The Oregon Holocaust Resource Center (OHRC), an educational organization, applies the lessons of the Holocaust to teach the importance of promoting a just and humane society, which values respect and acceptance. As a not-for-profit, nonsectarian organization, the OHRC is dedicated to communicating the lessons of the Holocaust to teachers, students, and the general public in Oregon and SW Washington. This is in fulfillment of the legacy left by victims to
survivors:
To Remember; to Record; to Understand; to Explain and to Enlighten Future Generations.
Goals
— Preserve and Transmit the historical record of the undeniable fact of the Holocaust.
— To sensitize and humanize through understanding the roots of violence, cruelty, racial and religious prejudice.
— Help Students develop the capacity for personal moral decision-making and the ability to relate the lessons of the Holocaust to their own lives and communities
— Increase Understanding of how democratic institutions may be subverted and human rights undermined.
— Establish that the ethical and moral implications of the Holocaust involve the entire human community.
In addition, the OHRC serves as stewards and caretakers for the Oregon Holocaust Memorial, in Portland’s Washington Park.
History of the Oregon Holocaust Resource Center
The OHRC began in 1983 after some preliminary discussions and planning among interested members of the ecumenical community, a group who had been recording oral histories, academics, and those interested in furthering diversity and tolerance education. The Center’s operation began in earnest the following year, with offices at Congregation Neveh Shalom Synagogue, under the direction of Dr. Sylvia Frankel.
The genesis of the Center was the survivors oral history project of the late Shirley Tanzer. Under the leadership of Shirley Tanzer and Rabbi Joshua Stampfer, the OHRC was chartered as an educational organization. Soon after its founding, the OHRC initiated programs of teacher training, a Speakers’ Bureau of survivors that visit middle and high school groups, an annual writing & art competition for students, and an oral history program. Later it added exhibits, lecture series’ and special programs and events, such as seminars for students, commemorations for Kristallnacht and Yom Ha’Shoah, and graduate classes in Holocaust education.
In 1987, OHRC helped sponsor an academic conference involving Christopher Browning, Lawrence Langer, and Deborah Lipstadt. Later, Elie Wiesel spoke to a large Portland audience under the auspices of OHRC.
In 1989, OHRC began sponsoring teacher workshops on the statewide in-service day. Since then, hundreds of teachers from Oregon and Washington have taken OHRC workshops to enhance their classroom instruction of the Holocaust. In 2001, OHRC and the Oregon Committee for the Humanities cosponsored the first collaborative workshop for teachers, held at Willamette University.
In 1993, the OHRC Board voted to seek an academic affiliation with a university. In 1994, the OHRC affiliated with Pacific University, in Forest Grove, Oregon, and opened an office in Pacific’s Warner Hall. This office was expanded to become the Center’s headquarters in January 1996.
This relationship grew and lasted until 2007, when it was decided OHRC needed to be closer to Portland, and the Oregon Holocaust Memorial. The OHRC moved to its current home on NW Kearney in January 2010. The Oregon Holocaust Resource Center is an independent organization, supported by donations, grants, and special funds.
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