UCLA Library

This presentation will discuss the story of five books looted by Nazis from the Jewish Community Library in Prague during World War II that were recently discovered in the UCLA Library. Curators in Prague found four of these volumes using the HathiTrust database, after which UCLA began a repatriation process. A brief overview of the historical context of the confiscation and destruction of millions of books and other cultural items by the Nazis from 1933 to 1945 is explored, as are the post-war efforts for restitution and repatriation by the victorious allies. As the digitization of academic library holdings progresses, the probability of more looted material being uncovered in academic libraries worldwide increases. But how did they end up there and what should libraries do with them once discovered? Scholarly literature describing similar experiences of academic libraries was not found. This case study is one example that can open a dialog to address the issue.