The Archive Thief: The Man Who Salvaged French Jewish History in the Wake of the Holocaust

In the aftermath of the Holocaust, the Jewish historian Zosa Szajkowski stole tens of thousands of archival documents related to French Jewish history from public archives and collections in France and moved them, illicitly, to New York. Why did this respectable historian become a thief? And why did librarians in the United States and Israel accept these materials from him, turning a blind eye to the signs of ownership they bore?

With her award-winning book, The Archive Thief, Lisa Moses Le...