really
about the past, rather we must constantly plan for the future: how
will we preserve this for another five hundred years; who is going
to use this archive fifty years from now; what will they need and
why and so on. With this in mind we know that we will continue to
push the limits of the CJHN site. "
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Read more about the CJHN in this June 23,
2011 article from the Canadian Jewish News.
The CJHN was also featured on Andornot
Consulting Inc.'s June 13, 2011 blog post.